Riverdale: Who Is The Black Hood?

This primary antagonist of Riverdale Season 2 has some deep Archie Comics ties that you may not realize.

At the time,Pepwas arguably the most successful publication from MLJ Comics.

But what often gets ignored is how many other characters MLJ/Archie already had in their stable.

Or at least its kind of the same character, as the Hoods history gets pretty complicated pretty fast.

Below is what is considered to be the only surviving episode of the show.

Its still a rather entertaining listen, if obviously dated.

But the character still had plenty of life left in him.

This revival came courtesy ofMan Thingco-creator/all around comics inspiration Gray Morrow and famed DC creator Neal Adams.

The late 1970s was a fascinating period for Archie Comics.

Then the unexpected happened.

Archie became one of the most risk-taking companies in the industry.

Although uniformly excellent, the best of the batch was Duane Swierczynskis run onThe Black Hood.

During this melee, he kills the previous Black Hood, Kip Burland.

A new Season 2 storyline went three issues, but the current run of theHoodis currently on hiatus.

This massive infodump brings us back toRiverdale.

Who exactly is The Black Hood on this series?

That question is shaping up to be season twos central mystery.

From the third episode we can glean a few things.

First and foremost, he sees Riverdale as a city in moral crisis.

I am the wolf, you are the flock, this is the bloodletting, he writes.

But it does indeed seem as if he is being targeted.

Or at least he was at first.

(Moose, Midge and even potentially Ethel arent really in Archies orbit on this series).

So who and why?

The first and most obvious answer seems to be someone hired by Mr. Lodge to screw with Archie.

Him actually being a crook explains his utterly inept crime-fighting skills.

He wants Riverdale to be in chaos.

Honestly though, its most likely to be someone we dont know yet but will become important later.

His television counterpart seems straight up evil.

So whats the deal?

And isnt that the most exiting part of all of this?

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