In this op-ed, writer Vandana Pawa explores new Bollywood Archie Comics adaptation The Archies and how it can teach young people about civic participation. Spoilers ahead.
The town of Riverdale has seen many iterations. While some are more well-known than others, each adaptation of the Archie Comics universe brings different viewpoints into the mix. This December, Indian director Zoya Akhtar brought Bollywood to Riverdale for the first time and the result is a delightfully wholesome, and slightly campy love letter to younger generations.
Akhtar’s recreation of the quaint fictional town is an idyllic cottage-core fantasy where trousers are perfectly ironed, cakes are pristinely decorated in lambeth style, and bike baskets are full of freshly picked flowers. Set in newly independent India in a town of Anglo-Indians who decided against returning to Britain, the story begins as an escapist dive into the lives of the classic comic book characters audiences already know and love: Betty (Khushi Kapoor), Veronica (Suhana Khan), Archie (Agastya Nanda), Jughead (Mihir Ahuja), Reggie (Vedang Raina), Dilton (Yuvraj Menda), and Ethel (Aditi “Dot” Saigal). Despite the setting, it quickly becomes clear that while escapist, Riverdale is not immune to the cruelty of our actual lived reality, which shows up in the film in the form of corporate greed.
Hiram Lodge, Veronica’s father and a wealthy developer, sets his sights on building a tourist-attracting hotel in the town’s central green space and community hub, Green Park, sending the town into a frenzy and subsequently putting many small business owners out of work. The park is beloved in Riverdale, with a tradition stating that every resident plants a tree as a means of preserving the legacy of each citizen. However, Mr. Lodge uses his wealth to bribe members of the town’s council to allow bulldozing of the park.
In a classroom scene, with “History & Civics'' written on the chalkboard, students share their concerns about losing their beloved Green Park with their teacher. In response, the film’s titular character Archie Andrews, admits, “I just don’t think about politics. What’s it got to do with my life?” As his classmates react in shock and awe, they have no choice but to break into song and dance (in true Bollywood fashion) to call out their friend, explaining to him an eternal truth: everything is politics.
Related: Riverdale’s Finale Was Always Going to Be This Way: Queer and Campy to the Very End
Who decides what lessons our teachers impart in school? Should our schools be co-ed? Why do I have to wait until I’m 18 to get my driver’s license? The teens ask a number of questions that showcase the reality of the world they’re living in, and how much is actually dictated by power, money, and politics. In doing so, they inspire an action that many of us still fear: calling out our friends. As the song comes to a close, Archie joins his schoolmates in understanding the role that politics plays in each of our lives, realizing hat he may actually need to do more for the people around him.
Archie learns that it might be possible to save the park by gathering signatures on a petition, but the group must take matters into their own hands after being told that signatures from anyone under 18 will be discarded. Dilton has built a radio at home and uses it to broadcast the news to the entire town; Veronica trades pieces of her glamorous closet for petition signatures; Betty bakes pastries and in exchange for more signatures; Reggie puts on a comedy show to raise awareness. And when developers attempt to demolish the park sooner than publicly announced, the kids put their bodies on the line — sleeping on the grounds in an act of civil disobedience resembling a die-in — to ensure that machinery stays away for one more day. Each teen refuses to believe that they can be so easily shut down by the powerful adults in town, and channels their personal talents into something actionable and tangible.
In a society that seeks to both disempower young people due to their age and limit their understanding of civic participation to the singular act of voting in elections, it’s difficult to feel like you can have an impact in your city, let alone the larger world. However, the teens of The Archies know one thing for certain — “you can’t just live your life for kicks,” and they have no intention of doing so.
When disenfranchisement runs rampant in our own less idyllic towns, the establishment wants us to believe that there is little left to do to enact change. But if young people take lessons from the Archies gang, there’s actually much more power in our hands than we thought. What unique skills does each person have that can contribute to a cause? How can our personal interests and talents be utilized in a way that benefits our community?
Similarly to the film, there are a number of real life actions not limited by age or citizenship that use the resources and strengths we have to live purposefully in our communities. Participatory budgeting, the process in which people come together to decide how to spend public budgets, gives people the opportunity to exact power over their own circumstances. Attending school board meetings allows students to share views on the administrative decisions being made in their own schools. Attending or planning protests and rallies empowers people to come together on an issue, demonstrating to those in power that there are others who have the same views. Creating social media content that shares information about a topic in an easily understandable way can have a far reaching impact. Utilizing peer networks to organize opportunities for the dissemination of food and first aid allows the material needs of community members to be met.
The idealism of Riverdale returns at the film’s very end, as just enough petitions to save Green Park are counted and the heroic teens announce to the town that their beloved community space is here to stay. The students have made a difference that will impact generations to come, and the joy onscreen is palpable. These kids, albeit fictional, needed the win — and honestly, so did I. As governments fail to meet the needs of their constituents, corporations continue to value profit over people, and genocide ravages entire populations, at a point in time where it’s easy to forget, the young people of Riverdale remind us that it doesn’t have to be this way. And while it may not be revolutionary in doing so, The Archies teaches us one important lesson: you’re never too young to change the world.
