9 September 2023
I hadn’t been so excited about a Dan DeCarlo story since I scored the damaged but mostly complete 1955 issue of Millie the Model® for cheap from the bargain box! That was cover-to-cover goodness of some of DeCarlo‘s finest, undiminished in the slightest by Stan Lee‘s bad gags.
The Best of Archie® Musical Madness is a trade paperback reprint and is no bargain at $13.99US* (*unbacked securities). But with 256 somewhat (25%) reduced pages, it’s still competitive with new material, but features a lot of classic DeCarlo and many of his lesser (though better than most) colleagues’ work from 1967 forward.
But that’s not the exciting part.
I was eleven in 1967, or 12 when The Archies® debuted on teevee in 1968, so Betty and Veronica (and Midge, and Josie, Valerie, and Melody, and Sabrina, of course) were early entrants into this adolescent fanboy’s spank bank. (Oh! And Samantha — Bingo Wilkin‘s girlfriend, and Batgirl, and Princess Ponytail too!)
And that’s still not the exciting part.
It’s pretty much what I expected.
Light-hearted fun. Simple, inconsequential fluff pieces with musical themes touching on topics of the day and cameos from “realworld” techs’n’execs, with stories propelled by Monkeesesque absurdist hijinx and forced rhymes.
Fun and satisfying, sure. But, not exciting yet.
I picked up the book again this afternoon to dip in. I ration myself sometimes. It keeps things fresh. While Alice’s Restaurant played itself out, I read a silly little Sabrina story, crafted by writer George Gladir and ably illustrated by Bill Vigoda and Chic Stone. Chuckling at both Arlo and George as I finished it, I flipped the page and DeCarlo’s reproduction of the cover depicted above seized me by the throat. Archie and the gang drafted? What did writer Dick Malmgren have planned for us? I closed the book before I began to hyperventilate and I told myself, I have to wait for this. Archie in the Army.
This is big. This is important. This is exciting.
Look, I know, you know, and every other remotely semi-intelligent fanboy knows that Arch and Jug will never get killed in combat, let alone ever finish high school. So, this was Not a Hoax! Not a Dream! Not for Real! This had to be an Imaginary What If Story from some other Elseworld in the multi-Archiverse. But it was still Important. Not to drop any spoilers about what may or may not have happened to Reggie on the Group W Bench, but I will tell you that it does feature many characters peacefully protesting America’s engagement in Vietnam, though never actually mentioning the nation by name. It also features a Hippie Seditionist who suborns felonies by urging Arch et al to burn their draft cards and to refuse to report for induction. Of course, this story being constrained by the Comics Code Authority, such a suggestion is quickly countered by Archie’s admonition that one must work within the system. So, on one level, it was “balanced” puerile pap, beautifully illustrated. On another, it was deftly subversive. For all the Code’s obeisance to “the authorities” Malmgren nevertheless managed to get Hippie Seditionist to say “You don’t see the politicians risking their lives on a battlefield! Why should you? You have as much right to stay alive as they do!” Later, Archie himself refers to the Vietnam conflict as “a senseless war.” This may seem like pretty tame stuff in 2023, but in 1971 the weight of the Code was heavy and burdensome. Even so, Malmgren’s story expresses the fatigue that Americans were feeling. By then almost everybody knew someone whose brother or cousin had been killed in action. The war was grinding on and people were getting sick of it.
And sad to say, THAT’s exciting.
in addition to its original presentation in Everything’s Archie #16 (October 1971),
“Summer Prayer for Peace” has been reprinted in
The Best of Dan DeCarlo #2 (March 2011),
The Best of Archie Comics #4 (August 2014),
World of Archie Double Digest #51 (August 2015),
Archie 1000 Page Comics Jam (2015),
Archie Spotlight Digest: Archie 75th Anniversary Digest (2017), &
The Best of Archie Musical Madness (2023).
The Grand Comics Database refers to this story thus: “A rare example of Archie expressing political views, both against the Vietnam War and against violent protests. The title of the story comes from a song released by The Archies on the album ‘Sunshine,’ one of the most serious and ambitious songs by the group.” Herewith, the lyric:
“A Summer Prayer for Peace” — by Jeff Barry
Three billion people together forever,
Three billion people sing a summer prayer for peace.
Oh look, look around you, see what you have done.
Where’s the world that God intended
With love for everyone?
Sing, sing of freedom,
Sing a song of joy.
Altogether making better
What some would destroy.
How will it end? How will it end? How will it end?
Amen, amen, a—men!
Okeh, surely Jeff Barry‘s no Bobby Darin, but his passion is just as real, and he’s following Bobby’s admonition to “sing a song of freedom. Sing it like you’ve never sung before. Let it fill the air, tell the people everywhere, that we the people here don’t want a war!”