Worried that Comic books are a bad influence on your children? what you need is the Comics Code Authority, a bunch of faceless pencil pushers to enforce a strict code of rules that must be obeyed under any context. This includes banning of all things occult, to the degree that writer Marv Wolfman couldn’t be hired by DC because his last name is the same as a Universal monster.
The Comic Code Authority was more interested in enforcing the word of the “Code” than actually the spirit of it. And if you’ve made it this far and have no idea what the Comics Code Authority was, let me explain. After World War 2 the sales of Superhero books declined and in their place new comic genres became popular, genres like Horror, Real Crime, Romance and Westerns. But Comic books where thought of as a “Kids medium” and some of those genre’s are less family friendly than the adventures of Superman. With absolutely no censorship or age restrictions, kids where reading comics with any level of sex and or violence in them. Parents where livid and The Reverend Fredric Wertham answered their call and wrote the book “The Seduction of the Innocent”. With Comic book writers and artists as pariahs they came to the solution that they would create a self regulating body that would deal with this, the strictness of their rules put parents minds at rest because now Comics didn’t have words like “Horror” or “Fear” in the title and the undead didn’t grace the covers or interiors of their children’s funny books. The code actually had no power other than just being a symbol on the front of comic covers, it was entirely enforced by Elementary school teachers and store owners only complied with the ban out of fear that the school principal and a hoard of angry mothers protesting outside their premises.
The code slowly eroded and Marvel became the badboys of the Comic industry flaunting their rules any chance they got and working around them as subtly as they could. I really hope you now have a mental image of Stan Lee hanging by the Bike racks wearing a Leather Jacket and smoking a cigarette. Marvel started their post Comic code authority days chasing after every fad, Romance comics, War Comics, Westerns all to keep the lights on. But the fad that changed things for them was Science fiction comics, which naturally lead to Jack Kirby drawing monsters. The popularity of Science Fiction comics lead their storied rival of DC to reinvent the Superhero starting with the new Flash, then Green Lantern, then to The Justice League of America. The popularity of the last one lead to Timely (that in a few months would become Marvel) to order Stan Lee and Jack Kirby to create a new Superhero team. A team of explorers who get exposed to the nations biggest fear radiation and ended being mutated permanently and one even into a literal monster. Marvel’s biggest hits of this era all of Sci-Fi Horror roots, as mentioned the F4 a team of explorers who fight monsters and fight an evil Warlock who dresses as Death, The Hulk who shares many similarities with Jekyl and Hyde and a Spider-man (who they almost got sued by a manufacturer of Halloween costumes for plagiarism).
That’s all well and good but what of Sabrina? While Marvel Comics where working on eroding the system from within, Archie where more complicit with the code. Having experimented and failed earlier with new Superheroes (after the days of Comic’s being used as scapegoats). Archie found success with a series of B-Stories with a protagonist named after the company, Archie where anything but subversive. They portrayed the everyday adventures of a teenage boy who can’t decide who his “best gal” is while his best friend just wants to eat a lot of Hamburgers. Archie Comics image was so squeaky clean they got green-lit for a cartoon series about their band after the PTA had found a new folk devil in Saturday Morning cartoons, Cartoons that included a very faithful adaptation of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby’s Fantastic Four comics made by Hanna-Barbera.
But hiding within this wholesome slice of Americana was a Witch! A teenage witch who enjoyed Milkshakes. Debuting in Archie’s Mad House, a PG version of Mad Magazine (not a Horror Comic). Sabrina a debuted as a troublemaker, The Archie universes answer to Dennis the Menace, spiking drinks with Love Potion number 9. The character was envisioned by George Gladir and Dan DeCarlo as a one shot strip, but fans of Archie wanted more and with no backlash of her teaching children about the Occult (the original strip actually refers to Salem as her Familiar). The Choir boys managed to get away with something that the bad-lads at Marvel would’ve had to fight for.
Sabrina continued to appear in Archie’s MadHouse until issue 74 when she would be spun off into her own ongoing book and a Filmation animated series. But in this time the character had been altered by an Archie Comics committee into a goody two shoes who only uses her magic for good. If anything she was now a High-School aged clone of Samantha from Bewitched with her own supporting cast, Salem was now her Pet cat. This was how Sabrina was until the 1990’s when changes like Salem being a former warlock where introduced. Archie’s characters where stagnant because the company often reused old scripts, believing their audience wouldn’t notice if they only used the script once every four years because the audience for comics either threw them away after reading them or would only collect them between the ages of 8 and 13. DC also did this in 60’s and the early 70’s on their B Superman books (World’s Finest, Superman’s Girlfriend Lois Lane and Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen). Sabrina’s Comics changed with whatever TV series they where tied to, sometimes Fummetti (an italian word for “photo comic”) or redrawings of the show packaged as a comic.
But whatever happened to the Comic’s Code Authority? Well they tried to use the power they never had and it imploded on them. Marvel where given a letter from the White House that said “This drug situation is getting pretty bad could you write a story with Spider-man warning kids about them” and Stan Lee and Gil Kane (with John Romita Sr illustrating the cover) obliged President Nixon’s stationaries request. But the CCA did not approve of this and tried to pull Amazing Spider-man 97 from stores and… nothing happened, no parents protesting, Newsstands sold the comic without their logo and the world moved on. From that day onwards Marvel published all their comics with the Comics code Authority logo on them without even sending their scripts or pages for approval. The Comic Code Authority was a corpse that only DC and Archie supported. DC obviously didn’t submit every comic but their standard ones (things that aren’t Watchmen or Vertigo) did go through processing until 2006. Where the Comic Code Authority was one retired Fourth grade teacher who was reading free copies of Archie and DC who would sometimes 9 months after the comic was published sent them a note saying “This Batman comic is too violent”.
Of course once the Comic’s Code Authority was a complete non-entity, Archie Comics where deeply uncool, being sold at Supermarkets and bought by parents in vein attempts to shut up their kids while they buy groceries. Archie needed reinvention, they needed to get with it, and stop the Superheroes from giving them wedgies and stealing their lunch money.
Archie first dipped its toe into the water with the introduction of Kevin Keller an openly gay character, this got Archie comics good media coverage. No longer where they the butt of an unfunny joke, they where revolutionary not just being held by a Sitcom character to show what a Dork they are. The next step was simple kill Archie, which they did having him leap in front of a bullet meant for Kevin. The US media was in shock, and of course the other thing Warner Bros second comic company stole from it’s first was Reboot. Now Archie comics where more mature or self aware and subversive, Archie vs the Punisher wasn’t a one-off now he could meet the Predator or Debbie Harry or live in a Zombie Apocalypse. Sabrina also got a reboot, a new version that wasn’t inspired by her kids shows, now they could fully explore the occult. Sabrina’s first NEW Archie role was to bring the dead back to life, After life with Archie was such a success that Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa was asked to do more. So in came a new version more in line with the original, a comics Sabrina who has Harvey under love spells and argues with her Familiar. What a strange ride.
