The blossoming Riverdale romance between type-A-with-secrets Betty and brooding-with-secrets Jughead seems perfectly tailored for ’shippers. After all, their names even fit together in a pleasing manner. Fans have begun to use “Bughead” and “Bethead” to refer to the couple, far better hybrids than anything Betty and Archie mashed together could yield. So, because we live in a commercial world, io9 reports (via Bleeding Cool) that Archie Comics is trying to trademark both of those monikers. Just what they intend to do with them is anyone’s guess for now.
How the series would handle a Jughead love story was a question before it even aired, given that Jughead is openly asexual in the comics. Actor Cole Sprouse even suggested how that could be explored in future seasons: “Asexuality is not one of those things in my research that is so understood at face value, and I think maybe the development of that narrative could also be something very interesting and very unique and still resonate with people, and not step on anyone’s toes,” he said in an interview with Hollywood Life back in January. For now, however, Archie Comics is trying to lay claim to whatever you want to call his relationship with Betty.