aka: archie andrews & veronica lodge demonstrating the strengths of a hothead + coolhead team-up, showing how two seemingly-opposite personalities can complement one another in terms of strengths and weaknesses, and just generally providing active examples of the phrase "us against the world" 💘
(yes this is over a year late but I SAID I was gonna do this & do this I shall welcome to useralwaysspeakshermind’s version of varchieaw2021 coming to you live in 2023 right before RD’s final season begins)
I’ve said before, probably the last time I did a Varchie Appreciation Week, that I’m not really confident in choosing one favorite scene or quote related to this couple, and that’s purely because they have so MANY that I love. Like, to be honest, there just isn’t a clear winner for me; not because I’m indecisive, but because I can make a strong case for every single one I gravitate toward. So the two I went with here are quotes that are special to me for what they symbolize in the storyline. I personally adore couples that flip typical gender roles on their head, and Varchie (despite the occasional narrative stumble for Alleged Reasons Of Drama) is an absolutely stellar example of that, particularly when it comes to the opposing ways in which they process emotion.
Archie, for instance, is Mr. Feelings. Whatever it is...love, hate, hope, despair, happiness, sadness, anger, etc., he embraces it (or it embraces him) full throttle. He catches a lot (like, a LOT a lot) of heat from all sides of the Riverdale fandom for it, in a way that’s kind of hilarious to me because of how thoroughly he’s condemned for essentially giving into his emotions in the same kind of scenarios that (I won’t name names for the sake of not turning a post that’s meant to celebrate my ship into a negative, mudslinging campaign) certain leading female characters from certain shows and certain movies and certain books are fiercely defended for crumbling in.
[Note: this is not a misogynistic condemnation of female emotion, an attempt to devalue the importance of female characters being allowed to voice their feelings, any internalized acceptance of the antiquated patriarchal presupposition that Girls Are Too Emotional And Should Be Criticized Or Laughed At For “Overreacting,” OR a move to defend fictional white men. This is merely an expression of my deep fascination with the whole “We need more portrayals of male characters showing emotion!” train somehow screeching to a halt the second a guy in fiction who apparently doesn’t fit enough of the acceptable Is Allowed To Have Feelings parameters like, you know...actually shows emotion? And makes decisions rooted in that emotion? Decisions that frequently don’t make sense? As decisions rooted in emotion typically fail to?]
[Note #2: at the end of the day, this is just me explaining why I love some quotes in a CW show. However dramatic I get, it is not that deep, it has never been that deep, and it never will be that deep. I’m just wordy and I love to analyze, and Archie and Veronica provide me with a lot of excellent material.]
He’s not very good at putting what he feels into words, he tends to want to keep people happy to an extent that makes him less careful with himself, and he’s so impulsive that he can go from 0-100 on the road to self-destruction faster than most people can even locate the gas pedal. In addition to all that, he’s surrounded by people that frequently take his happy-go-lucky, Boy Next Door/Dumb Jock act at face value...and then resent when he fails to meet those preconceived notions. When his dad gets shot, the fear, shock, and anger he feels takes over until he’s reacting in ways that make no logical sense to an outsider, but all the sense to him. Veronica, as the person who accompanies him home, is the firsthand witness to all that. When he decides he needs to walk the dog (while still covered in blood), she offers to do it herself and then goes along with him and listens to his ramblings when it becomes clear that he’s not in the kind of place to be talked into anything. When they get back to the house, she goes out on a limb and tries the only thing she can think of (cue: arguably the most infamous scene in Riverdale history that just about every non-Varchie love(d/s) to hate on because jealousy is a disease and some people insist on refusing effective treatment despite being chronically ill but anyways).
Now. As referenced above, some people looooovvveee to decry The Shower Scene. (”Omg, she’s such a slut!” “I hate Veronica. How dare she use her body to manipulate Archie when he’s in PAIN!” “This is NOT the time or place for sex, Veronica!” etc., etc.)
BUT!
The inappropriateness of the time and place is the whole POINT. It’s what literally makes the scene that follows it (the one I’m writing way too much intro about) work.
In this particular moment, Veronica is being stared smack dab in the face with a very difficult, very delicate situation that calls for a careful response, and because she has essentially no prior experience in this zone to draw on, she’s forced to play it by ear. As a result, she begins her approach by mirroring Archie’s actions/taking her cues from him; after seeing the way he distracted himself from the elephant in the room by focusing on everything but his personal turmoil, she basically goes Oh, okay, distraction is what we’re doing, cool. I can do distraction, and walks into the bathroom. (A move that, btw, is a major risk and took some guts.) Archie is unsurprisingly let’s be honest into it, and they, ahem...distract themselves for a bit.
But the thing about distractions is that they only provide you with a temporary escape from whatever it is you’re trying to run from (in Archie’s case, the fear, anger, and helplessness planted within him after seeing his father get shot, and in Veronica’s the same, because she knows Archie is hurting and isn’t sure what to do to help). After acting fine for a whole couple of hours or so, Archie suddenly snaps over something small, asks Veronica why she’s even there with him, and tells her he wants her to leave. Veronica, obviously hurt by how harshly he lashes out, very nearly does leave...but at the last second she thinks better of it, turns around, and digs her heels in, telling Archie (who is clearly not okay and by then on the verge of tears he’s trying hard to hold in) in no uncertain terms that he doesn’t need to be alone, so even if he gets angry at her for staying, she won’t leave him. It’s a big move for someone who doesn’t naturally fit into the nurturing role society typically expects of girls, and that’s kind of why I love it so much...because Veronica is willing to leave her comfort zone to help Archie, we get to watch her grow as a character, and the connection between her and Archie deepen. Honestly, what more could you ask for in a hurt/comfort scene?
*sighs sappily*
This quote is especially special to me because it features Archie, a guy who is about as antithetically wordsmithy as possible, doing his best to comfort Veronica, a gal who takes the “Big Girls Don’t Cry” trope to another level, and it’s just so doggone cute.
Despite her bubbly exterior, Veronica is a character who explicitly identifies with ice rather than fire (my girl forever), and tends to take things very much in stride. No matter how terrible the situation she finds herself in, her default mode is to keep pushing, keep moving, keep doing anything and everything that helps her avoid opening up to feelings that could hurt/sadden/anger her. She doesn’t unload her problems on friends or family, she doesn’t make leading comments in the hopes that someone will ask her what’s wrong, she doesn’t decide to handle something on her own and then break down crying in a moment of weakness; she literally has to be chased down and caught giving in to her emotions, and even then, she tends to try to cover any slipups with denials and standoffish attitudes. She’s not a character who gets a lot of sympathy, but neither is she a character who asks for sympathy...as a rule, when something goes wrong in her world, she deals with it herself and mentions it to no one. To which I say “yes MA’AM!” because never will you ever catch ME loving a fictional girl who cries/whines all the time over problems of her own making like seriously if you ever see me praising a giant crybaby b!tch who keeps having breakdowns over the bed she’s made herself and is upset that she now has to lie in I’ve been kidnapped and I’m trying to signal you.
The one big exception to that no-telling rule? Archie.
In this scene, Archie shows up unannounced to the Pembrooke, solely because he’s worried about Veronica. Despite all her assurances that everything’s fine, she’s been behaving in a way that, while passably normal to outsiders, tells him something is very, very wrong, and he refuses to be put off any longer. When she finally cracks and explains what’s going on (Hiram is “sick” [was he really though, or was it just Hiram being Hiram inquiring minds would like to have this answered once and for all]), it only takes Archie a second to jump in and start comforting her. He doesn’t wax poetic or anything of course, but he goes straight for the heart of the matter and offers his girlfriend support in a concrete way she can make use of.
(It’s also important to note that he recognizes the delicacy of the situation and meets her right where she’s at; instead of being like, “God, the world sucks, I’m so sorry, I wish I could protect you from this” or “Why do you care, your dad is the worst, shouldn’t you want him to kick the bucket?” or even “That’s terrible, wanna do something to forget it?” he sees at once how much she’s struggling to make sense of a very complex blend of emotions, instantly hurts for her, listens to her troubles, and tries to help however he can.)
When he tells her she’s the strongest person he knows, it’s because he genuinely thinks that and wants her to know he believes in her. He’s seen her strength and leaned on it himself, and because he admires and trusts in her ability to offer it to others, that’s the thing he chooses to remind her of. He doesn’t start outlining detailed this is how you should do it plans or anything along those lines; he all but takes it for granted that she’ll get back up, start fighting, and figure out something that works, because he’s seen her do it before and has enough faith in her strength to believe she’ll do it again.
And then he hugs her and because hugs are kind of their thing it GETS ME, okay?
Also, there really aren’t a lot of people who are there for Veronica, because Veronica is (for better or worse) written as the Strong Character whose lot in life frequently consists of being the one who supports (sometimes emotionally, sometimes physically, sometimes financially) the weaker friend/parent/love interest. The few times she does need help, it’s on the emotional support front, and that’s why her relationship with Archie is so lovely...he can’t fix her problems for her; of the two of them, he’s far less skilled in the solutions arena, but he can and does offer her that ‘broad shoulder to cry on’ she jokes about in S1, and that in turn gives her the comfort and strength she needs to pull herself back together and go slay some dragons, and I personally <3 that.
