When you think about Riverdale, your mind usually
goes to one place, right? The love triangle.
It's always Archie, Betty, Veronica. Always.
Yeah. And maybe, you know, Jughead is off on
the side somewhere with a burger. Exactly. And
that's the hierarchy. The main characters are
at the center and everyone else is just... Well,
they're kind of like set dressing. Set dressing
is a good way to put it. I mean, for a long time,
characters outside that core group were basically
just plot devices. They existed to make the main
characters look better or funnier or more desirable.
Right. But today we're doing a deep dive on a
very specific piece of that set dressing. Someone
who wasn't just in the background, but was actively
designed to be the punchline. We were talking
about Ethel Muggs. And honestly, going through
all this history, I'm starting to think we've
all been reading her character completely. wrong
for like 60 years? It's a totally valid question.
Ethel is such a fascinating case study because
she represents this very specific, and let's
be honest, kind of cruel archetype, the unwanted
woman. The girl whose affection is played for
laughs or even for horror? Yeah. Horror feels
like a strong word for Archie comics, but her
origins are rooted in a kind of slapstick horror
for sure. But our mission today isn't just to
look at the bad old days. It's to track how a
character designed as a one -note visual gag.
A gag about being boy crazy and ugly? Exactly.
How that character evolved into a sci -fi loving,
doll furniture making, zombie apocalypse starting
icon. And a country music star. You cannot forget
the country music starlet phase. Oh, we will
absolutely get there, I promise. But to understand
how far she's come, you have to see where she
started. and maybe more importantly, what they
almost named her. I saw this in the notes, and
wow, it feels like the writers were just being
mean. It really does. So before she became Ethel
Muggs in 1962, there was this prototype character
in the late 40s and 50s, and the name they were
floating for her was Ophelia Glutenschnabel.
Glutenschnabel? That's not a name. That sounds
like a medical condition. It tells you everything
you need to know about the intent, right? Glutenschnabel
isn't a person. It's a punchline walking in the
door. You're meant to laugh before she even says
a word. So thankfully, they landed on Ethel Mugs.
She officially debuts in Archie's Pal Jughead,
hashtag 84, May 1962. But her entrance into the
story is so... Strange. It's not organic. No,
it's weirdly technical. It's the whole inciting
incident for her entire character arc for decades.
Dildon Doily, the town genius. Of course. He
invents the electronic mate selector. So like
a 1960s Tinder that takes up an entire room?
Basically, yeah. It crunches all the data on
every student at Riverdale High. And the machine,
this supposedly objective scientific computer,
spits out a result. It pairs Ethel Muggs with
Jughead Jones. You know, that's fascinating to
me. And for decades, the joke is Ethel is delusional
for chasing Jughead. She's not. She has empirical
data. A computer told her they belong together.
That's a great point. It's a justification that
everyone just forgets. She's not being crazy.
She's following the science. Right. But we do
have to talk about the visuals because this is
a comic book. And the artist, Sam Schwartz, he
did not draw her like Betty or Veronica. Not
at all. I mean, you look at those early panels
and she's tall. She's gangly, kind of plain faced.
And let's be real. She looks a lot like Jughead.
Like Jughead in a wig. Oh, that's 100 % intentional.
She has the same angular build, the same prominent
nose. She is his physical mirror. The gag wasn't
just that she was unattractive. It was that Jughead
was literally running away from a female version
of himself. Which implies a level of self -loathing
that we do not have time to get into today. But
you mentioned horror earlier. And there's a prototype
story from 1948 that... Well, it's pretty dark.
Oh, yeah. This is from a story by Bill Vigoda.
There's this unnamed girl who is clearly a precursor
to Ethel Tall, skinny, really aggressive. She's
chasing Archie in this one, not Jughead. And
the punchline of the strip isn't Archie hiding
from her. No. The final panel is Archie lying
down on a set of active railroad tracks. He literally
says something like, it's no use, Jug. This is
a much easier way out. That's insane. The joke
is, I would rather be killed by a train than
go on a date with this woman. Exactly. That was
the comedic baseline. She's a literal threat
to his life. So when Ethel comes along in the
60s, she inherits all of that baggage. Her pursuit
is framed as this predator -prey situation. Let's
talk about that pursuit. For the longest time,
that was her entire personality. She chases Jughead.
He runs away. It's very Roadrunner. But with
a culinary twist, Ethel figured out pretty early
she couldn't outrun him, so she developed what
the comics call the Stomach Strategy. Which is
actually brilliant. Jughead is entirely motivated
by food. And they would print real recipes in
the comics, like Ethel's sugar cookies or Ethel's
secret burger recipe. She realized that if she
was holding a tray of food, he would at least
stop running. It's a little sad, though, isn't
it? I have to bribe you with cheeseburgers just
to get you to stand still. It is, but it also
shows she's observant. She knew her target. She
even used her poodle, Clementine, as bait to
lure Jughead's dog, Hot Dog. The logic was if
their dogs were dating, they'd have to hang out.
That is some next -level strategic thinking.
But eventually, the writers tried to fix the
Ethel problem, right? We have to talk about the
makeover trope. Oh, yeah. Because in every teen
movie... This is the big moment. The nerdy girl
gets a makeover and suddenly the guy sees what
was there all along. And this is where the comic
actually does something really interesting and
subversive. There's a famous story where Betty
and Veronica decide to fix Ethel. They give her
the full treatment, hair, makeup, new clothes.
And the big reveal shows that. She is genuinely
beautiful, like a total bombshell. So according
to the laws of fiction, Jughead should immediately
fall in love with her. But he doesn't. He is
completely, totally, 100 % uninterested. I actually
love that. Why's that? Because it proves Jughead's
disinterest wasn't shallow. He didn't dislike
her because of how she looked. He disliked her
because he didn't want a girlfriend, period.
It respects his character, and in a weird way,
it frees Ethel. Her worth isn't tied to being
pretty. That's the key. It frees her. Once the
writers realized, okay, the makeover plot doesn't
work, they had to give her other things to do.
Yeah. If she's not just the girl chasing Jughead,
then who is she? She's a nerd. I was so happy
to find out she's a huge rail fan. Loves trains.
She's also into art, and she makes miniature
dollhouse furniture. Which is such a specific...
quiet hobby. It's not flashy at all. But it tells
you she has this rich inner life. She's not just
an obsessed stalker. She's an introvert with
these really intricate passion projects. And
that new depth starts to bleed into her romantic
life. The most important story here, I think,
is the Hank storyline. It feels like a real turning
point. It absolutely is. This is where Ethel
stops being the joke and starts being the protagonist.
So the setup is that Ethel has a pen pal named
Hank. But she's so insecure, she sends him a
picture of Veronica instead of herself. The original
catfish. Totally. So Hank comes to Riverdale
to meet Ethel. And Veronica, who's in on the
whole thing, pretends to be her. And you're just
waiting for the crushing humiliation to begin.
But it completely flips. Hank spends time with
Veronica as Ethel. and he can't stand her. He
dumps her. He dumps Veronica. He tells her she's
vain and shallow and nothing like her letters.
Then he bumps into the real Ethel, starts talking
to her, and immediately realizes this is the
person he's been writing to. This is the girl
with the interesting mind. That's actually really
powerful. It is. When the truth comes out, he
tells her something like, you're more beautiful
than any picture. He chooses her for her. It
changes everything. It validates her. It basically
says, Jughead is the weird one. Other guys will
see you for who you are. It gave her agency.
And by the 90s, she's dating a blind boy named
Jeffrey. And she actually tells Jughead, I'm
tired of chasing you. And I bet that drove him
crazy. Oh, instantly. The second she stops chasing
him, he gets jealous. But it shifted the power.
Ethel was no longer the one begging for attention.
Okay, so she becomes a real person. But because
this is a comic book that's been around forever,
she also becomes... A lot of other things. This
is where the writers can just go wild. Well,
yeah. I have this theory that because she's the
outsider, the writers can do anything to her.
Archie and Betty are protected. You know, they're
the brand. But Ethel. Ethel can be turned into
a zombie. In Afterlife with Archie, she's basically
patient zero of the zombie apocalypse. She gets
bitten by a zombified Jughead at a Halloween
dance. Of course. And the transformation is genuinely
scary. She attacks Betty and Veronica has to
blast her with a fire extinguisher. It's always
Ethel versus the pretty girls, isn't it? Even
in the apocalypse. Oh. But then there's the country
music arc from Archie's RC Racers, which is something
else. I'm still trying to wrap my head around
this. She quits the race to become a country
singer named Ethel Sue. Yes. And she partners
with a villain named Babette who tricks her into
posing for photos with a camera that's secretly
a ray gun. A ray gun. Okay. That Babette believes
will shoot Ethel and give Babette mental powers.
I don't even know where to start with the physics
of that. Don't think about it too hard. The point
is you could never do that story with Betty Cooper.
It's too bizarre. But Ethel can handle the weird.
She thrives in the weird, which brings us to
her on -screen versions. Because the Ethel you
saw in cartoons is very different from the Ethel
on the CW's Riverdale. Oh, completely. First
off, casting Shannon Purser in Riverdale was
genius. Just brilliant metacasting. Because she
was Barb from Stranger Things. Justice for Barb.
Exactly. The ultimate ignored best friend who
gets killed while the popular kids are off having
fun. Casting her as Ethel was the show winking
at the audience. and saying, we know who this
character is. But the Riverdale Ethel got dark.
She wasn't just chasing Jughead with a plate
of cookies. No, she was part of the whole Gargoyle
King storyline. Yeah. She was a key figure in
this town -wide, cult -like role -playing game.
And for the first time, she had all the power.
All of it. Jughead needed her to solve the mystery.
She had the rulebook, so she made him play along.
She even made him kiss her. just to get information.
It was twisted, but it was the stomach strategy
on a whole new level. She finally had leverage.
It's such a contrast to the 1990 TV movie To
Riverdale and Back Again. Oh, wow. Yeah, that
movie is like an alternate reality where everything
works out for her. She's played by a model, Cindy
Ambul. She's grown up to be this gorgeous, successful
fashion designer. And Jughead stays in Riverdale
for her. He does. He looks at her at the end
of the movie and realizes he completely missed
out. and he wants a chance to make it right.
It's the Hollywood ending that comics always
denied her. It's amazing to see all these versions,
from a joke to a horror movie monster to the
romantic lead. And in the recent Bollywood movie,
The Archies, she's just a core part of the friend
group. It just shows you can't really have Riverdale
without her. So let's try to pull this all together.
We started with Ophelia Gluten Schnabel, a name
designed to be laughed at. And we ended up with
a character who has been a zombie. a cult leader,
a country star, and a romantic hero. Ethel Muggs
is the ultimate survivor of comic book evolution.
It really is a story about gaining agency. The
writers kept trying to put her in this desperate,
ugly box, but she just kept breaking out. She
got hobbies. She got other boyfriends. She got
a life. And that's why she resonates, I think.
Most of us aren't the star quarterback or the
head cheerleader. We're the Ethels. We're on
the sidelines trying to figure out our own story.
She proves that even if you're not the main character,
you can still be the most interesting one. I
want to leave you with one final thought. It's
something that really struck me when thinking
about that 1990 movie where Jughead finally chooses
her. What's that? We've spent... 60 years, assuming
the joke was on Ethel. Right. That she was silly
for wanting this guy who didn't want her back.
But when you look at how cool and weird and resilient
she became, and you look at Jughead, who is basically
a guy who just eats burgers and refuses to grow
up. You start to wonder who was out of whose
league. Exactly. Maybe the problem was never
Ethel. Maybe she was just decades ahead of her
time, waiting for a guy who was actually mature
enough to appreciate a woman who makes her own
furniture and knows how to do it. How to start
a zombie apocalypse. I think she's probably still
waiting for that guy. But at least now, she's
got plenty to do while she waits. Amen to that.
Thanks for this deep dive. Anytime.