Drawing on Time - Jughead’s Time Police: Archie Forever

You may recall that I closed out 2018 talking about Jughead’s Time Police. A look at both the limited series run from the late 1980s, as well as the 2015 appearance of the concept in Jughead #2. Apparently, much like the first ever appearance in “The World of Jughead”, the homage was popular enough to warrant another mini-series.

Under the “Archie Forever” title umbrella, Jughead’s Time Police returned to comics from August to December of this year (2019). Written by Sina Grace (who has worked for both DC and Marvel) with art by Derek Charm (who has worked on Jughead since issue #7 in 2016), the revival works as a character piece while remaining faithful to what came before it in the 1980s.

Supposedly there will be more issues if the five issue series sells well. The collected edition is due to come out in January 2020. So let’s have a look at why time travel (and Archie) fans should purchase these comics.

ISSUES 1 & 2

We open at Pop’s Diner on “an average day”. Archie is on a date with Veronica, as Jughead remembers he needs to make a pie for the Riverdale Pie Contest. He runs home (seeing Betty en route), messes up his ingredients, and by page 3 is banned for life from the contest due to the judges getting food poisoning.

No one can cheer Jughead up. Until Archie says “I wish we had a time machine, so that we could warn you”. That gets Jughead to enlist Dilton in a project.

A couple days before the Battle of the Bands (where the Archies are competing), Archie follows Jughead to find out why he’s missing practices. He discovers Jughead with a newly completed time machine, which incidentally gets charged by riding a souped up exercise bicycle. Kevin Keller is also with Jughead and Dilton… but he merely wanted somewhere to study that was quiet.

Still, when Kevin leaves before the test run, Jughead realizes he’ll need to recruit Archie as his backup instead. They successfully travel to the past (Jughead touching a button on his beanie), running into Betty. This prompts Archie to (accidentally) destroy the trellis outside Jughead’s house, catching the attention of Jughead’s past self.

Jughead immediately returns them to the present. He tells Archie not to worry about creating “a fissure in the time stream”, they’ll try again later. But he decides to do so solo (before Archie and Dilton can return). That’s when a redhead appears, telling “Forsythe Pendleton Jones” that to save the timelines, he needs to come with her to the future.

Issue two soon confirms that the new arrival is January McAndrews, and (as in the original run) Jughead is told that he will become a Nobel Prize winner, with a section of the Riverdale City Museum dedicated to him. We even learn the reason this time – a sustainable food processing method that he invented. But why has he been brought to the 29th century?

When Jughead (and Archie) made contact with his past self, a divergent timeline began. January says they need to calibrate her “looper scooper” device to close out the memories he gained during time travel, to keep the timeline intact.

Jughead requests a detour to the Riverdale Food Mall, and that’s where they run into time thieves. (Sina supposedly told Derek Charm to make them look cool, like “Tessa Thompson, Janelle Monae and Awkwafina”.) In a fun nod to “Back to the Future” (also a variant cover for this issue), Jughead borrows a kid’s hoverboard and uses it, throwing food at the thieves.

The distraction allows Jan to capture them in a thought balloon. The time police who arrive are impressed, and want a photo with Jughead.

At this point January says they’ll take care of his memories tomorrow – but she acts suspicious as she walks off. She then meets with someone, congratulating him on the scheme to break out the time thieves. And the issue ends showing us the mystery figure is ALSO Jughead, albeit one with a longer nose.

ISSUES 3 & 4

Issue three contains the most time travel. We get a couple panels of longer-nosed Jughead aka “Jughead 1941” (as he’s called in concept art) in a flashback, seeing January spying on him four days ago. She has since brought him to the future, where they discovered that “Jughead Prime” (the one we’ve been following) is from a “no-good timeline”.

Dates are never given, but the recap to start Issue 4 mentions “Jughead from the 1940s”, so we can assume this is meant to be Jughead from the original Archie comics run.

At any rate, our Jughead Prime hears the other two talking about “dealing” with him, and he runs off. Eluding their pursuit, Jughead escapes to the past using a Time Cap from the Museum. So January calls in “a 1986 with a 2008”, interpreted as a time fugitive using a Phase Three Timecap.

After jumping around a bit, Jughead Prime settles on a hiding place of Hamburg, 1847. The supposed origin of the “Hamburg Steak”. He tries the local cuisine, only to be caught by the Time Police, who prove surprisingly competent… yet they are no match for a mysterious new arrival, who appears out of nowhere.

After Jughead Prime is grabbed by this mystery man, they time portal to safety. But even though as the man claims he’s not a time thief, Jughead is worried. We see the newcomer’s face to end the issue.

Issue four begins from the perspective of Jughead 1941, scanning various timelines. (It includes a background shout-out to “Jughead’s Diner”, another short-lived mini-series of the early 1990s.) Jughead 1941 even brushes off the food January brings, wanting her to give him access to the timestream database. When she does so, Werewolf Jughead (from the Archie series “Jughead: The Hunger”) is summoned to them.

Back with Jughead Prime, the mystery man admits he is not only an Older Jughead (with a fully sapient robot pal called “Bot Dog”), he’s the one from Prime’s divergent timeline. The one who saw his past self in Issue One. He never got around to finishing his pie for the Contest, and zoned out during the Battle of the Bands, but he eventually figured out time travel technology.

This led to the discovery that Jughead 1941 would take control of the time police. Apparently Jughead 1941, upset that he not only wasn’t original, but was living in a boring timeline, decided to live out the lives of alternate Jugheads. Alas, this has consequences, including Older Jughead’s own timeline disintegrating.

Older Jughead admits that after analyzing this problem… it’s hopeless. He only brought Jughead Prime here – the past self he’d once seen – so that they could share the Last Burger together.

We cut to Jughead 1941 in the midst of his coup, sending Werewolf Jughead after Jughead Prime, and then throwing January McAndrews into a time warp.

Except Jughead Prime rejects Older Jughead’s defeatism. He gives a rousing speech, and they’re about to team up… when the Werewolf and the Time Police locate them. The two are arrested, as Jughead Prime has been framed for January’s disappearance. Jughead 1941 then gets them both alone, gloats, and adds that he’s got even more Jugheads recruited to take them down.

We now see behind him are Riverdale’s Jughead (from the 2010s TV show), Captain Hero’s Jughead (from the 1960s comic), a female Jughead (?), and many more, to end the issue.

ISSUE 5

Issue five has a number of nice callbacks to earlier events that seemed inconsequential. We begin with January McAndrews extracting herself from the time warp, emerging on the Iberian Peninsula in 1492. Having gotten her bearings, she jumps back to her time, and to the time thieves from Issue Two. She makes a deal with one of them (named Lily) to help, since they both got played.

Cut back to all the Jugheads, where Older Jughead throws a smoke bomb. What follows is a bit of a free for all as the Jugheads fight, with January and the time thieves showing up to help. In the confusion Jughead 1941 runs off, with Jughead Prime following, after grabbing something off of Older Jughead.

They square off in the control room, with Jughead Prime saying he understands his 1941 counterpart. After all, his own time travel disaster started because he couldn’t accept things for the way they were. And when 1941 snarks back at Prime, our Issue 1 Jughead plays his trump card.

Older Jughead’s Last Burger from Pop’s Diner. That Pop’s no longer exists, Jughead Prime exclaims. Nor do that Jughead’s friends, as the timelines collapse, and is that really what Jughead 1941 wants to happen? To all the realities?

At this, Jughead 1941 concedes.

The Time Police help to return all the Jugheads… except by now, Older Jughead’s timeline is gone. So January suggests he join their future instead; she’s been considering using a team of specialized individuals for missions, one that might even include former time thieves.

At last, Jughead Prime’s memories are scooped, and he finds himself back in the present with Archie. Apparently the time travel didn’t work? (And Kevin Keller comes back in, for some reason?) But even so, Jughead has decided to forego his attempts to change the Pie Contest results. He thinks this is the time to be a good friend to the band.

Cut to just before the Battle of the Bands, and a cameo from Jenny Lewis. The Archies perform, and they don’t win, but Jughead says what’s important is that they did their best… and they get to hear Jenny Lewis perform “Head Underwater” too. Everyone goes back to Jughead’s place afterwards.

Which is when Hot Dog goes upstairs, eyes Jughead’s beanie, and then vanishes by touching that same button from Issue One.

FINAL THOUGHTS

There’s a lot more to this series than when I’ve said in this review. For one thing, Hot Dog had the occasional thought bubble asides, which itself may be a bit of a callback to the original “Time Police” run. (You may recall that Hot Dog even had a whole comic issue involving time jumps.)

I also skipped over things like references to the Riverdale television show, almost all the variant covers, more on the time thieves, and the many quips of the various Jugheads (like when he reflects on how English class teaches about “Man versus Self”). Seriously, you should pick this set up for the full effect, Jughead has great serious speeches too.

Jughead is both the hero and the villain and neutral. It’s an interesting study into how one event can change the course of a life.

And all that is even before we get to the images, which are top notch. I’ll admit I’m not great at highlighting artists in my comics reviews, but here Derek Charm had to mimic a variety of former Jughead styles, without making them look out of place. Including a real life actor. I think the art team on the whole did a fantastic job.

I’d go so far as to say this a must for anyone who is fond of Archie comics in general, as I suspect there are references even I didn’t catch to events in the franchise.

Will this spark more issues? Or at least more fanfic? (There’s truly a lot of things that could be expanded on after this.) What do you think about Jughead time travelling again, should he maybe bring any other characters in the franchise? (They do seem to have the ability to wipe memories now.) And what would you do if you could think yourself to another time period? Thanks for reading, and please do let me know your opinion, if you have the time.