The end of an era?

So far, with the global crisis and the prognosis of a meltdown, we have not really seen much end of an era scenarios. Okay, Woolworth went down and stayed down, GM went bust but soon bounced back. Michael Jackson and Ted Kennedy have died. Reader's Digest has filed for bankruptcy but news is that they will still be around. So the aftermath of the global financial crisis appears to be 'more of the same'.

But there is one era that is about to end for sure. Archie Andrews is marrying Veronica Lodge. Yes, you read that right. Looks like he is going to ditch Betty Cooper, and she is not the only one who is heart-broken.

I have been reading Archie comics for over 50 years, since I discovered comics. We used to read it surreptitiously because comics were considered to be 'yellow culture' corrupting the youth. I never found out what that meant, but they did make Socrates drink hemlock for 'corrupting the youth of Athens', so it has existed for a long time, and it still does. (In those days, Singaporeans would flock to JB to watch Chubby Checker's Rock Around the Clock because it was banned over there.)

Anyway, I have always also rooted for the underdog, and Betty was it. She was pretty and intelligent, as opposed to the merely extravagantly rich Veronica. Okay, she is beautiful, too. Still, she is the wrong girl. The report has it that this (the marriage proposal) happens when they graduate. What! They are not supposed to graduate, they are meant to be in High School forever. This is a comic, for Gods sake. It's like Superman suddenly becoming the bad guy. (Remember Superman 3, and how lame Richard Lester's effort was?)

So whatever comes next, this is the end of an era.

Atlantic.com