Adam Hughes Is Wrapping Up His Run on Betty & Veronica

Fan-favorite comics artist Adam Hughes is apparently wrapping up his run on Archie Comics's Betty & Veronica.

This likely won't come as a surprise to fans who have been waiting patiently for his next issue pretty much constantly since the title launched in July.

The second issue of the series didn't publish until after New York Comic Con in October, and Betty & Veronica #3 is expected on the shelves in April.

In their May 2017 solicitations, Archie revealed that the three issues would be collected into a trade paperback titled Betty and Veronica by Adam Hughes Volume 1, due in stores on May 10, which led most fans to believe that the ride was over.

Mark Waid would seem the most obvious choice to succeed Hughes as writer on the title, given the fact that he recently inked a deal to expand his role at Archie.

In the transition between "classic Archie" and a more modern publisher, high sales and critical acclaim on books like Afterlife With Archie, The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, and Betty & Veronica have come at the cost of frequent publishing delays. While Archie and Jughead got off to good starts in the New Riverdale line, Betty & Veronica has been running behind all along, and it seems Hughes is ready to, at least for the moment, hang it up.

@TerryMooreArt I have ANIMAL HOUSE on, as that's the vibe I need to wrap up BETTY & VERONICA.

— Adam Hughes (@AH_AdamHughes) March 6, 2017

With Riverdale on TV and a new first-look deal with Warner Bros. Television just signed, it's likely Archie will want to pick a creative team to follow Hughes' act that is both capable of delivering on a deadline and -- here's the taller part of the order -- likely to generate comparable excitement to what Hughes can do.

How that much plays out is yet to be determined, but it seems as though the third (and final? Or just final for now?) issue of Hughes' Betty and Veronica is nearing completion, and it's going to be a wild ride.