Before becoming a staff writer for TV shows like Big Love and Glee, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa made a name for himself as a playwright, starting with a play called Weird Comic Book Fantasy that imagined classic comic-book character Archie Andrews coming out of the closet. He’s since gone on to write actual Archie comics in the form of the extraordinary Afterlife With Archie horror series, and earlier today, Aguirre-Sacasa was named Archie Comics’ new Chief Creative Officer, a position that “will be exploring the potential to take Archie’s Pals and Gals outside of comics and into different media.”
One of Aguirre-Sacasa’s first moves as CCO is recruiting Girls creator Lena Dunham to write a four-part story to be published in 2015 in the flagship Archie series, a move that comes after Dunham expressed her love for the Archie characters during a Q&A last November. While the plot is currently being kept under wraps, Aguirre-Sacasa says, “It's really, really funny. It's incredibly contemporary. It's a classic Archie story, with a definitely unique, Lena spin, and it's going to be set in Archie continuity." Archie fans should take comfort in that quote, which suggests this is going to be more family-friendly fare than Dunham’s usual work. (Though granted, it would be hilarious to see “Welcome To Riverdale a.k.a. The Crackcident.”) To promote the announcement, long-time Archie creator Dan Parent has reimagined Girls’ season one promotional poster with the women in Archie’s life.