Earlier today, The CW released a batch of photos from “A Kiss Before Dying,” next month’s season 2 premiere of Riverdale. Among them was the first look at Charles Melton in the role of Reggie Mantle, Archie’s foil and frequent bully from the comics.
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Last year, Mantle was played by Ross Butler, who left Riverdale this year to pursue a larger role in the second season of 13 Reasons Why. Originally, Butler had taken both jobs, likely assuming that at least one of them might not come back. But since Riverdale also wanted to expand Butler’s role, he had to hand off Reggie to Melton in order to remain at 13 Reasons Why.
In the photo, seen below, it looks like Melton may be giving Archie a hard time — but considering Archie will be dealing with the potential death of his father (who was shot at the end of the season 1 finale), one hopes that’s just us misreading the body language and that Reggie isn’t that big of a jerk.
In the first season, Mantle and Archie were only really rivals a couple of times, most notably in an episode where they competed to be head of the football team after the death of Jason Blossom. Ultimately Archie “won” but handed the title over to Reggie anyway, saying that he could not give the team the level of attention a captain should.
Over the summer, Reggie and Josie McCoy (of Josie and the Pussycats fame) were depicted as a couple in the Riverdale comic books, prompting some fans to wonder whether that story will be explored in the show’s second season.
Riverdale comes back on Wednesday, October 11, at 8 p.m. ET/PT on The CW.
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