Comics Review: "ARCHIE & FRIENDS LEVEL UP! #1" Levels Up on "Minecraft"

ARCHIE & FRIENDS LEVEL UP! #1 (#19)

ARCHIE COMIC PUBLICATIONS, INC.

STORY: Ian Flynn; Hal Smith; George Gladir; Bill Golliher

PENCILS: Steve Butler; Doug Crane; Dan DeCarlo; Sam Schwartz;

INKS: Lily Butler; Scott McRae; Mike Esposito; Rudy Lapick; Samm Schwartz; Dan DeCarlo

COLORS: Glenn Whitmore; Barry Grossman

LETTERS: Jack Morelli; Bill Yoshida

EDITORS: Jamie Lee Rotante; Vincent Lovallo; Stephen Oswald

EiC: Mike Pellerito

COVER: Dan Parent with Rosario “Tito” Peňa

VARIANT COVER: Dan DeCarlo

32pp, Color, $4.99 U.S. (June 2025); on sale in comic book shops April 2, 2025

Rating: All-Ages

“Servers You Right”

Eternal high school student and teenage boy, Archie Andrews, and his friends made their debut in M.L.J. Magazines' Pep Comics #22 (cover dated: December 1941), and before long, Archie was the publisher's headliner character.  In 1946, the company changed its named to Archie Comic Publications, also known as “Archie Comics.”

Archie Comics published the series, Archie & Friends, from 1992 to 2012 for 159 issues.  Since 2019, Archie has been publishing a new iteration of Archie & Friends as a series of themed one-shot comic books.  The latest is Archie & Friends (Level Up!) No.1, the nineteenth issue in the series.  It features one new five-page story and five reprint stories.  Entitled “Servers You Right,” the new story is written by Ian Flynn; drawn by Steve Butler (pencils) and Lily Butler (inks); colored by Glenn Whitmore; and lettered by the great Jack Morelli.

Archie and Friends in Level Up! in “Servers You Right”:

Archie and the Gang (Betty, Veronica, and Jughead) come together to play the video game, “Crafty Miners,” an open world video game where you can do anything.  The fun and games turn a little edgier when Veronica decides to be her normal self, and Reggie shows up to do some damage.  Can Dilton, the server administrator, save the day?

THE LOWDOWN:   For several years, Archie's marketing department has been sending me PDF copies of some of their titles for review.  One of the most recent is Archie & Friends Level Up! (which is titled Archie and Friends, No. 1 (#19), in the indicia).

The Archie & Friends series has previously offered movie-themed editions in the past, such as Archie and Friends Hot Summer Movies (cover dated: July 2023), which included the story, “Riverdale Jones and the Burger of Destiny,” a parody of the then upcoming film, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023).  The target for parody this time is the recent smash hit, Warner Bros. film, A Minecraft Movie, which is based on the video game, Minecraft, which debuted in 2011.

I don't have much interest in the movie, but I will likely watch it when it arrives on the Warner Bros. Discovery streaming service, Max, in a few months.  Surprisingly, the script by Ian Flynn offers a rather nice scenario, which could have become a rather nice full-size, standalone story instead of this good five-page story.  I wish Archie would have let Flynn fly on this one.

The art team of Steve Butler (pencils) and Lily Butler (inks) deliver some standout work.  As far as my experience with their Archie Comics work, this is the best looking that I have seen in terms of composition and aesthetics.  And I say this as a fan of their Archie work.  “Servers You Right” has captured my imagination in a way I did not expect.  Glenn Whitmore's colors really serve the art quite well, and, as always, Jack Morelli's lettering hits it hard.

In addition to the main stories, there are five reprint stories.  Two with Archie as the star, and one each with Betty, Jughead, and Sabrina the Teenage Witch as the star. I grew up on classic-style Archie Comics.  So, there is something comforting about seeing Archie, Betty, Veronica, and Jughead in both all-new and classic adventures.  I will always recommend classic-style Archie titles, so I am giving Archie and Friends Level Up! a heartier recommendation than usual because of the Butlers' art.

I READS YOU RECOMMENDS:  Fans of classic-style Archie Comics will want to find a copy of Archie & Friends Level Up!.

B+

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux a.k.a. "I Reads You"

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