Reggie Mantle

Reginald "Reggie" Mantle III is a fictional character in the Archie Comics book. His full name is given as Reginald Mantle, but he is usually called by his nickname Reggie, and sometimes refers to himself as "Mantle, The Magnificent." The character was introduced in 1942. In the Spanish versions of the comic book, Reggie's name is Carlos.

Family

Reggie, at one point, says he was born in Texas, claims to have some Native American ancestry, and comes from a fairly well-to-do family, although certainly nowhere near the level of Veronica Lodge's. His father, Ricky Mantle, owns a newspaper-publishing company with varying names, one of which is The Riverdale Gazette. Reggie seems to show journalistic aspirations himself, often working as the editor of the high school paper, Blue and Gold. He's quick to use the term "freedom of the press" to defend controversial or inflammatory articles. Little is known of his mother, though her name was eventually revealed to be Vicky.

Like many Archie characters, Reggie has a number of relatives who are created for one story only. One, his cousin May, is often mistaken for a pre-teen. After a makeover, she attracted attention at a school dance, but chose to dance with short Dilton. Another cousin, Regina, has Reggie's style of humor, but after a date with Jughead, appeared to enjoy herself. Reggie also has a number of relatives whom he often uses to get favors. In an Archie's Weird Mysteries episode titled Cinemadness, Reggie had a niece named Amy, but Reggie does not appear to have a brother or sister in the comics.

Interests and personality

Reggie is a naturally gifted and talented athlete who excels at football, baseball, basketball and ice hockey. Sometimes, if his skills are not enough to secure victory, Reggie is known for using schemes such as bending or downright breaking rules, and he often shows little team spirit. Once in a while, Reggie tries to win competitions on a technicality by pulling out a rulebook.

The most common accessories associated with Reggie are the mirror and the comb. A lot of jokes in the comics are on how he loves himself more than any girl, earning him the nickname "Reggie 'I-Love-Me' Mantle". His vanity leads himself to believe that he is God's greatest gift to women. This may be why Veronica often likes Archie more than she does him. Somewhat of a fashion plate, Reggie also has the distinct trait of being the character who most frequently experiments with his hairstyle to match current trends - even more frequently than Betty and Veronica. These looks have lasted months (rather than been contained within a single story) and have included several incarnations of sideburns, slicked back, short, shaggy, and even a ponytail in the early '90s.

Reggie is also a bassist for The Archies and occasionally lead guitarist after Archie, and naturally thinks of himself as the most important and talented member of the group—and has gone to great lengths to prove it, such as hiring groupies to scream his name during concerts. Although his instrument of choice is guitar (and bass), Reggie has also demonstrated skill in singing, acting, and piano-playing. In one storyline, a gossip columnist causes mayhem for The Archies when he prints a blind item article about an Archies' member who secretly plays with a "rival group." The member is revealed to be Reggie, who apparently is a church pianist on Sunday.

His sharp, and albeit often rude, quick wit has led to him in some storylines working part-time as stand-up, often insult, comedian at a Riverdale comedy club, and hopes to perform professionally someday. In spite of his evident upper-middle class status, he is remarkably cheap, and the first time his schoolmates remember him inviting them to a party, he had filled the room with vending machines from which to obtain the party food.

Reggie's pranks are usually harmless, meant to embarrass his victims rather than actually hurt them. In one incident when he tried to humiliate Chuck Clayton during a sledding contest, Reggie dug a pit for Chuck to fall into when he landed. Reggie filled the pit with sawdust to soften the blow so Chuck wouldn't be hurt, adding crankcase oil to make it stick and covering it with snow to conceal it. As Reggie told a friend who was helping him with the prank, "I'm not cruel, dum-dum, just clever!" His prank backfired when he ended up jumping the farthest on the sled, landing in his own pit.

It is not unusual for Reggie's practical jokes to backfire. In another story, Reggie is sent to Mr. Weatherbee's office for putting a tack on a chair as a prank. Defending himself, Reggie disdains such a simple prank, pointing out to the principal that his pranks are more elaborate and better thought out. The Bee writes a note to the teacher explaining this, but when Reggie returns to the classroom, he discovers he still has a lot to learn about pranks—Mr. Weatherbee wrote the note in disappearing ink. In one Archie comic, Reggie tries to impress the whole school with his amateur movies of himself. Unfortunately for Reggie, the movies shown were actually the Mantles' home movies of Reggie's childhood after an accidental switch.

In one story, mirroring the George Orwell novel 1984, we see the serious side of Reggie. His father has printed a story about U. S. government waste and incompetence, in a complicated matter dealing with Mr. Lodge's companies; and a judge, apparently acting under pressure from military brass, ordered Reggie's dad jailed until he reveals his source. Reggie is furious and looks for a way to get his father released. The opportunity presents itself in the form of a contact between the judge and his pretty young secretary. Reggie has a camera, and snaps a picture, telling the judge he'll get it printed unless the judge releases the elder Mantle.

Relationships

Reggie is Archie Andrews's rival, and he has a perennial crush on Veronica. In one story, it is said that Veronica was the only other person to evoke any kind of emotion on Reggie other than himself. The fact that she loves Archie makes Reggie jealous, so he enjoys making Archie's life miserable by playing practical jokes on him, sometimes going as far as making everyone turn against Archie.

Reggie's main love interst though out the comics run is Veronica Lodge. During the early years it seems Veronica favored him over Archie and still does. In story in the futer Reggie marries Veronica. Alot of fans think that they would make a great couple and that they blong together.

Ironically, many of his schemes backfire and allow Archie to be the victor. Sometimes, Reggie's ego is his own downfall, as he can sometimes be overheard bragging about his scheme. While Veronica often does date him, she sometimes does so only to make Archie jealous. Despite the rivalry, he and Archie are generally amicable and remain good friends, and often spend time together pursuing dates or practicing athletics. In Archie's Double Digest #201, during the possibility of Archie moving, he eventually had to admit he would miss Archie, whom he called his best friend.

Sometimes, Reggie targets Jughead Jones instead, thinking that he is too lazy or stupid to do anything about it, and receives some payback when Jughead proves that he is smarter than he looks. In reality, however much they deny it, they are good friends who care about each other. However, their relationship is rarely stable when Archie is not around, as Reggie and Jughead have very little in common.

Reggie is insanely jealous of anyone else but him being in the spotlight, and will sometimes deliberately cause them trouble to get what he wants. During the Baby Tales storyline, for example, at a baby shower for the Jughead Jones's family, he was infuriated that they were the stars of the evening. He tried to change this by making fun of Jughead's family. This infuriated everyone in the room, until Ethel Muggs, who had come dressed as a stork, hooked the flyline from her costume on to Reggie's tuxedo, which caused him to be hung up for the rest of the evening, to everyone's amusement.

In another story, Reggie deliberately breaks an expensive vase of the Lodges and frames Archie for it; so he can take over his date with Veronica. He continues this horrid behavior at school, causing all sorts of messes, framing Archie for it, landing him in trouble with the teachers and prinicpal. Betty Cooper helps Archie with cleaning a store room, when Reggie attacks her. For that, she summarily thrashes him.

Veronica scolds Betty for nearly ruining "Reggie's aristocratic profile". When Archie criticizes the spurious contention, Veronica yells at Archie to shut up, blasting him with her "aristocratic mouth" to coin Jughead's phrase. Eventually, Reggie is thwarted when Jughead removes the rotor from his car, which strands him and Veronica, to the humor of the police.

Other than Veronica, Reggie is romantically interested in Midge Klump, who is the girlfriend of one of Reggie's athletic teammates, Moose Mason. This infuriates Moose, and Reggie has received some unkind, sometimes almost brutal, treatment from Moose at times. But Reggie never gives up on his attempts to date Midge, often thinking of ways to get past Moose by taking advantage of the latter's low intelligence or any other weaknesses. On very rare occasions, however, Midge does date Reggie out of her own choice, having prevailed upon Moose not to interfere, because she is known to get frustrated over the direction her relationship with Moose goes.

Reggie is mainly attracted to Veronica and Midge, but he occasionally seeks to date other women, including Betty Cooper. Their relationship usually consist a playful banter between them. Whenever Betty is down because Archie forgets that he had a date with her, Reggie always steps up the plate and offers to be her date, not because he pities her, but because he genuinely likes her. In one memorable story, Reggie is genuinely touched when Betty knits him a sweater as a thank-you gift. They proceed to date, where Betty comes to discover the gentleman in Reggie. However, when they start to kiss, Reggie whispers Veronica's name whilst Betty whispers Archie's. They laugh it off and revert back to being friends, but smile meaningfully at each other at the end of the story.

He is also known to date Cheryl Blossom occasionally. The two have very similar personalities, and at one point, before she began dating a boy named George, tried going out together. Like Betty and Veronica, however, Cheryl mainly uses Reggie as an alternative to Archie.

On certain occasions, when he's feeling generous or whenever it really matters, Reggie shows a kinder side where he will come to the aid of his friends or total strangers, although he prefers to keep these good deeds secret. In one comic, it showed he had a close childhood friendship with an elderly woman named Mrs. Finklehoff.

Publications

Reggie has starred in his own titles:

• Archie's Rival Reggie #1–14 (1950–Aug 1954)
• Reggie #15–18 (Sept 1963–Nov 1965)
• Reggie And Me #19–126 (Aug 1966–Sep 1980)
• Reggie's Wise Guy Jokes #1–60 (Aug 1968–Jan 1982)
• Reggie's Revenge #1–3 (Spring–Fall 1994)

External links

• Archie Universe
• Reggie's blog