Almost a year after they announced it at New York Comic Con 2020 (see “Confessions of a Comic Book Guy: It’s Significant!”), Archie Comics will debut its first original comic on the Webtoon webcomics platform. The first three episodes of Big Ethel Energy, by writer Keryl Brown Ahmed and artist Siobhan Keenan, will go live on Webtoon on September 21, and new episodes will be posted weekly. 

The series will focus on Ethel Muggs, a.k.a. Big Ethel, who in the early years of Archie was awkward, unattractive, and constantly trying to snare the heart of a decidedly uninterested Jughead. While her character has been softened over the years, she was often the butt of cruel jokes. Big Ethel Energy focuses on her post-high school life: Having left Riverdale behind, Ethel is self-confident and happy in the career she has pursued. When the mayor of Riverdale hires her to write a history of her hometown, Ethel sees it as an opportunity for some payback, but to her surprise, she finds out that Archie, Betty, Veronica, and the rest of the Riverdale High School gang have also changed a lot since graduation day.

Archie Comics is the second major comics publisher to debut new comics on Webtoon; DC is also doing original comics on the platform (see “DC Universe Characters Are Coming to Webtoon”).

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