The pool is probably filled with Dom Perignon

Panel One: OH MY GOD MR. LODGE BROKE ARCHIE'S HAND! I imagine a psychosexual pervert like Hiram Lodge with his raging Elektra complex smells the hands of anyone bringing Veronica home. Having caught a whiff of his daughter's sweet love nectar on the hands of one of her bumbling suitors, he likely flew into neck-veined rage and shattered the boy's wrist like it were twigs made of crystal. Of course, Archie being the oblivious dolt that Mr. Lodge has correctly pegged him as, probably just uttered an interrobang before asking if he could come swim in the pool.

Panel Two: Add any classic Mark Trail dialogue to Veronica's thought balloon and it'll fit. It's a handful of speedline away from being any scene in Speed Racer.

Panel Three: Those are clearly the faces of two guys peeing in the pool and not giving a shit. I'm pretty sure the floating rings around Jughead's neck are the result of him not washing stray hamburger grease off his body.

Moose keeps his IQ score on his clothes at all times

I'm becoming more and more convinced Moose is a descendant of Lenny from Of Mice And Men. I reckon being a massively built mental midget with a childlike sense of wonder about the rest of the world is not the worst thing in the world, but it can't exactly be easy, either.

I think someone needs to replace the Archie-making machine with one that doesn't operate via punchcard, or at least one that doesn't make jokes using garage sale slang/terminology that NO ONE has used since the 1950's. You know what this means? Moose is dumb not only by our standards, but the standards of the 1950's, a time when people thought Lucille Ball was in any way amusing. That's fucking DUMB.

Still, my favorite part of today's strip is Archie in panel one. He is either trying to walk like Snoop Dogg or playing with an invisible marionette. I report, you decide.

Back from the...lazy?

1) 16 year olds who still refer to their father as "daddy" will likely be high-maintenance nightmares for whatever man is unlucky enough to end up with them.

2) WHY THE FUCK IS THAT CREEPY LITTLE GIRL SHOWING UP AGAIN?! Every time there's a beach scene, she shows up looking like the Coppertone version of the girl from The Ring. KILL IT WITH FIRE!!!

3) Hiram Lodge ambles like he has rickets.

You engine blockhead!

Based on his fashion choice, the truth is revealed! Archie is really Charlie Brown all growed up!

Not so much to note here, other than Betty's continuing gradual progression to having full-fledge gorilla arms and the complete lack of any kind of discernable punchline. instead, we get depression that goes nowhere. Are Archie and Betty destined to be the new Lockhorns?

Let's drink to the hard working people

The look on Mr. Lodge's face in panel two is basically every Dennis Hopper performance ever, which is why I like it.

Archie is apparently so docile and unaware that an old man could carry him from at least one room and plop him down in the front stoop and he is still confused about the proceedings.

Of course, Mr. Charity Dude looks mildly pissed off. He must have been working the rich part of town for a while and thus subjected to the dumbass shit the rich always give to charity.

He coulda robbed Veronica

Highlights from today's strip:

-Archie is so unkempt that insects live in his clothes

-Betty has arms the length of a gorilla

-Betty's turned a tacky Christmas sweater into a fuck-me dress

-The fact that Archie just didn't drive her someplace dark and ask "will you touch me?"

Indie beauty and the jock

Is there a single store in the country that would rent rollerblades or skateboards? And even if there were, do you think they would mangle their stock in order to appease a single customer? Maybe Moose showed them some of his 'roid rage and that was that.

I love Midge's lingering surprise. The first panel shows them clearly in the city, while the third panel shows them out in a suburban area zoned for residences. Meaning that they had not just recently left the shop, but skated for a few miles. Maybe she's still aghast as the mongoloid she's ended up with?

However, probably my favorite thing in this strip is how frightened the clerk seems in panel two. "Please don't assault me because I was honest with you!" Moose seems to have turned his broad shoulders into property-wrecking roller-skate boards.

Also, Midge seems to adore Roxy Epoxy, from the miniskirt to the hairstyle to the cleavage-revealing ripped shirt in panel three. At least someone in Archie is with it.

Oh shit Jughead, our Dairy Queen can time travel to the 50's!

"Hey, we may both be trapped in the same soul-killing minimum wage slave post, but at least I can get skin cancer, too!"

Archie's magical powers of levitation continue to develop, although I'm hoping for an impatient customer to come careening around the bend and knock his head clean off. Also, everyone in Riverdale is apparently illiterate and incapable of making a complicated decision, as the drive-through menu consists of pictures of four items and not a single word.



Apparently, working in the trans fat mines are not enough demeaning work for Mr. Andrews, as he is also involved in the most pitiful case of white slavery ever. Betty's undisguised class rage in panel two continues to threaten to explode into a fit of proletariat violence. Archie and Veronica must be returning from the plastic surgery center, as Veronica's boobs seem to defy gravity. Maybe Archie is using his mutant powers to make them levitate. The machine that produces this strip must also share hard drive space with pirated episodes of Heroes and a copy of Das Kapital.

Make it a double, Sam!

Using their fake IDs, the Riverdale gang sneaks into a pool hall. Giving away that they are relative tykes, Archie takes the "look at me! look at me!" approach to showing off his new "skills." Unfortunately, his latent mutant power has chosen that moment to manifest itself (the lack of motion lines in panel two lead me to believe that the pool balls are levitating). Veronica is appropriately surprised, but Jughead's incredulous expression shows that not even the supernatural can penetrate the veneer of cynicism he has adopted as his defense mechanism. Archie, unable to control his telekinesis at this time, learns the hard way never to levitate a hard object over your own forehead.

Or, you know, he's just a shitty juggler.

Meanwhile, on Saturday, Riverdale's municipal woes continue as the water pressure's out of control. Just look at how far it squirts out of the hose without a nozzle or Archie using the "thumb trick." I have to admit, I chuckled at the idea that Veronica, pissed off at someone saying out loud something about her tomboyish appearance, cowed Archie so badly that he just stood there as she intricately coiled the hose around him.

Taking advantage of the disadvantaged

To save money, Jughead apparently hired midget laborers to install his hi-def flat screen, as it is no more than half a foot off the floor, well within kicking range. I love that he can't differentiate between fantasy and reality, so much so that he makes a "glub glub glub" sound when someone onscreen falls overboard. Also, he's going to ruin his eyes sitting so close.

My main theory about this comic is that the robot creator is making fun of humans unable to adapt to technological advances. This pro-robo propaganda must cease, Archie Robot!

I always assumed Jughead was in some kind of gang

My favorite thing about this strip is probably the fact that in the first panel Archie interrupts Jughead from what is either an invisible limbo contest of one OR Crip walkin' down tha row gettin' stoned.

Also, I have problems believing stuff accidentally ends up in a recycling bin, unless he mixed his homework in with newspapers and old porno mags.

Jughead, ever the nihilist, tries to "comfort" his friend by reminding him the cyclical nature of the universe and subtly telling Archie "you're going to die one day and your component molecules will be absorbed by other organic entities." At least, that what I want to believe, because otherwise the "punchline" to this strip is "haw haw your homework is on a recycling truck and therefore will likely be recycled in a manner that proves the robot making this strip does not understand irony."

I imagine the "Men's Store" just sells guns and pornography

I love the inherent class war that's ongoing in this strip. I love how Veronica, despite being the richest teen in Riverdale, usually dresses like she just got out of softball practice. I also like how Betty, the naive middle class girl usually walks around it skirts that would make porn stars think they were too scanty for the pre-gonzo "tease scene." I also love how jealous Betty has been calculating exactly how much Veronica has been spending. Perhaps this is the breaking point before her prole (relative to Riverdale) rage explodes and ends in violence. "$1000 on a single fucking dress? Your time has come, borgeouis fat cat!" This is immediately followed by a shovel-based murder. I mean, she's got a linebacker stance in the second panel, and she looks like she's about to stick one of those size 12 workboots up Veronica's ladyhole.

I focus on this of course because it distracts from the glaring prolem of this strip - THERE'S NO FUCKING JOKE. Way to blow it, robot! You understand the concept of "set-up," but now you must learn to follow through in order to complete what we humans call "humor."

Packages of Ten? Packages of Eight?

Ever since Josh from The Comics Curmudgeon inroduced the idea that the daily Archie comic was written and drawn by a robot who failed the Turing Test, I can't get it out of my head. This here blog will be mostly daily ruminations on the AI attempt at human comedy.

Today the robot has taken on a decades-old human joke about the failings of our nouns. Apparently pondering the parkway/driveway conumdrum prevents Dilton from hearing derogatory conversations about himself that take place two feet behind him. Also, Archie and Betty look geuinely amazed at someone in the process of silent, non-expository thought. He also looks highly distraught pondering this puzzle. My girlfriend thinks it's because his dog got run over by someone driving in the driveway.

Someone needs to check the purity levels at the Riverdale Reservoir.