Bailey gets her toon on. I've been investigating comics and lawsuits... Apparently the Archie Comics group "lawyered up" to go after a one-man show called Cherry Comix. Supposedly Cherry was diluting the Archie brand by having a (naughty) comic drawn in a relatively similar style in a relatively similar setting. BUT... I have unearthed two other comics that the Archie group left alone: Fast Willie Jackson and Tippy Teen. Unlike Cherry, these two were drawn EXACTLY like Archie and were thematically similar as well. So why were they allowed to continue? Well, I read further, and it comes down to this: an art STYLE cannot be trademarked or copyrighted. Only specific works (drawing, book, movie...) can be copyrighted. An art style is essentially an IDEA, and the copyright office states that mere ideas cannot be protected, only the expression of those ideas. The only other legal leg to stand on would be if a "reasonable person" would mistake Cherry et. al. for Archie. Anyone who ever read Archie would probably not get the two mixed up. So... In the 1960's at least, I guess you could say that things like Tippy Teen used the Archie-like style because people expected teen comedy comics to look a certain way. Just like they expect superhero comics to look a certain way, or shoujo manga to look a certain way. So, why tempt fate? In my case, to get gimmicky... Which I will show in a future installment. For now, I am just practicing with the visuals... By the way: has anybody out there commonly seen the word "teenager" written as "teen-ager" instead? What about the word "teener"? I don't think "teener" ever caught on...