PAUL KUPPERBERG TALKS LIFE WITH ARCHIE

Paul Kupperberg is taking over the "Married Life" of Archie in the Life with Archie Magazine, following an initial run by Michael Uslan.

Following is a question-and-answer with Kupperberg about his Archie Comics work.

Question: Is this your first time working for Archie?

Kupperberg: Kinda, sorta... I did some work with Archie a long time ago, probably around 1980, on a custom comic they were doing for Radio Shack computers. I'd done the last couple of similar books for DC before Archie got the contract, so they called me in to write that for them. But as far as actually writing Archie comics FOR Archie Comics, yes, this is my very first time.

Question: What brought you to Archie?

Kupperberg: I took the I-95 down from Stamford to Mamaroneck...! Seriously, for the last four or five years, since leaving a 16-year long editorial job at DC, I've been working for all sorts of different companies doing a lot of different kinds of writing, a lot of which I was prohibited from doing because I was on staff there. I've also been writing a lot more humor comics than I ever had before, including a whole bunch of Cartoon Network characters for the DC books and Bart Simpson comics for Bongo. I'd long had my eye on Archie...I've gotten to write so many of the most iconic characters of the 20th century, I knew I had to get around to the Riverdale bunch sooner or later. After talking to Victor Gorelick, who I've known since that early custom comic job, I worked up some Archie story pitches and sent them off. He liked some of them and, just like that, I was writing Archie shorts.

Question: Were you a fan growing up?

Kupperberg: I was a fan of everything growing up! I'm first and foremost a DC fan -- ain't no better comics than the DC Comics of the 1960s! -- but I also read and/or collected whatever else was out there from Marvel, Gold Key, Harvey, Dell, Charlton and, of course, Archie. In fact, when I was about 12 years old, a kid in the neighborhood had a ton of Archies, maybe 300 books, that I traded a handful of DCs for, and I read every single one of them! I also absolutely loved the Archie superhero comics of the 1960s by Jerry Siegel and Paul Reinman! I still do.

Question: What's it like telling Archie stories when he is an adult?

Kupperberg: I think because I'd only gotten to write five or six conventional Archie stories before I got the assignment to write Life with Archie, the transition to writing the grown-up Archie wasn't too dramatic for me. I just took the voices I've been familiar with from the comics all my life and extrapolated from there. I've been reading Archie on and off forever, plus I'm still friends with half the people I grew up with, so I've seen how little people really change across the years, even across the decades!

Question: You're taking over after a successful run by Michal Uslan. How will your stories be different?

Kupperberg: Overall, I'm walking the path blazed by Michael, but because he was doing a miniseries covering the whole arc of the "Archie Marries Betty" and "Archie Marries Veronica" stories, he didn't have the luxury I have of drawing out bits and incidents. He was cramming a lot into a little space: an issue of a comic book gives you about 90-110 panels to tell your story, so if you're covering years of time, and only have three issues per "marriage" to do it, it's tough to really dig in there and play things out. But, especially for the first six-issue story arcs, I'm following close to Michael's big picture plan. He set up a great world to play with, with more characters than I can possibly tell stories about, so I'm trying to stay true to what he started, just doing it in my own style and voice.

Question: What is necessary for a good Archie story?

Kupperberg: The same thing that's necessary for any good story: good characters! Archie, Jughead, Veronica and the rest are all extremely well-crafted characters, each very distinctive and easy to nail in broad strokes, but when you start dissecting them to see what makes them tick, there are these much deeper traits to work with. For instance, on the surface, Reggie is a blowhard and a bully, but once I started writing him in the Life with Archie stories, the reality of that character started coming out. He's a guy whose best years are behind him in high school. There's a scene in the Betty continuity with his boss, at what's essentially Walmart, who remembers him from his high school football days, then asks, "So whatever happened to you?" There's a lot to work with when you've got somebody as rich as that. I'm finding that kind of stuff in all the gang. These stories flow pretty easily thanks to that.

Question: Other than the money, is Archie different when he is married to Betty than he is when married to Veronica?

Kupperberg: Archie is Archie, wherever he's at and whoever he's with. He's a good guy, wanting to do the right thing and make everybody happy. But he'll also stand up for himself and his friends, even against someone like Mr. Lodge, who is pretty much our "bad guy" in both series.

Question: Are you breaking the story up into different story arcs or is it one big soap opera?

Kupperberg: Each story line is one big soap opera, broken up into six-issue story arcs. And it's not all soap opera...there's some humor in there too. I'm not above having a ticked off Midge pelt Jughead in the face with a glob of coleslaw. Fortunately, it turns out that Norm Breyfogle, who's penciling both series, is a great cartoonist on top of being a great superhero artist, so there's nothing from the serious to the silly that he can't handle.

Question: Little Ambrose has returned in the Betty half of the comics; will we see him in the Veronica half as well?

Kupperberg: Ambrose and his Chow House do make an appearance in "Archie Loves Veronica," when Betty wanders in and gets all nostalgic for home over the aroma of his hamburgers, which he says he learned how to make from "an old friend," but the two never do recognize one another. I'm trying to do the inter-series crossovers when they make sense, like having the same fast food franchise developer appear in both series. But it's confusing enough to keep these stories straight as is! Norm sent an email just the other day when he realized that Jughead and Midge's conversation in an issue of one continuity made no sense, since it was referring to events taking place in the other continuity.

Question: So far there have been lots of surprises for fans as well as nods to past continuity, from Betty's date being Henry Aldridge to one of the characters in a Mr. Justice t-shirt. Will you be continuing those types of things?

Kupperberg: Some, though not as much as Michael's been doing. For instance, in the "Archie Loves Betty" line, Chuck is hired by MLJ to draw the new Mister Justice comic book... based on a movie that Archie was supposed to score.

Question: Dilton is exploring the "Married Life" world; will there be more alternate timelines or is it just the two?

Kupperberg: We've actually pulled back a little from the Dilton storyline. Victor Gorelick asked me to concentrate more on the ongoing soap opera elements instead, the type of stories that will appeal to a more mainstream readership. Thanks to the magazine format, Life with Archie has the potential to reach a wider audience than ever through places like Toys R Us and Walmart, so we don't want to surprise readers expecting life in Riverdale with "Back to the Future."