Superfluous Archie Characters in Extreme Close-up

"Curls. Too. Tight. Can't. Stand. Pain. Any. Longer. Must. Hang. Myself. With. My. Tiny. White. Bow." Courtesy of Archie's Double Digest #72.

Poor Close-up Kid. A melon too gigantic for his one-size-fits-all cap, fragile Steve Ditko era Peter Parker glasses, a gap in his tooth slab, and an off-brand baseball bat. Not pictured: the bullies he's running from. (Courtesy of Archie's Double Digest #116.)

We break from our regular superfluity to report that Miss Grundy cares more about the fleeting high of football victory than ensuring Moose’s post-Riverdale success.

If you flip the comic and zoom in on Little Close-Up Girl’s odd coif, it kind of looks like a dog’s butt. Courtesy of Archie #298 (1980).

What could be the cause of Jughead’s flop sweat? Perhaps Archie’s “lunch” is in actuality enough Oxycontin to kill three Mooses, yet barely enough to scratch the itch on the big toe of the monkey grafted to Juggy’s back. Or maybe Arch’s “lunch” is just lunch, and Jug aims to eat it. Close-Up Girl’s shocked expression, however, betrays her suspicion that Jug’s pelvis has other designs on the sandwich. Courtesy of Archie & Me #134 (1982).

Superfluity hits the Big Time with a cover shot! One assumes that she is kinda sorta maybe smiling at the thought of Archie being yet again on the receiving end of Mr. Weatherbee’s corporal punishment paddle, Ole Blister Maker. However, she may be delighting in the unknown-to-me fact that the Near East, which sounds like Archie Code for “middle east,” is an actual geographic name of the region that Wikipedia says includes Bahrain, Cyprus, Egypt, the Gaza Strip, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, the West Bank, and Yemen. Or maybe she’s pre-laughing at the idea that any newspaper would abbreviate Henry Kissinger’s name to “K” and have anyone know immediately who the hell they were talking about. Courtesy of Archie’s Pals n Gals #106 (1976).

“Take it! It smells pretty, just like you! take it! No, I don’t think it’s weird that I’m blind to both your obvious discomfort and the woman and her baby carriage in the background who’s the same monochrome as this flower! JUST TAKE IT!”

Sure, the Tooth Fairy took the top one, but he lost all the bottom ones in a bar fight. Courtesy of Betty and Me #115 (1980).

One week after seeing herself in profile, she underwent maxillofacial surgery to bring her forehead in line with the bottom half of her face. Courtesy of Archie & Me #134 (1982).

A subgenus of Superfluous Archie Characters in Extreme Close-up: the Superfluous Archie Character in Deep Background. Courtesy of Archie's Pals 'n' Gals #125 (1978).

I don’t know which is creepier: Beach Pervert’s tight-lipped delight in seeing clumsy teens inexplicably land on each other or how the sand, rocks, umbrellas, and even Beach Pervert himself drastically change from one panel to the next. Courtesy of Archie #298 (1980).

It's that same stoner from last week! And he's crying cheek tears over the fate of pals he will never see again. The decidedly unmoist Betty holds the key that will unlock this odd panel. Once the sweaty side effects of the experimental LSD she slipped into everyone malteds resolves, her guinea pigs will develop telekinesis! it's the first step to world domination! Bwah ha ha ha!