#riverdale s7 recap
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Riverdale s7 e1
There is a lot of commentary about whether the show is bad or good, and among those who hold that it's bad, a debate about whether said badness is intentional (It's camp! It's satire! It's commentary on culture and/or our times!) or brought about from a lack of talent or planning by the producers, writers and/or actors.
What I say is this - I love the care with which Riverdale is made. Starting with the S7 opening sequence!!
Archie’s painted hot rod is shown, then as the song plays Archie spins into view, his face framed in a little circle. He's doing something with his eyebrows. His smile is just a little off. Not a LOT off. Just off. Immediately after that we see him press a kiss to Mary Andrews' cheek. We know it's all wrong because Mary Andrews is wary of the violence of this son that she regrets mothering and can't wait to get rid of. They are not this affectionate.
Next up is Betty Cooper, short hair in the cutest ringlets, smiling sweetly, looking wholesome. Betty Cooper found the pressure to be sweetly wholesome unbearably suffocating all six seasons of this show. Immediately after her is Veronica with the most spectacular bangs, looking pretty and hard and insincere. These are things that Veronica hates to be thought of as.
Then comes Cheryl, severely annoyed to be there, giving an evil eyed false smile. Assuming arguendo that this is Jughead as world-maker as well as narrator, the fact that Cheryl gets to have a do-over of her intro in the montage, a doubling-up if you will, is noteworthy. Everyone else gets the one shot in the juke box, but Cheryl gets a twofer, wearing the Lolita-Grundy sunglasses and pouting over the door of a great looking convertible. Kevin, looking gormless is up next and it makes me feel worried. Toni Topaz is looking ultra heterosexual with her long ponytail up-do. She winks at the audience. This is not edgy Serpent Queen Toni at all. But she and Veronica both look spectacular with bangs. Tabitha in white cats’ eye glasses and white gloves, blows a kiss to the audience, looking sheltered and innocent when we all know she's a weirdo and not above cosplaying a truck stop hooker to catch a killer.
The only person who looks like "himself" is Jughead, who comes last. Worried, frantic, concerned and unhappy - basically, fail-adult Jughead without Tabitha. Poor Jughead.
The year, he says, is 1955 and apparently people didn't mind when couples executed complicated dances involving swirling skirts inside a diner where people are trying to eat. Jughead is narrating as he clatters away on a huge typewriter at the Diner. Apparently the patrons don't mind that either. Does he keep it there? Did he commandeer the one in the office?? Does he haul it around??
As Jughead narrates, speculating about where he is - Not sure if he's in the past or the past of an alternate universe - he speaks faster and more frantically, sounding more and more like Bunker Jughead of Rivervale. He tries to sound unhappy about living in a railcar with Hot Dog (". . . which actually tracks" sighhhh) but we all know he's relieved he's not homeless and couch surfing. Having a dog and a residence of his own is more stability than he's had since graduating high school and before Jabitha began cohabitation.
They're all juniors in high school again! Betty and Kevin holding hands down the hallway, Betty in excellent patterned pants with eyes only for Kevin who won't look at her. Jughead looks at the two of them with an expression of suppressing in indigestion burp but neither notice him. Jughead is worried for Betty, all the time, nonstop, in every universe. Plus Bughead were the horniest little fuckers in any high school on American television ever, and so the fact of Betty dating a gay man worries Jughead. He doesn’t want to have sex with her anymore, yet Jughead wants Betty to have good things. And Jughead has never liked Kevin much, but he’s worried for Kevin too. Betty wasn’t and isn’t a girl who takes not getting her way with grace.
Cheryl still has a twin brother, but she is completely not at all in love with this one. The face she makes is not of a girl dominating the halls of her high school with her soulmate. Jughead feels very similar about this iteration of a Boy Blossom, noting first and foremost that this kiddo is Cheryl’s twin, then second that he is not Jason, before introducing us to his actual name: Julian.
Julian like the possessed doll, the chimera twin that got eaten by Cheryl in the womb, etc, that Julian. Who actually knew this Julian name, other than Toni?
Jughead’s thoughts turn directly from Cheryl to Not-Jason to Reggie then on to Archie. This is the first of several pings back to earlier seasons, which I am sure I’m not going to be able to catch in a perfect way. But! Reggie and Jason were constantly in each other’s company in Jughead’s hallucinatory reminiscences of Jason during S1, even though Reggie barely ever mentioned Jason, and Cheryl has never been shown actually discussing Jason with either Reggie 1.0 or 2.0.
The key thing that Jughead notices about Archie is his body, in the same way the key thing he notices about Julian is that he is not Jason. Archie being wholesome enough to kiss his mom on the cheek goodbye every morning being into body building in 1955 is very progressive (and gay) of him, isn’t it? That sort of muscular build was still sort of a niche thing, I thought.
Jughead has been frowning at all these people for quite a while, long enough to confirm that they have no recollection of their S6 selves. He hasn’t seen Tabitha, who he helpfully explains is chronokinetic and the town’s literal guardian angel AND his girlfriend.
Just in time, Pop Tate announces that the bus from Mississippi has arrived. Tabitha, looking very sad, is accompanied by Toni, equally sad, and a third person, who I assumed was Chuck even though the actor has changed because that wouldn’t be Munroe. Sadness from having to witness an act of racial injustice and hatred makes people move in slow motion into the Diner.
Jughead watches Tabitha slowly walk past him before he calls her name. The way he says “Tabitha” is so cautious, because she might reject any conversation with the guy wearing a bulky sweater with the S stamped on it AND a felt crown making very loud tappity tap noises at her grandfather’s diner, and hopeful, because maybe they’re friends, and maybe hearing Jughead will make this Tabitha remember season 6. The guarded, questioning response he gets from her makes Jughead change tack fast, to discuss the Emmett Till hearing verdict as something he heard “on the radio.” When Jughead says the verdict made him “sick to my stomach” Tabitha frowns slightly, wary of where he might go with this, perhaps. Tabitha saying that she and her friends are trying to figure out what they should do next, Jughead isn’t even breathing. He’s watching her so hard, so hopeful that Tabitha will give him some hint that she knows this is the wrong universe, and so worried she might not.
When she asks him to confirm that his name is Jughead in a way that indicates they aren’t even friends in this universe, Jughead is so hurt that his drops out of his careful, speak-in-full-sentences 1950s speech, and stutters. His eyes get much, much sadder, right before he says it’s overwhelming and heartbreaking. He looks like he might cry. Poor Jughead.
The cruelty of his fate is astounding. He was a kid who was left behind and rejected by his mother, let to live homeless by his father, rejected by Fred Andrews, routinely forgotten by his girlfriend during what he thought of as their shared childhood memories, and now, the singularly stable adult friendship and relationship of his life is like it never existed. Jughead Jones is someone who hasn’t ever been without a girlfriend, it seems since starting one with Betty Cooper, but now when he needs a relationship the most, Tabitha literally doesn’t know him.
Simply because Tabitha Tate doesn’t know him, Jughead hates everything about the 1950s. (Whoever said the 1950s was the greatest decade should have their head examined, he deadpans.)
Archie is trying to skip out of the house when Mary calls to him. Archie grimaces so hard at his mother’s summons that I can see it through the back of his head. This did give me a small twinge of hope that maybe he does remember S1-6, and that Archie is putting on this wholesome teenager act, same as Jughead, until he can figure out what’s going on. He puts on an evidently false face of doe-eyed innocence when he gets it together to go talk to his mother. He’s literally never made that face before in the past six years.
Mary Andrews is very upset about the photos of James Dean’s car accident in the papers, so she confiscates the keys to Archie’s “hotrod” with “fire painted on its sides.” Archie tries to talk his way out of this but fails. He longingly looks at his “barely above a jalopy” vehicle before turning to face the reality of having to take a very old looking bicycle to school.
Archie has never been this cute to me. His little face! Then he’s peddling uphill, getting honked at, and so mad . Just, adorable. I wanna give him a cookie. He gets to school just in time.
Meanwhile, Betty in her very excellent 1950s pants is sitting with Toni in the Blue and Gold room. Her sweater says Betty on it in a curly font. With her short blonde curls framing her sweet face Betty looks picture perfect. She and Toni both have such enormous eyes that I keep getting distracted from the serious topic they are discussing - how to get past the school censors to properly cover the Emmett Till travesty. When Betty says she will throw her weight behind getting the story told, Toni smiles at her in a small cheek scrunching way that she’s never done before. She looks amazing, by the way - the bangs, the big hoop earrings, the scarf /headband thing in her hair, the Southside Serpent Jeans jacket.
Cut to a class where a 1950s tv announcer voice is explaining what a mill is (a souped up hot rod or jalopy) in a film the class are watching when the principal (Warden Norton repurposed as Principal Featherhead!) bursts in to make an announcement. Archie is wearing an R sweater, with Jughead in the S sweater seated nearby.
What do these mean??
Veronica make an iconic entrance, complete with heralding blues horns. Yellow heels, yellow belt, black dress with white polka dots, black purse, sunglasses, big black sunhat trimmed with the same fabric as her dress, and red lips. Lace gloves with little black polka dots.
OMG SHE LOOKS SO HOT.
I want this whole thing. I make a vow to only wear yellow heels with black dresses.
Archie, getting his first look, drops his pencil. (Kevin, right behind him, has no reaction whatsoever.) Jughead, Tabitha-less, looks constipated as he notes: “Damn.”
Girl, that’s what I said!
With everyone else in some sort of sweater or jacket, buttoned up to the neck, Veronica’s plunging neckline and sleeveless dress makes her look practically naked. She’s a Hollywood scion - Hermione and Hiram have “Amercia’s number one rated television program,” and of course they’re going to call it, Oh Mija!
I LOVED this in-joke, because it functions as a tribute to Hiram. Mija was the word he said the most, after, maybe, Archie.
For some reason, this whole situation - Veronica’s appearance, introduction, presence and existence- piss Cheryl off entirely. She is huffing, rolling her eyes, and generally extremely antsy.
Seated right behind her, Archie is just in heaven. Veronica is being very alternative-universe here: her self introduction is very pompous. Real Veronica Lodge actually hates pomposity. Her vocabulary is still very Jughead-huge though (“opportune” and “raven haired.”) Veronica says that she’s trying a method acting type of thing (de rigueur for the age perhaps - another thing she might actually say) of experiencing small town life so she can better portray the “innocent ingenue” in the upcoming production of “Our Town.”
Longtime viewers are meant to know that she is lying about staying with an aunt-and-uncle, mostly because these people have never been introduced in the past six seasons. As far as we’ve ever been told about Hiram in the competing lores of his life, he doesn’t have siblings. We have almost no lore about Hermione, other than FP hit on her almost once in high school and she had the affair with Fred Andrews as an adult.
Both Cheryl and Betty do not like that Veronica called them “small town lifers” basically. Archie is entirely entranced with her, laughing at every little joke that Veronica makes, and even Cheryl pointedly turning in her seat to glare at him can’t make his besotted grin falter even a little bit.
Veronica purrs and preens when she calls herself “the scion of Tinseltown royalty.” I’m surprised she doesn’t roll her Rs. When she winsomely says Thank You, Archie, whose face has been lit up like a christmas tree this whole time, bursts into solitary applause. Cheryl is still very mad, but Archie gets rewarded with an extremely sexy wink by Veronica for being such an immediate fan.
Is that a blush I see on Archie’s face?
I love this Archie. He’s so cute.
The table that Veronica chooses to try to join is Cheryl, Betty, Kevin, Julian and Archie. This is a weird fricking cluster of people. Cheryl and Betty? And what the heck would Kevin and Julian have in common? When Veronica asks to sit, Cheryl wants to say no but she is betrayed by both of the other redheads, who clear the space immediately. Veronica comes to perch gracefully between the two redhead boys.
Veronica says she caught all their names in the class they were just in. Of course, Betty having BETTY embroidered into her sweater probably helps with that too. Remembering that the R wearing Archie is Archie might be more of a feat. Veronica shows that she took Cheryl’s eye rolls to heart by pointedly asking Cheryl what her name was. Cheryl is extremely displeased, yet again. This seems to know exactly what just happened between Veronica and Cheryl- he is trying very hard not to laugh too much.
Cheryl tries to explain that that they’d been discussing James Dean’s death, very self-importantly adding that she is president of his fanclub, when she gets undermined by Julian, who interrupts with a very weak joke about the Oh Mija! show being “high-larious,” to Veronica. He says that the Blossoms “tune in every week” which must be a lie, because Cheryl’s whole face sours. Betty and Kevin seem like they’re on the same wavelength. They project the same calm, almost bovine energy when they ask Veronica where she lived in LA (BelAir) and if she knew James Dean.
Cheryl sharply tells Kevin off for being “so provincial,” then goes off to sideways disparage Veronica by implying that she wasn’t important enough to be a friend of James Dean, a person who was friends with Elizabethe Taylor. Turns out Veronica Lodge was ‘friendly’ with Jimmy, “friendly” enough to go skinny dipping together at the Chateau Marmaduke (standing in for Chateau Marmont).
This makes Archie choke. Literally. He focuses on “skinny dipping” -Veronica! Naked! She does Naked things! - while Betty and Kevin (Bevin? Ketty??) are entranced about being that friendly with James Dean. Julian is more in Archie’s camp - he wants to know if Veronica has done the naked thing once or more than once. I so appreciate the asshole energy that Julian projects nonstop. He reminds me a lot of Bret Weston Wallis that way. You know on sight that he’s a dickhead, which is 180 degrees different from the angelic way that Jughead used to hallucinate Jason.
When Cheryl plays with her hair to sarcastically ask if Veronica will claim that she had dated Jimmy Dean, Veronica says no, but then drops a bombshell. James Dean “played both sides of the net.” In case the small town rubes don’t get her meaning, Veronica clarifies that this means both girls and boys. Kevin has a milder version of Archie’s choking reaction from seconds before at this thought. He’s smiling, and Betty is frowning. Oh? Oh???
When Kevin wants Veronica to name what James Dean was, Archie interrupts. This made me wonder if there was a 1950s term for bisexual, that everyone would’ve known, that you can say on a CW show in 2023? I guess not because Kevin never gets to finish his question.
Archie has a confused reaction, which fits canon so far and why Jarchie hasn’t happened yet even though it should. He finds the concept of regular guys who are almost cowboys (all American? Is that what he means to say?) being anything other than 100% proof heterosexual incomprehensible. Cheryl reacts with homophobic anger - it’s besmirchment, it’s foul, to say Jimmy Dean was not straight. When Veronica calls her provincial, Cheryl slut shames her. Nobody cares that Cheryl has flounced off, so now Kevin wants to know about Sal Mineo.
Kevin is definitely not straight in this universe. Veronica knows it, apparently immediately. Poor Betty.
In science class later that day we see ETHEL is Jughead’s lab desk partner. Jughead is miserable to be back in high school. He has an Asian American science teacher, who wears nerdy round glasses and has a bit of a lisp. The teacher says Bailey Comet is due to arrive in two years. He sounds vaguely Singporean, his teacher.
Cut to Cheryl screaming GUYS as she floats in the air, trying to ice the comet.
Cut to the end of school, where Archie winsomely offers Veronica an escort home. He has no ride, however, and Veronica isn’t the type of girl to walk. (She also just can’t, not in those high heels.) Julian has offered Veronica a ride, ditching his sister wholesale. JASON WOULD NEVER. Archie and Cheryl can’t bear to look at each other in the face of this rejection they’ve suffered.
In the waning light, Betty and Veronica are trying to talk to two old white men. Dupont from Stonewall is here in Riverdale now as Werther a ‘child psychiatrist’ who fully backs Warden, I mean Principal, Featherhead that the Emmett Till murder and trial are not suitable subject matter for the school paper.
Toni tries to advocate for publication by saying that people need to know what happened “so that it doesn’t happen again.” That is so adorable and incorrect. Knowing something terrible happened again does not in any way ensure that it doesn’t keep happening. I think the better way to think about it is, We owe it to the wronged to mark their stories. Featherhead shoots her down by saying that “these sorts of things don’t happen in Riverdale.” He also says a wrong thing - that “change doesn’t happen overnight.” Actually all change happens overnight. That’s where there’s always a backlash to any progress, because those who can’t keep up want to turn it back. A lot of the time, they succeed. In any case, Featherstone patronizes Toni by telling her take satisfaction in how ‘well written’ in article is.
Later, at family dinner in which Polly and Charles don’t exist, Betty tries to push her parents into reading Toni’s article on the air at their nightly broadcast on RIVW. 15 minutes is what they get, of which Toni’s article would take a whole minute. Hal’s 50s persona is very hilarious. He looks extremely shifty and chipunky, reminding me quite a lot of Peter Pettigrew of all things. Alice has absolutely killer eyebrows, sharp enough to slice your face open. They both repeat Featherstone’s line about the article being ‘well written’ but have no intention of rocking the boat. Betty is angry but she is overruled by the power of the Blossom money and her parents not wanting to upset their only sponsor.
1950s Archie is still the cutest. He is working his car, underneath it, as he breathlessly narrates his ove for Veronica Lodge. He actually says SHAZAM! persuasively. Hit with a thunderbolt indeed. He’s so 1950s in fact that the things he says and the way he says them feel suspicious too perfect. “How’s a guy like me gonna get anywhere with a girl like Veronica Lodge” and so forth. Jughead is perched like a depressed crow in his S sweater that seems to get darker and darker as the day goes on, looking off to the side and not listening to this earnest puppy love talk.
Jughead’s narration takes over. He is just so anxious. He’s talking so fast, thinking about Bailey’s Comet, trying to harness that to get back to the future. “But I needed [ pause ] help.” He sounds increasingly like the wigged out Bunker Jug of Rivervale. Archie asks for his dad’s hammer, which sets off Jughead’s memory - that Archie buried the hammer in the time capsule.
The capsule they buried in the year 2020 when they graduated from high school, not to be confused with the year 2020 when they were 6 years after graduating from high school, might still be in existence in 1955 even though they were sent ‘back’ to this time from the first but not the second 2020.
Jughead seems to think this is a logical leap and I am very tickled. I kind of find it annoying (sorry, anti-intellectualism incoming, mea culpa in advance) when time travel stories get too precious about theoretical physics, so this made me very pleased with the wild swings they take in narrative on Riverdale.
So! Jughead asks for a shovel to Archie, who gives him an odd look. Is it because Archie thinks “Can I borrow a shovel?” is a really weird response to “Have you seen my dad’s hammer?” or is it because Archie knows something?
Later that night, Jughead is digging something out of the ground again. Grave robbery is one of his leitmotifs, I suppose? He hits something hard, and guess what! It’s the time capsule. Jughead is out of breath as he says “Thank God” but he seems just as frantic and scared as before. And dun dun!! Someone is watching him do all this from the shadows! The hairline looks vaguely like Tabitha.
Veronica is going to school the next day, wearing more modest neckline and weather appropriate warm clothes. Archie has somehow gotten his car out of the garage, so now he’s able to offer her a ride home. She’s very pleased, but Jughead walks right in between the two of them, carrying the time capsule ice box. Summarily, he insists that the two of them come meet him in the music room. Veronica has no idea who he is.
In the music room, they’re all holding their 2020 self’s contribution to the time capsule. Toni has never seen the Pretty Poisons jacket. Veronica thinks the Pop’s menu is an only passable prop. Betty finds the headlines to be “like Dr. Seuss” meaning amusing gibberish, perhaps? And Kevin keeps asking unanswerable questions - he wants to know what the “inch” is in Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Archie wants to know when Jughead buried Fred’s hammer in a cooler.
Jughead tackles that one first, saying “YOU did.” Archie genuinely looks like he has no idea what Jughead’ is talking about, but I’ve sussed it out now - 1950s Archie’s response to confusion is to smile about it. So he smiles. Jughead can see that his attempt to “shake something loose” in his friends’ minds isn’t working, so in his frustration, his presentation starts to get very garbled. He tells them they buried all these things 67 years ago IN THE FUTURE which, given the tenses, doesn’t even amount to English. He says they need to get back to ‘our present, our future’ before full on stuttering. Betty is concerned, Cheryl is annoyed, Toni and Kevin look embarrassed for Jughead, Archie is smiling because he’s confused. Veronica, however, is very entertained.
Archie wants to know what Jughead buried. Jughead knows it was his “yarn beanie” but then says it wasn’t in the time capsule. For some reason, this takes the fun out of this exercise for Archie, the fact that Jughead didn’t include an item of his own in the ‘cooler.’
Veronica says she’ll play along, and asks if she or Elizabeth Taylor is more famous in the future. Cheryl, not to be outdone, cuts in with a request to give a bird’s eye view of the future. Jughead has not thought this far in advance, so his answer is (adorably) piss poor. he just throw things out - smartphones, text messages, spotify, the internet - in THAT order which is the most confusing thing of all time. Betty tries to help him out since he’s getting frantic during this speech that makes no sense to her - she asks Jughead to describe everyone’s Season 6 selves.
Jughead’s summaries are as follows: Archie was in the army, fought in a war. Betty was in FBI hunting serial killers. The way Betty practically salivates at the word serial killer, which doesn’t exist as a word yet, is VERY interesting. Veronica owns a casino, and before that a speakeasy. Toni bought the speakeasy, turned it into a biker bar. Both Veronica and Toni are charmed by this story.
Jughead positively chokes when he tries to summarize Kevin’s life. He can tell, by this time, that this is going very sideways, which won’t be helped by how out of sorts Kevin’s life became by the end of Season 6. Kevin is summarized as directing some musicals, after which he joined an organ harvesting cult. Not wrong, but not very fulsome. Cheryl, Jughead says, was possessed by an ancestor and became a witch. She is not a happy customer, at all.
Archie says a fascinating thing- that he wouldn’t want to go back to the future because “we” sound miserable. Well, given that he was just told he joined the army and went to war, this is true for him, but not all the futures are miserable.
Veronica wants to know how the whole ‘going back to the future’ thing will happen, to which Jughead’s entire presentation falls completely apart. When he says that one of the ways might be a comet, Toni (who has tried very hard to be polite so far) gives a What the fuck look to Betty, who answers it with a Oh he’s just like this smile. Jughead is fully in frantic world-maintainer Bunker Jughead mode now, and starts shouting about having Archie and Betty make out on Archie’s bed and then “BLOW UP A BOMB UNDERNEATH THEM.”
This is so funny. I love with Jughead gets all Bunker-Jug, with the shouting and the extreme hand gestures. Is he perhaps channeling Hiram??
Everyone thinks this is very funny, but Archie has had enough. Archie tries to make Jughead ‘take five’ which puts Jughead fully into feral motormouth mode to ask “YOU’RENOTGONNABEATMEUPAREYOUCUZYOU’REREALLYVIOLENTINTHEFUTURE”
The whole sentence is spit out as one long word.
When the two of them are alone in the gym, Archie lets it rip. “People are going to think you belong in the looney bin with the other nutjobs!” and “It’s hard enough without your crazy stories” etc. Jughead is coming down from his frantic mania so being called a ‘nut job’ is not helping. His eyes actually start to glisten with tears. “You think I’m crazy?” he asks, in a more normal, much sadder cadence. Jughead is so upset, and so lonely, and so despairing.
This is a big change from his mid teens, when he took on being not understood, being isolated, unique and alone, as a badge of honor. This Jughead understands the horror of being trapped in a solitary reality. He can’t even stand to look at Archie, because that would mean confronting how trapped and alone he actually is in this universe. Archie tries to be kind, telling him to keep using his ‘overactive’ imagination by channeling that energy into creating fiction. When Jughead gives up altogether, and agrees, Archie actually skips a couple steps (something he’s never done in any of the other universes) before leaving Jughead standing in the gym.
At the very red, very depressing Blossom mansion, Penelope, who has the most fascinating hairdo (it’s both ornate and simple, hideous and perfectly coiffed) while dressed like the nightmare camp version of the English queen wants to know why her twins look so sullen. The way the Blossom twins of this universe bicker seems much more realistic, and, accordingly, much more dull. I think this is post facto validation for the way the Cheryl-Jason relationship is in the S1-6 canon. It’s so much more interesting than this mundanity between Julian and Cheryl.
Penelope delivers movie magazines to Cheryl, and on the cover is someone not Veronica Lodge being cast in Our Town!
Meanwhile, Veronica is on a date with Archie at Pop’s! She loves the food. All her attempts to make lighthearted conversation with Archie fail. He has no idea who Gloria Swanson is. This literally breaks Veronica’s spirit. So she changes her line of questioning - “Tell me everything there is to know about Archie Andrews.”
His life is so boring. “Work on my car. I like sports. I come here to pops. And i hangout at sweet water river. mostly to fish.”
Then Archie reveals that Fred didn’t make it back from the Korean War, making him one of the 33,000 American servicemen who died. Thank you Fred Andrews for your service, I guess? I’m slightly peeved that they didn’t make up a different war like they did for Archie to go fight in during the 2020 that lasted for seven years, but then they used the real Emmett Till story so they might as well use the Korean War, I suppose. Archie is very used to people being upset about having asked, as well as not knowing what to say, so he is very smooth in the way he assures Veronica that “It’s OK” when she tries to apologize for prying. In this universe, Mary Andrews works part time at the dress shop (no lawyering for her, alas). I’m shocked she doesn’t work at Pop’s. Though I guess maybe this economy is better.
Archie has never had a serious girlfriend by his Junior year of HS, about which Veronica is shocked. Two days after meeting Veronica and in the course of their first real date, Archie more or less says that he wants to be Veronica’s boyfriend. He looks so starry eyed at her, that Veronica is extremely charmed. (So am I.)
But Veronica can’t be let to have nice things, so in comes Cheryl, shouting “J’accuse!” Cheryl hates Veronica SO MUCH. Just the ad hominem insults - “lying liar of a spoiled brat” and “banished by your parents!” - and she insists on shouting the fact that Veronica employed a bit of puffery when she was introducing herself to the class.
At the Pembroke, Veronica is weeping while consoled by Archie. Archie tries to say nobody takes Cheryl seriously Veronica fesses up that she was in fact banished, and she was a problem for her parents. Veronica says she was ignored and sidelined since the Lodges started Oh Mija! This is fascinating actually because Veronica’s persistent problem during her high school years was that both her parents were completely obsessed with her- and when she acquired a hitherto unknown older sibling halfway through her years in high school, Hermosa exhibited the same Lodge trait - obsession with Veronica, wanting to love her, wanting and willing to shoot at people on her behalf, and hating her just the little bit. Now, in this universe, she’s an inconvenient burden neither parents cares much about - which indicates that Veronica was so the object of her parents’ focus because the two of them didn’t have sufficient creative outlets. “The show is their real baby, not me.”
This happened in a slower way during S5-6. When Hiram finally, FINALLY killed off Riverdale and began his SoDale giant real estate project, he stopped being as invested in Veronica per se. And when Hermione found the semi-acting gig of being a “Real Housewife,” she disappeared entirely out of Veronica’s life.
It turns out Veronica’s deep dark secret, the thing that got her banished to Riverdale by her parents, was that she was in fact tangentially involved in James Dean’s death. She was one of several good time girls who formed a sort of racing fandom for Dean, and were going to meet him to cheer him on during a race.
After consoling Veronica, Archie gets home late, to be immediately yelled at by Mary. Mary is traumatized by the loss of Fred Andrews - which she honestly wasn’t very much in S4-6. Maybe this is why, if he does remember, Archie prefers to stay in this universe. He has a mom who cares deeply that his father died. Mother and son bond over their shared loss. The compromise is that Archie is allowed to drive as long as his car goes very, very slow. I will also note that his question about how he took HIS car out in a drive is a very unteenager thing to say. So the question remains - what does Archie know or sense about this alternate universe?
In a fit of masochism, Veronica watches her parents’ show. The kid cast to play the Mija is Tillie Temple (aka Shirley Temple, perhaps??). Veronica hates Tilie. Of course, right now is when Hermione calls. Turns out someone is keeping a strict eye on the guests that Veronica has over at the apartment. Veronica wants to go home for Thanksgiving, but Hermione doesn’t say she can come. She has Orson Welles visiting. Veronica is so lonely. This is also new for Veronica - Maternal rejection has never been her problem. That was usually reserved for Jughead, Cheryl and to a lesser extent, Betty and Archie.
Betty reads the Emmett Till newsletter which show the pictures of what Till went through. It radicalizes Betty into wanting to publish the article Toni wrote. But Toni wants to read a poem out during the morning announcements. There’s an echo of the larger theme in S1 through 6 here. In previous seasons, Cheryl took it upon herself to make up for her ancestor’s sins. In this one, Toni wants Cheryl to make it up to - who? Toni? the world? - someone for her parents’ cowardice in not wanting to cover the Till murder. Toni is planning an ambush.
Tabitha immediately approaches Jughead She asks for help. NAACP is taking Emmett Till’s mother on tour, so Tabitha is going with them. What Tabitha needs someone to help her ‘stay on top of’ school while she is on this tour. It’s really not clear to me what that will be, but Jughead - though he is crushed that this Tabitha doesn’t even seem to know him at all - agrees immediately. His eyes get all sad again, as he looks with wistful tenderness at this person who is exactly like his girlfriend but isn’t, at all. He smiles and says “Awesome!” which he corrects to “Swell.”
Meanwhile Toni ambushes Cheryl in the bathroom with Betty. Cheryl doesn’t mind letting Toni borrow her platform, but points out that Featherhead has pulled the plug before. For what, I wonder? When?? She’s otherwise very easily persuaded.
Tabitha has fainted, Featherhead is tending to her, Miss Bell is off, and so now, Toni can take over the morning announcement!
As Toni was reading the Langston Hughes poem I realized with the Rs and Ss stand for on those sweaters. R is for Riverdale. A bunch of other students have Rs emblazoned on their sweaters and sweatshirts. So the S must be for Southside. Jughead wears a Southside High sweater all the time to attend Riverdale High, and they just let him!
So anyway Toni exhorts everyone to ‘talk to each other’ about it, and this is the third weird lie propagated in American society. The emphasis on dialogue as somehow a catalyst for systemic change, which it is not
The four girls get a telling off from Featherhead, who tries to call them liars -but Tabitha has an answer for that (she felt sick! but felt better!) and insubordinate - but Cheryl has an answer for that (there has not been a rule that poetry can’t be read during the morning announcement or that they have to pass censorship).
In the classroom later, the teacher does open up the discussion to the topic, but see, this is the problem. It puts the burden on the three people of color - Tabitha, Toni, and the unnamed guy I have assumed is Chuck Clayton- to explain reality to everyone else, who can be passive recipients of information and responsible only for articulating their emotional responses.
Later that school day, Veronica is offered a ride by both Julian and Archie, and rejects them both in favor of walking home!
Late at night, Jughead is freaking out by himself in the diner, no typewriter. He is cracking up. Maybe seasons 1-6 were the dream and he finally woke up!!
Tabitha slides into the booth and Glory Hallelujah it’s HIS Tabitha! “The Tabitha who remembers and loves you.” He reaches out to grasp her with both hands. He’s so happy to see her, he says, covering his eyes with one hand, trying not to burst into tears. Tabitha says that the comet hit because Cheryl failed, so they had their extinction level event after all. This isn’t the Sweet Hereafter. She instead used her life force to send everyone back to 1955 to try to change the future. She has to be ALONE to untangle all the messed up timelines. “You have to make a go of it here in the 50s.”
So she parked Jughead here in 1955 to be safe, but because he kept remembering the actual reality (and could drive himself insane or further corrupt the safe timeline) she had to come back to make him forget, so that he can “live in the present, in the moment.” Oh, but Tabitha. Jughead was already so bad at that! And now that’s his part of the mission? To hold it together without her while she fixes the universe?
Jabitha may be the MOST EPIC relationship in scale which doesn’t quite make up for the tiny amount of screen time we’re likely to get if Tabitha has decided that she has to solve this universe sized problem ALONE. Jughead was willing to die a LOT. Tabitha went through every single scenario where Jughead died to see how to make that not happen. And now, Jughead is going to endure having the happiest time of his life wiped from memory - the time when he was a stable adult, who knew who he was in the world, when he was in a relationship and family unit of people who accepted him and supported him, when he had a real home - because Tabitha says it’s “for the best.” He decides to trust her with erasing the thing that any of us hold the dearest - his memories that constitute his sense of self. And can we talk about Tabitha’s self sacrifice? She’s going to do this very difficult work of setting the UNIVERSE RIGHT while voluntarily, entirely, completely forgotten (by her own hand!) by her significant other who adores her, all her friends in the community she chose to become independent from her parents, all alone.
Holy shit.
Jughead’s sprint home after their kiss, which rightly seems to freeze time to be everlasting before Tabitha steps away, is so desperate and frantic. Jughead who was terrified of being forgotten is beginning to forget the most important person in his adult life. All he has are the words “bend. toward. justice.” and the sense that something terrible has just happened to him, without the ability to remember what it is. This isn’t the Sweet Hereafter. This has to be hell.
I am LOVING this. It’s so BIG. I wish they could SHOW it though. But I think eventually, because the universe does in fact bend towards justice, someone will write me the fanfic that will have me lain flat on the floor from devastation. Because omg the Jabitha relationship has SCOPE.
And the final kicker- Jughead doesn’t recognize his stupid hat. Ha!
P.S. The title reference, “Don’t Worry Darling” if it’s to that movie that came out this year, in 2023, then it’s very twisty and fun. Because that movie is about a man manipulating a woman’s mind for his own aggrandizement, and this episode is the mirror of that - a woman manipulating a man’s mind, with his explicit agreement, to save the universe.
#riverdale season 7#riverdale opinion#jabitha#tabitha tate#jughead jones#veronica lodge#riverdale episode 7.1#i am back on my bullshit#but wow these are taxing to write#i was so insanely bored during the pandemic that i could churn out one of these per day almost lol#i love this show so much#riverdale positivity#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#Riverdale s6#riverdale recap#riverdale episode recap
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Comic News Insider Episode 1383 - Magical MoCCA Missive!
Comic News Insider: Episode 1383 is now available for free download! Click on the link or follow on Spotify/subscribe on iTunes!
Reviews: The Ambassadors #1, Harley Quinn vol. 4 #28, Dungeons & Dragons Saturday Morning Adventures #1, Rocketman & Rocketgirl #1, Riverdale s7 premiere
The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art (MOCCA) Festival was over the weekend and Jimmy attended both days. He gives his recap here talking about the overall show from setup to exhibitors to atmosphere to interviews and more. He also teases the interviews he got that you'll hear later this week split up into 3 episodes. Great talks with Hyesu Lee, Noah Van Sciver, Jess Ruliffson, David Reuss, Ashling Tu and Vyolet Jin. All amazing creators! As usual, Jimmy recruits some of his favorite reviewers to help out with this week's comic and TV reviews. Thanks to Ricky, Melissa, Edie, Emily and Marta! And to news anchor Emily for the news which includes: Joe Quesada signs with Amazon Studios, a Scott Pilgrim anime with the original cast is coming, K-Pop band Enhyphen will be in the Baby Shark movie and more! Also, get a hold of us!
Thanks for listening!
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The Sunnydale Herald Newsletter - Sunday, November 15th
Drusilla: (to the bird) I'll give you a seed if you sing.
Spike: The bird's dead, Dru. You left it in a cage, and you didn't feed it, and now it's all dead, just like the last one.
~~Lie to Me~~
[Drabbles & Short Fiction]
A small reprieve (Angel, T) by Bl4ckHunter
A Very Spuffy Christmas (Buffy/Spike, E) by SlayerOfSunnydale
Drastic Measures (Jenny/Giles, G) by HAL1500
Sticky Situation: Spider Slayer (Spiderman crossover, Buffy/Peter, E) by megamatt09
peachy keen (Cordelia/Willow, T) by Anonymous
The Fragments Left To Them (Willow/Spike, E) by inkbrush (Klaus_Kartoffel)
Sweet Torture (Spike/Xander, T) by jujukittychick
Shoes for one or for two (Cordelia/Willow, G) by Anonymous
The vampire of many talents: The pianist (Buffy/Spike, NC17) and The vampire of many talents: The chef (Buffy/Spike, R) by Tennsters
[Chaptered Fiction]
Twice in A Lifetime Chapter 23 (Buffy/Angel, T) by Sionell89
Chosen to Not Fade Away Chapter 15 (Buffy/Spike, E) by buffy_and_spike
What You Do Afterwards: Season Two Chapter 8 (Cordelia/Doyle, G) by myheadsgonenumb
Vampires in Riverdale Chapter 9 (Riverdale crossover, Buffy, E) by BuffyAndBetty
Xander Harris: Incubus King Chapter 3 (The Last Sovereign crossover, Buffy/Xander, E) by Oldwolf
Magical Connections Chapter 14 (HP crossover, Buffy, G) by lateVMlover (Buffyworldbuilder)
Buffy’s Seven Drunken Nights Chapter 4 (Dawn/Spike, T) by steeleye
All About Faith Chapter 89 (Multiple crossovers, Faith/Bruce, E) by Peanutbuttertoast
Prisoners of Love di Bewildered (traduzione in italiano) Chapter 11 (Italian, Buffy/Spike, E) by DarkGiulia69, kasumi_EFP
Map of the Stars Chapter 6 (SG1 crossover, Buffy/Jack, T) by gracerealized
Homewrecker Chapter 12 (Tara/Willow, M) by taylorgirl6
Found Complete (Tara/Buffy, T) by Stranger_In_Town
The Spider, The Slayer and The Key Chapter 17 (MCU crossover, Dawn/Peter, T) by Aragorn_II_Elessar
Broken Not Destroyed Chapter 31 (Arrow crossover, Buffy/Quentin, T) by Buffyworldbuilder
Caged Birds Don't Sing Chapter 9 (Faith/Buffy, M) by RavenclawSlayer
The Sexual Tension Award Chapter 3 (Cordelia/Buffy, T) by KebbyOriginal
And I Still Do (Love You) Chapter 23 (Buffy/Spike, M) by Slaymesoftly
Fighting the Darkness Chapter 21 (Multiple crossovers, Buffy, T) by lateVMlover (Buffyworldbuilder)
mother says i deserve better Chapter 2 (Buffy/Spike, T) by nothing_is_beautiful_and_true
Skipping the Stone Chapter 58 (Buffy/Spike, M) by badwolfjedi, sandy_s
What Goes Around Chapter 5 (Buffy/Spike, NC17) by celtic_goddess
Know Your Mind Chapter (Buffy/Spike, NC17) by SzmattyCat
First Wives but Second Loves Chapter 11 (Buffy/Spike, R) by rkm
Hellmouth Hurricane Chapter 9 (Buffy/Spike, PG13) by sandy_s
Anniversary Chapter 22 (Buffy/Spike, NC17) by Nik84
Let's Do The Time Warp Again... Chapter 2 (Buffy/Spike, R) by Behind Blue Eyes
The Wizarding World and the Dangerous Muggles Chapter 20 (Multiple crossovers, FR18) by Rich
A Sovereign Light to Unite the World Chapter 4 (Multiple crossovers, Xander, FR21) by ShadowMaster
[Images, Audio & Video]
Graphics: Assorted banners (Drusila, Willow, & Dawn) by RachM
Crafts: I designed Spike, Buffy, and Scythe pins by outrunbun
Artwork: Spike by spacemuskrat
Angel - Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood by NileQT87
[Reviews & Recaps]
The BtVS S7 rewatch by Stoney
Happy Anniversary! Omg how old am I? by sintonia
Buffy #19 at CBR.com
PODCAST: Episode 42: Faith, Hope & Trick by Myth Taken
What's Wrong With Buffy's HD? Part 1,
Part 2, and
The Original Team reacts to Buffy's HD by BuffyHD
[Recs]
More Links Than A Bag Of Sausages by petzipellepingo
[Community Announcements]
Heroine Big Bang Artists Needed
[Fandom Discussions]
Angel & Spike #16 Preview by Priceless
What would have happened if Buffy had went to Northwestern University? by vampmogs
Joss Whedon Angel episodes, why not as good by vampmogs
idle thought #198 by madimpossibledreamer
“Seeing Red” still gives me chills. by LunchThreatener
Is Spike a masochist? by Hellmouth999
Question: Favorite plot-twist on “Angel”? by dcgraca
Thoughts on who Buffy might end up with after Season 12? by clover_frank_gold
Thoughts on the Wicca drug metaphor? by MonkeyOnYourMomsBack
Reevaluating Dawn by xcjm
writing an essay about language in btvs by RelevantBreath
Who else liked Skip? by sahinduezguen
LILAH MORGAN APPRECIATION POST! by SarcasticGayBitch
If you gave the licence for one character to say "FUCK" per season, who would get it and why? by Themaleslayer
The thing in Season 4 Episode 10 of Buffy is hilarious (big episode spoilers) by GuitarTest
I just don't like Faith, at all. by SpicyHashbrowns
Does anyone know what did creators of some of the most popular modern shows say about Buffy by Proud3GnAthst
"Potential" is my favorite Dawn episode - any other fans? by jdpm1991
Conner? by jcs050607
Watcher’s Convention - plot gap? by harrisonfoured
The Angel series actually makes a big difference for the Buffy series by GuitarTest
When the ending of "Awakening" happened how did you react? by jdpm1991
More little ATS things I love by illyriashade56
spike deserved someone who loved him by versacherries
it’s wild to me how after they kicked her out of her own home Buffys friends acted like nothing happened by clumsycapitolunicorn
[Articles, Interviews, and Other News]
Every Known Slayer (In Canon) at Screen Rant
10 Friendships That Should Have Happened (But Never Did) at Screen Rant
Submit a link to be included in the newsletter
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Arrow S7 Ep1 Thoughts
I haven’t watched Arrow in a long time, but watching the recap and uhhh Ricardo Diaz or whatever was the most annoying fucking bitch… the biggest reason I’m watching Arrow is because of the Elseworld’s crossover (since I stopped on the episode for The Flash) and also because the show is ending and I’d hate to not finish it after putting in six seasons so far so let’s fucking goooooooooo
- See, this is the problem I have with many shows. They use the same annoying villain for more than a season and honestly I just want the pain to fucking end. Why do you think they only have villains for a season, and then they defeat them and are never seen again? Because otherwise it gets repetitive and boring. Also low-key forgot that William was Oliver’s son. Oh… that was a nightmare Oliver was having um… well everything still applies.
- Ruelle’s songs are always amazing for badasses I love it and her!
- “Watch it, Arrow” bitch are you really going to try and fight him he’s THE ARROW. You’ve seen him fight. Stop being a little bitch. Also, wouldn’t they have to put Oliver in solitary confinement considering he’s a hero (or at least, a big target for the other inmates)?? And what does that security guard have against Oliver like—
- OMG THAT DUDE… I MADE A SUPERNATURAL FIC WHERE MY OC WAS HIS SISTER AND WENT ON WITH SAM AND DEAN. Brendan Fletcher is such a great actor! Anyways,,, we all know Oliver���s going to refuse helping him because he’s trying to stay alive and out of trouble but it’s in his nature to help people so he’ll definitely end up helping him.
- That guy looks like Mick Rory. Also, okay dumbasses, good luck beating the shit out of T H E A R R O W 😂😂😂
- How to tell that someone is cosplaying as the Arrow other than Oliver being in jail: they unnecessarily shot this guy in the hand, and then made a spectacle out of him by posing him on the tire of a police car at the precinct.
- Why does Oliver look surprised he has a visitor? YOOOOOOOO DIGGLE!!!! Oliver’s number one since the first episode 🥺🥺🥺
- OLIVER’S EYES WATERING UP MY FUCKING HEART!!! Also, I give him shit sometimes but he’s so fucking strong? Physically, yes, but I mean mentally as well. Any other show would take some insane, nonsensical route to get the main character out of jail but Oliver knows that he has to stay down and out of the spotlight for once and he IS. Incredible.
- FELICITY?! WITH THAT PINK HAIR AND NOSE RING?! Please keep this hacker-esque Felicity! It’s so good and looks so fucking hot—
- This guy just trusting a random barista to know what to do, and around his work. What an idiot lmao but whatever I love hacker!Felicity we rarely see her. Her fake-name is Erin… okay. Interesting.
- Wait… Dinah, someone who literally betrayed them (last I remember, it’s hazy because again it’s been awhile and I remember her plot being kinda boring so I didn’t pay that much attention tbh) and was going off the rails… is now the captain of the precinct?? How? However, she SEEMS okay and was pretty cool from what I just witnessed so maybe I’ll give her another shot.
- RENE MY BABY BOIIIII!!! He’s teaching self defense to teenagers and his daughter PLEASE I LOVE THIS?!?!? I love his relationship with his daughter (and the idea of them fighting crime together when they’re able to again) but high key wasn’t she very, very young last season or am I tripping?
- “So it’s on us to protect ourselves” EXACTLY WHY RENE/WILD DOG IS TEACHING YOU SELF DEFENSE… Kid, he can’t be Wild Dog right now. I guess for safety or whatever but like damn I get that your parents were robbed the week before but maybe you could, I don’t know, ask Rene as your self defense teacher, to help you?? You don’t NEED Wild Dog…
- Can people stop calling Oliver “Arrow” it’s low-key annoying…
- NOT THUS DUMBASS KID TRYING TO BUY GUNS. BUT YASSS RENE KNOWING HE’D DO SOMETHING STUPID AND COMING TO THE RESCUE NOW I GET TO SEE RENE BEAT THESE GUY’S ASSES
- “The Green Arrow” technically still protecting Rene (despite the real Oliver and Rene’s iffy relationship) we love to see it
- Honestly though I think Oliver and Felicity are kind of cute and have an… okay… relationship but she’s much better suited with like nerdy guys. than guys like Oliver. I don’t know, I can’t put my finger on exactly why I’m not really into Olicity (other than the stans) but I miss her being a hacker and helping out instead of just being Oliver’s wife or whatever
- LAUREL!!! I mean, not the REAL Laurel if I remember correctly, I’m hoping that the Earth-2 (?) Laurel isn’t going to be as annoying and flip-floppy as she was last season.
- “… this New Green Arrow a threat” LIKE OLIVER WAS ONE??? YOU BITCHES DEEMED HIM A VILLAIN FOR THE DUMBEST BULLSHIT BECAUSE OF THE REAL VILLAIN RICARDO DIAZ, BUT NOW THAT THIS GREEN ARROW IS ACTUALLY A THREAT… NOW Y’ALL ARE SCARED?????????? Jesus Christ.
- It’s been 17 minutes but this feels like an entirely different show. Almost refreshing, if Ricardo Diaz wasn’t the villain (or that the government is against Oliver like idk it’s just not… interesting really)
- YAY AWWWW I MISS CURTIS!!! One of my ultimate faves 🥺🥺
- Well that dude is definitely not Tommy (even though I did hear about him coming back somehow??)
- That poor guy. Is he going to end up becoming a villain or something because Oliver didn’t protect him?
- Rene caring more about his kids having hope than their dumb immunity deal 🥺🥺🥺
- WILLIAM. If anyone hurts him I swear to GOD… I will kill them myself. Also, his bond with Felicity 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺
- How convenient that the guy’s cell is directly next to Oliver’s. And Oliver’s reaction to seeing the guy all fucked up… the guilt :(
- Yeah, both of you have family but you also are both in jail… maybe wrongly accused I don’t know if that’s true but in jail it’s a game of survival and as sad as it is for Oliver to look out for himself and his future, he’d risk everything for someone he doesn’t even know and he’s done that his whole life and look where he is now…
- YESSSS RENE MY FUCKING MAN!!! Doing what he needs to do for the sake of his kids at the community center!!!
- Oliver’s fighting naked I’m—
- WILLIAM SHOWING UP IN THE CORNER NOT ONLY SCARED THE FUCK OUT OF MY BUT IF ANYTHING HAPPENS TO HIM—
- “Thank God you monologue” THE WAY I’M SCREAMING!?!??! Also Felicity being allowed to fight back and be badass since Oliver isn’t there to take control we love to see independent women! Iris West could never! Honestly why the fuck does Diaz even CARE. All I remember is that he found out who Oliver was and didn’t like it because oof his own tragedy or something and now he wants to make Oliver pay, but it’s like… POINTLESS. It’s like Hiram Lodge in Riverdale… Diaz is boring.
- That “you’re okay” from Oliver when he saw Felicity aww!
- FELICITY… I GET THAT YOU’RE AFRAID BUT YOU CAN’T JUST LEAVE WILLIAM!!!
- How exactly is Felicity going to fight back, though. Like, yeah she knows some moves but her speciality is hacking.
- Dinah is still as annoying BUT she at least makes sense so that’s a plus.
- William’s “you’re leaving me” NOOO 😭😭😭
- YESSSSSS OLIVER GOING OFF!!!! Also not that guard just watching and doing nothing like he doesn’t make any sense. He hates Oliver but lets him fuck up the people that he has to know is doing bad shit like??
- WAIT A FUCKING SEC, ROOY AND WILLIAM?!?!?! OH BITCHHHHHHH
I’M HERE TALKING ABOUT HOW ARROW IS BORING BUT THIS EPISODE WAS SO FUCKING GOOD? Maybe it’s because it’s the season 7 premiere and the hype does tend to flutter off throughout the season but holy fuck!!! That was… really good!!
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Riverdale S7 E 11 (Chapter 128) Halloween 2
Jughead has found some sort of closure with the death of Rayberry though no answers yet about his potential murder, so he’s back to narrating. Except - you know how Veronica said that his storytelling had troubling sexual politics (i.e. misogynistic)? Well, he disappointed me by casually using the very unexamined & cliche misogynist phrase “crazy cat lady” about that woman who wanted to know if there was some milk she could borrow.
He is not showing his usual acumen at sussing out the weird. Because her obsession with filching milk from the associates of a known suicide is very intriguing. Some questions, such as: Is this area some place that is impossible to get milk delivery? Has she ever seen the milkman or is this a place the milk man never came and suddenly showed up for Rayberry? Is this residence in a food desert where getting basics like milk is difficult? Jughead is usually sympathetic to the underprivileged and yet- 1950s Jughead casual misogyny! #disappoint.
Anyway, after failing to follow up on that potential lead, he nevertheless goes charging over to Sheriff Keller’s house to bother him in the middle of a not great work month to tell him he’s doing his job badly. Unsurprisingly, Keller’s reaction is not amused. Jughead thinks that the milkman is important - “a killer milkman at large” he says, even though he doesn’t like saying it. He literally cringes at himself (decade upon decades ahead of his time) in having to say the words A, Killer, Milkman, At, Large. His hands are up in a very defensive, hands-up pose, begging Please don’t kick me out and Please don’t think i’m crazy. Keller is being very courteous. He says it’s already established that Rayberry suicided - which Jughead vehemently disagrees with.
It’s very hard to get law enforcement to redo homework they’ve already turned in. Keller is not at all an exception to this rule. He wants Jughead to produce someone who actually SAW a milkman, before he opens Rayberry’s case again. He tells Jughead to stop being annoying, trying to give him work and such, then segues immediately into exposition for this episode: Halloween is “not for teenagers looking to make trouble,” so he wants Jughead, a known trouble maker in Keller’s eyes because of his obsession with making Keller do proper policework, to remember “our ban.”
He has Jughead all wrong, does Keller, and always has across all universes. Like, the narrative shows that Jughead liked, at minimum, and probably adored (for unspecified reasons) Jason Blossom but Keller accused Jughead of somehow obtaining a gun, shooting Jason at point blank range in the forehead and then transporting his body all the way to the river to dump it there. Jughead for the past several episodes has been entirely isolated from anyone who does anything social in Riverdale right now (Archie, Reggie, Betty, Veronica), is trying to nurture a romantic friendship with Tabitha Tate, and is also revealed to be someone who has milk as part of his nutritionally complete breakfast - he’s as buttoned up and wholesome in his daily habits as anyone can be, in short - but Keller feels compelled to tell him to not get into trouble on Halloween.
We’re at the very fancily done traincar (Seriously, is that ceiling really like that or is that clever trompe l’oeil hollywood magic via Veronica??), where Jughead, who still manages to sleep with his felt crown without crushing it, contemplates a very full bottle of milk like it’s the skull of Yorick before smelling it then pouring it down the drain.
Many questions again - Does Jughead’s *train car* get milk delivery service? Also he has a drain? It connects to a sewage system somehow? (I also wonder this all the time about the OG Universe Dilton’s Bunker which has a flush toilet.) In any case, he just pours what he thinks might be poisoned straight into the sewage system.
While Drac’s Back (the song) is playing, Veronica is having breakfast at the Babylonium, which has on its marquee “Science Fiction Double Feature.” I have long black hair and bangs. Why can’t my hair look like that? How does she do that? She’s excited because she’s going to wear a whole dominatrix witch outfit to school.
Veronica’s outfit is EYE POPPING. Super high heels, large-gauge fishnet stockings, a boudoir chiffon skirt over a gem encrusted bodysuit, bare shoulders and arms, studded collar, an excellent broom prop and a fantastic witch hat. Her lipstick is black even. Everyone is completely agog, then it turns a bit mocking. As she walks down the hall, Veronica realizes these people don’t do Halloween costumes at school. At all.
When she enters the student lounge, her appearance is greeted with a record scratch sound. Betty can’t stop smiling about how hot Veronica looks to her (“You look- [grin grin grin] everything PLUS.”) Everyone’s reactions are so funny. Dilton is startled but can’t not stare at Veronica’s ass as she walks past him to talk to the people who count. Betty as I’ve said is very happy. Veronica glows so hot Reggie can’t actually keep looking directly at her. Archie is googly eyed with happiness. Why Betty and Archie look at each other to confirm that Veronica is indeed looking very fetching is the question that should launch much speculation about their respective sexualities.
In any case, Archie, then Cheryl, then Toni provide some context rules: Riverdale is uncomfortable about Halloween unlike Greendale which actively celebrates it, to such an extent that teenagers have to observe a sundown curfew. When Archie explains finally that a bunch of teenagers died in a tragic car accident on Halloween a few years back, Clay also looks intrigued. Veronica is bereft about not being able to do anything much on Halloween. Also nobody is allowed to say “hell” - Archie says “raising Heck” and Kevin says “raising Cain.” Reggie won’t even miss it - he’s never celebrated Halloween.
Veronica gives a little speech about all the ways Halloween can be liberating - for sexual exploration as well as to “honor the dead.” When Veronica says “back in Los Angeles” and describes what sounds like a normal Hollywood party, Cheryl has a really bad reaction. Why is Cheryl so enraged every time Veronica talks about Los Angeles? In any case, Veronica says the Lodges had “a family altar” where they lit candles for the dead. Im’ curious about the insane amount of Halloween related decorations that are up in this room anyway - no fewer than five carved Jack O Lanterns, a witch decal, more pumpkins, a couple skulls and ghosts and bats.
Veronica announces that nothing shall hold her down. She also uses the word “gatekeepers” and I don’t know if that means anything. Just in time to her saying, “Just when you think this town couldn’t get any kookier” in comes Jughead. Who immediately starts freaking out about milk. He starts screaming to NOT DRINK FRESH MILK ANYMORE. He slaps Dilton’s milk carton right out of his hand. He advises everyone to Drink Powdered Milk. Veronica is so tired of his silliness. I wonder if she’s going to do anything about it, because she is the only who is shown having a reaction.
We cut to Ethel, on the phone next to a very overbearing Mother Mary statuary AND a crucifix on the wall, telling Jughead she’s OK. Ethel says she misses Jughead (aww) and she misses school but this all just sails right over his head because he is still in his manic episode about the milkman. He tells Ethel, incarcerated in an insane asylum for claiming a milkman killed her parents, that he doesn’t want to upset her further but then directly proceeds to tell her his theory that his favorite author (which she knows! Because they’re actually really friends!) was murdered by “a” milkman at the very least. Then she has a great insight- that it would be useful to talk to whoever wrote the originating Killer Milkman comic. Just as Jughead is about to exult about this idea, Ethel hurriedly says that she has to go because the nun is giving her the evil eye, ending with a meaningful “hopefully I will see you soon.” Jughead wonders what she meant.
At the shop class facilities at school, Archie has successfully involved himself in Betty and Reggie’s twosome project to make Bella a usable car. Reggie and Archie are wearing matchy-matchy his-and-his T shirts smudged just the right amount with gunk (Reggie in white, Archie in green). The two of them flexing their muscles side by side doing car fiddly things makes Betty, who is dressed like Rosie the Riveter but with a pink paisley bandana that leaves most of her hair free, falls immediately into an erotic fugue. Her fantasies are really very specific - a threesome when the two others have eyes - and lips - only for her. Archie wants to give Reggie a “real Halloween” because all he’s ever done is cowtipping.
Betty defines a real Halloween as 1. trick or treating, 2. visiting a graveyard and 3. necking in a haunted house. Archie is familiar with 1 and 2 but she just made up No. 3, I think, because his eyes are bugging out of his head. He looks over at Reggie to see if he’s into it. Reggie is all about it.
Meanwhile, Veronica is flipping through the scrapbook of the Babylonium’s events of the past. There was in 1942 a Halloween Ghost Show at this theater, where a Phantom Polka Dancer would “appear in person” for “one night only.” The phantom polka dancer looks a lot like that possessed girl from The Exorcist. Veronica wants to recreate this ‘Halloween Ghost Show’ but before she can complete her smirk of satisfaction she hears thudding from what should be the empty projection room.
Very bravely, she goes to investigate. In it she discovers the gays necking. Clay pretends he left keys in the room. Veronica wants to do a 1920s glam themed ghost show for a Halloween night indoor event for the teenyboppers - staying with the letter of the law in order to flout its spirit. She’s so ambitious - it’s gonna be “monsters, movies, burlesque” ending with a “raising of the dead at midnight.”
Is Jughead even going to school anymore or does he just pop in and out of the publishing house at lunch time? In any case, his editor in chief keeps zero track of who has written what, so he doesn’t know who wrote the Milkman comics. But he does invite Jughead to the staff party for grown ups.
I guess Betty has completely subdued the school principal as well as his child psychologist boyfriend because the sheer amount of school real estate that Veronica’s promotional activities for her business is allowed to take up in its halls is astonishing. For a town that supposedly has a lot of trauma about four teenagers that died on Halloween, the booth she’s erected is enormous and spectacular. Clay and Kevin shout things like “There will be mayhem” but there isn’t a single disapproving adult in sight. Veronica is brazen. She promises that the four dead Riverdale students will “return from the dead before your very eyes.”
Later, Toni approaches Cheryl to show us that she’s back to her old bullshit. Here she is, drawing Cheryl ‘out’ again, to participate in a gay-backup-dancers-only floor show choreographed by Veronica. Cheryl isn’t so sure about any of this, and in any case, she has Vixen duties. After giving Cheryl (and only Cheryl) an inexplicably hard time about race dynamics, now Toni brings up the need for LGBTQ solidarity in order to force Cheryl into doing something that Cheryl isn’t sure about, that will also cause her to renege on an obligation she feels is a “tradition.” “People like us” is what Toni says. She is so manipulative.
At the end of basketball practice, Uncle Fucking Frank wants to make sure that none of his boys is gonna “go out wilding.” The locker room is also festooned with Halloween paraphernalia. Who put it up and why?
Julian starts to immediately make trouble. He has a little towel draped around his lower half, and I wonder if he’s in the same erotic fugue about Reggie and Archie, because he unnecessarily spread his legs to put one foot up on the bench to show both of them his junk as he invites the two to go ‘wilding’ with him. Reggie says no. Julian starts bark-hooting to get the other boys riled up after announcing that the ‘wilding’ is going to begin in the school parking lot after sundown on Halloween. Archie disapproves, turning his back on everyone to open his locker.
WE HAVE A VERY COOL LOCKER TO LOCKER TRANSITION as Archie closes his locker which then turns into Veronica’s locker door in the girls’ locker room, which she opens. She and Betty are talking about Reggie’s virginity (about Halloween) and how unbelievable that is. Veronica knows that Betty has the hots for someone, so she asks about it. Betty confesses that she has the hots for both Reggie and Archie. She advises Betty to use Halloween night to figure out which one makes her clit tingle more (“figure out which way your love compass is truly pointing”). Veronica’s skin in this game is that she wants to be told all about it the next day.
At the Blossom mansion, Penelope is drinking some red liquor. Her hair is amazingly ridiculous and it looks like a bitch to maintain it so it looks that exact degree of wrong and unflattering. Omg she’s so hot. Anyway. She thinks that Cheryl is less likely to gayly molest the other cheerleaders if they “decamp” the sleepover to “the grand hall.” Julian apparently is fully aware of what is being discussed, enough to object to his mother putting images of his sister engaging in “hanky panky” into the dinner conversation.
Adult supervision finally catches up with Veronica just as she’s putting the final touches on the decorations for her Halloween show. Alice Cooper appears, bristling with insecurity about the new competition in the Halloween entertainment of Riverdale of which she’s had a monopoly so far (“It’s not going to affect our ratings.”) Hence the whole Halloween taboo is partially revealed to be not so much about lowering teen mortality nor in honor of the dead. It’s about ratings & eyeballs on advertisers. Alice says that she will “allow” the event to proceed, but tells Veronica that she has been “put on notice.” About what? That Alice disapproves of Veronica?
After stocking up on Powdered Milk, Jughead hears someone walk directly up to his (very insecure) residence. He’s immediately terrified. He hides after grabbing some sort of hammer or poker or something.
It’s Ethel! She’s all smudged with dirt, wearing a very disheveled inmate uniform.
Jughead wants to know how she escaped from the asylum. She says that she’d heard about the escape tunnels, so she spent all her time looking for them. Having located them, it was her truncated call with Jughead that “gave me the push I needed to make a break for it.” Because she is alone that absolutely nobody ever calls her (not Betty, not Alice, not Dilton, not Ben) that she clung on to the one slight indication she was entirely forgotten! The two of them exchange a tender look. I like them together. Ethel says her keepers were cruel and abusive, so she just needs to make it a “couple months” until she’s 18. Jughead wants to invite her to stay with him, but it’s not safe. He offers Rayberry’s apartment, because Rayberry had the very useful foresight to pay rent through to the end of the year.
Jughead is just the nicest. He is concerned that she might be too afraid to stay in a dead man’s apartment, but Ethel is stalwart. He also invites her to a party her first night sprung from jail.
In the bathroom at school, Midge seeks permission to not have to go to the slumber party from Cheryl. Cheryl responds at first with the party line - the slumber party is “a Vixen tradition” and “the center must hold.” Midge folds immediately.
Cheryl is, I will note again, incredibly powerful in this timeline. Archie really, really didn’t know what he was talking about when he said people don’t listen to Cheryl. He’s simply protected from her wrath by dint of having the ginger gene.
But then, Cheryl realizes she wants to go to the Veronica-led event, so she comes up with the idea to let Evelyn (“that witchy witch”) to host the slumber party instead, so she and Midge can go to the Babylonium instead. The two girls (the gay one and the pregnant one) sweetly affirm to each other how discreet each of them are, and promise to reveal a big secret on Halloween night.
So even though he allowed (or was powerless against) Veronica to do whatever she wanted in terms of her commercial activities, Featherhead and his boyfriend still have hard-ons for giving Jughead Jones a rough time. Jughead is subjected to questioning by the pair as well as Keller and Sister Woodhouse about the missing Ethel Muggs. Being a smart boy, Jughead has learned all the right lessons from Rayberry about how to deal with these people’s pressure tactics. He responds with sarcastic amazement that they’ve essentially ‘lost’ Ethel - that is, he avoids lying but simply neglecting to answer an unstated question. Then when Keller threatens him with another home invasion, Jughead directly asks him not to ‘trash’ the place with a smile, which he wipes from his face immediately to demonstrate his disdain. As he takes his leave, a very Halloween ghost cackles for him as part of the soundtrack transition to the next scene.
At home, Archie and Reggie are putting themselves into the costumes created by Mary Andrews (who can’t stand to be seen now that there are THREE men in the house.) Reggie and Archie discuss Betty. The boys boast to each other about “getting vibes” from Betty. Archie suddenly wonders if Betty might want to “make it” with one of them this night. Made entirely of cheekbones, pouty lips and pecs, this causes Reggie to very homosexually get super close to Archie to say that it wouldn’t surprise him if Betty had such horny plans, since “she ain’t blind.”
It’s very ambiguous actually if he means only himself, or Archie, or both of them. In the mirror, he’s looking at himself frontwise, but he’s also looking at Archie’s sculpted arms and chest and the rest of him in the all american white T and jeans. Archie either genuinely doesn’t (he is just not smart in this universe) or pretends to think that Reggie meant only himself. So they stand shoulder to shoulder in the mirror, because that’s a very heterosexual thing to do, while Archie says that “she might wanna get with me, Reg.” Having been thus rejected, Reggie walks away from him. Unholstering his big gun, Reggie suggests that if either of them get the feeling that Betty has chosen either one of them, the unchosen will “vamoose.” Archie agrees, which leads to the two of them pointing their guns at each other. Twice.
Ethel and Jughead arrive at the Halloween party. I wish I knew what they were dressed as. Jughead is wearing a huge stovepipe hat. Ethel is in the mask that Jughead promised her. The extraordinarily elaborate costumes that all these comic book industry people are wearing would put a lot of cons to shame. Bernie screams for Jughead, launching himself into an embrace. Jughead looks extremely happy to be embracing Bernie. Bernie says “It’s gonna be a crazy night” so Jughead and Ethel enter the fray.
While her parents are hamming it up on tv, Betty’s three suitors (Reggie, Archie and for some reason Dilton) are waiting for her to appear at their home. When Archie and Reggie (meanly) imply that Dilton is there as a form of hero worship for the two of them in his role as “the water boy,” Dilton stands up for himself to let them know that Betty invited him in particular to be here.
When she appears, Betty’s cleavage looks absolutely amazing. It brings Reggie and Archie to their feet. Dilton is so agog that he doesn’t know what she’s supposed to be. Betty has really thought of everything about this entrance, from the costume to the perfect thing to say. She’s Goldilocks because “she couldn’t decide on a bed so she tried all three. Dilton has a really huge pumpkin head as his costume.
Reggie is having the best time trick or treating. He cocks out a hip and deploys his dimples to maximum effect. Of course, the good times can’t last. The four of them witness Julian and others bashing pumpkin decorations with baseball bats as they drive by, hollering. Of course, the cops are nowhere to be seen when it’s Julian Blossom flouting the rules and causing actual property damage. Dilton wisely decides he’s had enough, and goes home.
At Veronica’s event at the Babylonium, things look very “Cabaret” to me, which is 1930s not 20s, but it doesn’t matter. People look very sexy here. The costumes for this are eye popping as well - one girl has a whole 3 foot tall headdress and everything. As soon as Cheryl and Midge enter, Toni is all over Cheryl.
I was so happy they didn’t make me listen to Fangs singing at his big gig, but Riverdale betrays me by forcing me to listen to him at this party.
At the Pep Comics party, workaholic artists gonna art, apparently because sketching is going on - with Ethel participating! Jughead interviews a series of very interestingly wonky-looking people. One guy in a silk top hat who says he doesn’t know who wrote the Milkman story but is seething with jealousy over it. Jonah, in smudgy eyeliner, doesn’t think it was that great. Then Jughead talks to the devil, who tells him that it was “Ted Sullivan, a journeyman writer.” (Ted Sullivan is on the writing staff at Riverdale, and wrote among others, the “Killing Mr. Honey” episode.) After saying his name four times, Riverdale drops the bomb that this Ted is dead, died the same way as Rayberry, because he didn’t think he could live up to the masterpiece that was the Milkman Comic. Then the devil launches into a speech about “the enemy is here, at home” and “we’re the enemies.” Jughead is very startled.
After lighting a truly huge number of candles at the graveyard, Reggie and Bettie are howling at the sky. Reggie says he knows a lot about wolves because he’s a fellow alpha who grew up with them. His way of showing off is so cute and so dumb. “Is that what you think you are? An alpha?” Betty asks in a butter soft voice.
I know they’ll deny it, but Riverdale writing team has read at least some of those werewolf-Serpent fanfics, because this set up - howling together ‘as a joke’ in a graveyard on Halloween then having Reggie and Betty talk like this is almost a fricking prompt for some Retty/Beggie werewolf AUs to be drafted.
What could be a very interesting alpha-omega discussion between this pair is interrupted by Julian and a couple Bulldogs still whooping it up as they cruise around town being a nuisance. Seeing Julian breaks the mood between Reggie and Betty, causing her to go seek Archie out.
Of course, Archie is sadly contemplating his father’s gravestone. Betty starts to apologize immediately. Even though he clearly isn’t, Archie reassures her that he’s fine and that it’s ok and it’s fine. Then he demonstrates how haunted he is by this father’s absence -he immediately launches into a memory. The two used to do a lot of trick or treating together as kids, even doing Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher. Then I realize that I fell for it - THIS WAS ALL A PLOY. Archie’s plan was to tug at her heartstrings so he could bring up that he was the OG hotstuff. Well dang, Archie!
Reggie tries to interrupt but his face already admits defeat. He asks to be taken to the haunted house. The three of them go to the murder house. Betty is not at all spooked, so she wanders further into the house to look for “eleven up.”
Reggie is really the most honorable, because he takes this time to discreetly tell Archie that he’s going to vamoose as he originally proposed. Archie is nice too, telling him he doesn’t have to do that, but Reggie is a man’s man (and a genuine ladies’ man) because cock blocking out of spite is just not something he’s willing to do no matter how enticing the girl. Betty comes back with orange sodas. Archie grants Reggie a good enough exit, by telling Betty that Reggie was tired. Betty, despite her earlier threesome fantasy, doesn’t much care which of the pair she gets. She smiles at Archie.
Veronica so loves giving speeches and hosting events. She looks so happy in her black lipstick, standing in front of four coffins. I still can’t believe that this event is going to go forward in this way. This is so callous it’s kind of funny. Anyway, Veronica is going on about the midnight feature, dropping the fact that Boris Karloff is her godfather.
The music number is from the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Which is very timeline busting. So are we doing like a backwards-reverse Back to the Future thing where instead of a fictional white guy taking credit for a real-life black musical invention from his past ( Rock ‘n’ Roll) we have a fictional Latina woman taking credit for a real-life musical written by a white man in her future? The twisty turny of all this is also breaking my brain because the singing in the actual movie of the real musical (Rocky Horror Picture Show) was very very imperfect except for Tim Curry and Meatloaf, and intentionally so. The singing in the musical numbers of Riverdale also have this same trait - it’s intentionally imperfect except when Josie and Kevin were singing. The overall technical quality of the singing is better than in that musical film (Susan Sarandon can barely sing, which places the Cheryl, Betty, Veronica and Archie actors in a higher competence category). But for some reason (oh fine, because I love Rocky Horror Picture Show) this marmoreal smoothness of the singing by everyone involved is very very horrifying to me. I’m getting literal shivers of distress. There’s just too much camp happening. When it meets the airbrushed camp of Riverdale, the rough-around-the-edges camp of Rocky Horror evaporates, leaving only raunchiness. Riverdale has highly sexual teens, and always has, but at the same time it gets very coy with how it describes sex, sexuality and sexual activity, so I was a bit startled at Clay belting out “orgasmic rush of lust” like that.
Kevin calling for “mommy” when we’ve never seen her but has caused him to be, well, how he is by calling him fat one time because he actually was and he never got over it, is a lot. But then they pan away as he sings “what’s this? Let’s see” as he starts to look at his own crotch I REALLY WANT TO KNOW what the choreo was implied to be. Did he look into the contents of his own crotch pouch? Why is the audience reacting like that??
Cheryl then comes out with the most on the nose bit. She scream-sings: I feel released/ Bad times deceased - and so on. Cheryl has ballet training, and again the technical competence which doesn’t at all cover up the extremely clunky nature of the steps she’s being made to do is horrifying. At the end of her number, she pulls Toni close to kiss her in front of everybody.
We cut to Veronica doing Frank’n’Furter which is a bit like Nicole Kidman being made to sing Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend. There are certain songs that can never be sung by anyone other than that one singer, and “Don’t Dream It” is really one of those songs. The topsy turvy un-doing and re-doing continues, because for a woman (and a very cis, very pretty one at that) wanting to be “dressed just the same” as Fay Wray has zero subversive energy compared to Tim Curry as the transsexual alien doing it, so there’s a neutralizing of the power of that song. In order to make up for it, they put Veronica in a Marlene Dietrich tuxedo-for-girls from Morocco (where Dietrich sings a floor show and then kisses a girl on the mouth in front of everyone to general delight and applause). It’s not fair to pit Veronica’s Riverdalian version of this song (and the screechy belting they make her do given the key choices) against the true blue one by Tim Curry, but it must be said: There’s nothing sensual about the way Veronica is saying things like “give yourself over to absolute pleasure.” Everything she’s doing - the volume of the singing, the thinness of the voice, the effortful meaninglessness of the choreography - is the opposite of giving yourself over to anything.
Into all this, Alice, looking like a bomb has hit her, enters the theater. She reacts with horror. I don’t know if the horror is supposed to be about the nature of the song she’s hearing or it’s from being turned on by Clay dancing gayly in just his shorts. Kevin articulates her shellshocked reaction with yet more exactly on the nose misappropriation of the lyrics (“It’s beyond me/ Help me Mommy”).
All the extra give the hardworking main cast of Riverdale a standing ovation.
Elsewhere, Reggie is walking home all lonesome along the deserted road when very ominously, Julian and two others in death masks stop beside him. Julian says that Reggie should “join the fun unless you’ve got something better to do” because he is “going across the bridge to Greendale to raise some hell.”
OOOH HE SAID THE FORBIDDEN H- WORD!! Was - was the strange word choices in Raising Cain and Wilding and all that leading up to this moment?
Reggie isn’t going to make it with Betty today, so he hops into the car of destruction.
At the haunted house, Archie finally makes a move to Betty, telling her he wants to kiss her. She says she feels exactly the same way. Unfortunately, they are cockblocked by a milkman who peers in on them. Betty is smart - she isn’t afraid of no ghosts, but a real-life white guy being creepy is very good reason to run the heck away.
After the event, Clay and Kevin are cleaning up like the good theater people they are. Veronica wants to do a weekly midnight event at the theater that is “Fun and Campy.” We are being extraordinarily on the nose today. Anyway, the gays are worried about Veronica’s homelessness after parental abandonment, leading to her having to live in the movie theater. Veronica lies about all of it (“everything’s peachy”) because she can’t stand sympathy or pity from others.
At the Diner, Midge and Fangs have told Cheryl and Toni their big secret (her “honeybun” in the oven). Midge then remarks on the fact that Cheryl and Toni have effectively come out to all the teenagers who were there at the Babylonium. Toni is so glad that they’ve all put away their masks.
I don’t know how loud they were speaking or if Evelyn just has superhuman hearing capacity, but she is there at the diner (somehow? why? how? isn’t she supposed to be hosting the sleepover? Is she there to pick up a midnight snack??)
Archie and Betty are safely back at home. They tell each other that they had the “best” time ever. Now, they are cockblocked by Alice, who takes out her distress at finding Clay very hot by yelling at her daughter in front of the whole neighborhood.
With a quiet moment to herself, Veronica lights a votive candle to… Rudolph Valentino. Why is he on the altar with her grandmother? Where’s Boris Karloff?? There’s a Jughead amount of candles lit in her small living area she’s made in the movie theater. Veronica sleeps with a photo of herself with her parents. Oh the poor baby. She’s very upset.
Jughead has walked Ethel to Rayberry’s apartment. Jughead is not wearing any sort of headgear - no crown, no jokey hat. I - I feel like he’s en déshabillé. Unable to resist the hair,
Ethel invites him in, using a tone of voice that sets all my shipping urges tingling. Except -oh poor Ethel. This is the universe - THIS IS IT! - the one where she could totally have a thing with Jughead, but there’s Tabitha! Tabitha the Real is out there saving all of the multiverse and Tabitha of this world is out there on the bus tour against racism. No dice. Jughead says he’s tired and that he needs to feed the dog. Sigh. Ethel totally reacts like this is a rejection of her invitation to an assignation, but she’s nice about it. But come on Jughead, live a little! (Sorry, Tabitha, but Ethel was here - in my heart - first.)
As soon as Ethel enters the Rayberry apartment, dun dun dun, that weird guy in the milkman outfit is totally in there waiting for her.
Jughead is walking out when he gets accosted by that very plot-important lady obsessed with forcing her neighbors to make a milk donation to her cat. She says, “Oh I thought you were the milkman” because she heard the bottles again. There’s both a Dutch Angle AND dolly zoom happening as Jughead puts it all together, before rushing back to the Rayberry former residence shouting for Ethel.
Jughead breaks down the door! He falls faceforward into the apartment, only to make direct eye contact with the corpse on the floor. “Jeepers” he says and - seriously, truly, this was wonderful line delivery. I mean it.
Ethel is having HER MOMENT. She’s so super tall to begin with, so she looks totally magnificent, holding a bloody knife, standing victorious over the dead milkman, as she passionately tells Jughead, “I told everyone it was a milkman!” Jughead looks so scared.
Archie is woken up in the middle of the night by Uncle Frank, who seems very upset. He says a carful of Bulldogs went over the bridge into the River. Archie stares upset at Reggie’s very empty bed.
If they made Reggie die in the racist’s car I will be pitching a FIT.
#too many thoughts about Riverdale#Riverdale episode 128#riverdale 7.11#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#riverdale episode recap
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Riverdale S7 E20 (Chapter 137) Goodbye, Riverdale
We open with Betty Cooper’s signature color as everyone around her thinks of her - pink and soft and fluffy. Cherry blossom petals are falling from leaves against a backdrop of a pretty yellow shingle house with pretty windows. (Betty doesn’t actually consider herself to be pink per se- one of her earliest fights with her mother that we saw were whether she has the right to scarlet lipstick).
A Jughead Jones (not THE, but A) tells us that it’s “the present day.” 67 years after 1955. It’s 2023. Not that it means anything in RIverdale where it was 2020 for 7 years. He starts to speed through people’s lives. The teenagers”have become adults.” We scan to black and white photos of Betty, Veronica, Cheryl and Toni looking very wholesome. There’s a glamorous photo of Polly Amorous performing that number she market tested on the girls of Riverdale. And a photo of Alice Cooper holding something up, looking very proud. There’s a photo of all the participants (with Cheryl in the center) of Riverdale Grandstand. In the most laconic way, this Jughead says people grew up and got married and had kids and raised them and also, uh died.
The knick knacks we are show are another shot of Polly Amorous, a tourist souvenir nightlight of the Statue of Liberty, an old hardcover copy of Kingsley’s Human Sexuality. The Riverdale postcard that adorned 1955 Jughead’s window in his train car, a little handout for The Annual Sock Hop, the button for Bee and Vee for Co-Presidents button. The final item we get shown is a photo of Betty doing her panty flashing turns on her mother’s tv show.
“The story tonight is about saying goodbye to a town that was once lost in time.” He says it’s going to start near the end with an 86 year old Elizabeth Cooper, who is hanging out with her granddaughter. Her hobby is apparently to check the obituaries daily. (I mean, obituaries are in every newspaper, so does this mean Betty reads ONLY the obituaries?) The dark haired granddaughter asks Grandma Betty about knowing someone in high school who is the subject of the obituary. She remarks that whoever is dead seems “like an interesting person.”
I had to pause to look. The obituary is for Forsythe “Jughead” Jones, in glasses, tie and suspenders. I can’t make out what it says.
Grandma Betty (there are multiple Betties in this episode just like Jughead so I’m going to have a heck of a time getting the nomenclature clear) says that the dead person was. Jughead Jones, in a blue S t-shirt, yellow suspenders and the felt crown flashes like a hallucination next to her as Grandma Betty fondly agrees that Jughead was indeed an interesting person. He’s smiling very brightly He rarely does actually, in this entire series, including the most recent season, so it’s nice that Grandma Betty specifically remembers him in this rare moment of unabashed grinning.
The granddaughter is named Alice.
Alice.
ALICE?
Immediately I don't like or trust Grandma Betty. It’s not my culture to recycle names so something about this western habit seems very ill-starred to me to begin with, but you named a girl child after ALICE COOPER on purpose! Oh NO!
Anyway, Grandma Betty says that she and her friends were all interesting people, and they had “marvelous adventures” the likes of which Granddaughter Alice “wouldn’t believe.”
Uh. If you’re in your 80s in 2023, Grandma Betty, you’re not the Betty that had marvelous adventures, per se. At least not with the other three members of the core four. Like, you barely ever even talked to Jughead.
Betty says that since Jughead is dead, she’s “the last of them.” With this thought she decides that she wants to go back to Riverdale before it’s too late, because she’s forgetting more things daily, and she wants to go back before she “forgets everything.” Granddaughter Alice agrees before taking her leave.
Mercifully the show shows me the obituary.
Forsythe “Jughead” Jones (no Pendleton or the 3rd), Prolific Editor of Jughead’ Madhouse Magazine, Dies at 84.
But the photo they use must have been when his Madhouse magazine did something because he is not in 84 year old make up. Grandma Betty lets out a heavy sigh.
It’s night-time now, and Grandma Betty has fallen asleep with her Riverdale year book. The nightlight comes on. (I feel like this nightlight is important somehow between the Cooper sisters but I can’t recall). This wakes her up, making her call out “Hello?”
There’s a jingle of bells. A Jughead Jones is sitting on a chair, staring at her, smiling. Watching her sleep?? Suddenly all the lights are on. Taking the entirety of this in stride, Grandma Betty calmly tells him that she was going through “our yearbook,” The Visitor Jughead Jones (I told you, nomenclature was going to be a problem) also acts like they just always talk to each other, asking casually what she was trying to remember. She tells him that she’s going to Riverdale tomorrow, and her granddaughter is taking her. She then says, “Going through these pictures, I just wish I could go back to how it was.”
Which the fuck Jughead is this that she’s hallucinating/ is visiting her? He’s wearing a beanie, an S T shirt, flannels. His demeanor is closer to the Brittle Sadness Jughead of S1, he’s not wearing the glasses of Adult Jughead, he also doesn’t have the manic-eyed chipmunk cheek demeanor of slick-haired RiverVale Narrator Jughead.
Anyway, Visitor Jughead tells her, like this is completely normal, that “You could pick a day, and I’ll take you.” He also warns her that even though this is possible, it will be painful, because she’ll have this double consciousness - one part of her will be living that day, and another part will be watching herself live it. So then Betty says that if it’s actually possible to “go back” then she will pick a day that she “missed.” The day she picks is the day of the yearbook handout, which she missed out on entirely because she “had the mumps and had to stay home.” She never got her yearbook signed.
It’s very disconcerting watching the young Jughead look at this old woman in a paternalistic way as she talks in an increasingly babyish way about how, out of 86 years of life, the thing she regrets with a lot of feeling is being sick on the day she could’ve gotten her yearbook signed.
Visitor Jughead, looking very lighthearted because she doesn’t actually want to relive a day that actually occurred, cheerfully tells Grandma Betty that all she needs to do is walk through a door (which magically appears) bearing the sign “Betty’s Bedroom,” and “you’ll have your day, the day you missed.”
There’s another magical twinkling of bells.
Ah. OK. So you see, every single thing that happens on ‘this day” absolutely didn’t happen. The actual day was a wash for Betty - she was sick in bed with the mumps. She has only a second hand (if at all) recollection of how that day went, maybe via phone call from Veronica or something. The things that happen on the other side of that door, DID NOT HAPPEN.
We’re on the other side of the door, when it opens and Betty walks out of a black void, looking young and played by Lili R and in a super pink outfit. The black void is absolute. She leaves the door open as she walks into a bright sunny day in her 1955 bedroom, to do a twirl, celebrating how “it’s exactly like I remembered.” Then she catches a glimpse of her 1955 self in the mirror and is stunned. I mean, anyone would be, to wake up and find yourself in Betty Cooper’s face and body with the 1955 styling - aesthetics 10/10, A++ etc. She gawks in wonder at herself, which is very funny, before turning around to ask Visitor Jughead (who hasn’t changed clothes or anything to make himself fit into 1955 better) if this is what she really looked like.
Bathed in gold light, Visitor Jughead nods at TimeTravel Betty.
“There were so many things I wanted to change about myself back then,” Betty says, before bursting out with “Why? I was perfect!” I mean, speak for yourself, I guess, but also I kind of know what she means. “We were all perfect!” she exclaims.
Visitor Jughead has an eerie agelessness about him, which is different from Angel Gabriel Inhabingting Jughead. He has no comment to make to Timetravel Betty about any of this, and just calmly, distantly observes how she reacts to this fictional world with 1955 trappings he’s constructed for her (reasons unknown). Reminder once again that she hasn’t been taken back in time to a day that happened. This is his personal magical gift to her (is he HER guardian angel? Why does he take the shape of a Jughead?)
Betty doesn’t really care what he thinks, and continues to exult over the perfect verisimilitude of this false world. “My window!” she cries. “How many sunrises have I seen out this window!” Well, technically speaking, none, because this isn’t in any way a real world. This is a fourth alternate universe (after Riverdale proper, Rivervale, and 1955 Riverdale) constructed specifically for Grandma Betty.
Then we see an Archie come into view, getting ready to leave his house for the day. “How many times have I looked out this window into Archie’s?” she says, her eyes suddenly full of emotion, her voice husky. This question, Visitor Jughead does answer: “In the thousands, at least.” (I mean, she and he lived in adjoining houses with the same assigned bedrooms since they were very small kids, so given the 365 days in the year, thousands seems like rather a lowball number).
Because Visitor Jughead is an omniscient narrator as well as a time-bubble builder, he tells a calmly accepting Timetravel Betty that Archie is “about to have a talk with his mom, about what he’s going to do after graduation.” She doesn’t ask like, How do you know that or whatever. She just turns to the window, apparently to … watch?
Then we cut to Archie looking at a pamphlet for “Building America’s Highways.” Inside, it says things like “Make an Adventure Out of It!” and “Everyone is Welcome” showing very cheerful, burly men in overalls doing manly work with other men. “Help build America for us, our children and those visiting our lands. Strong hands and positive minds are building roads for generations to come” and so forth. This is how you get trafficked, Archie, but okay sure, believe a pamphlet.
Mary Andrews summons Archie to breakfast. Archie says that he has to let Vic known if he’s going to be “joining his crew on Monday.” This upsets Mary immediately. She sits down to say that it doesn’t make sense to her, wanting to “dig ditches.” Archie starts to riff on what we’ve just see in the pamphlet. He is all about Eisenhower’s call to build roads “from coast to coast, all the way to California.” Then he adds that it’ll “give him something to write about.” She points out that he’s been plenty prolific while staying put in Riverdale. Archie patiently reminds her he’ll be gone three months at the most. Mary tells Archie that he’s going to “take one look at the Pacific Ocean, and forget Riverdale.” He insists that Riverdale will always be “our home.” She then says the things you should never say to Archie Andrews if you don’t want him to do something- “You’re just like your father.” In any universe, including this fourth one, this is the way to unlock Archie Andrew’s heart. If Mary actually wants Archie to return home from his road building adventure, she shouldn’t say what she says next: “He always dreamt of settling in the West.”
It’s very bizarre that Fred Andrews who died in 1952 would think of California as “the West” like that, like he was born in 1852 but okay. Sure.
Then Mary says that Archie has her blessing to settle in the West. So at least, this third? (because does Mary Andrews exist in Rivervale??) Mary Andrews is consistent with the others - she doesn’t want that much to do with Archie Andrews, her son.
The scene ends with them telling each other they love each other and embracing. Mary starts crying.
It’s clear that somehow Timetravel Betty was in fact able to ‘watch’ all this along with the audience. She comes in from the side as Mary’s upset face starts to fade, to inquire of Visitor Jughead, “I don’t remember. What happened to Mrs. Andrews?”
There’s a whooshing sound, and Visitor Jughead tells her a made up story, which he also shows her in a sort of TV show hallucination. Mary was running her dress shop. A customer named Brooke came in, and they fell in love, and lived together until “the end.” There’s a whooshing fade out. Timetravel Betty skips over the any of the obvious questions - Mary Andrews wasn’t straight? Was she out? Did anyone give the two women trouble? - to simply say that Mary was “always a kind woman.” Which … that hasn’t really been evidenced by anything that’s ever happened with the story as far as Mary Andrews is concerned, but we have to remember that TimeTravel Betty is the same person as Grandma Betty who was the 1955 Betty grown old, and 1955 Betty was actively, alarmingly, intensely stupid. And once again, Time Travel Betty exhibits this same trait that sets my teeth on edge so much about all the other Bettys - “She once gave my mother hell for disowning me.” Either someone is directly useful to the life of Betty Cooper and their action counts, or it doesn’t matter at all.
Why even ask about Mrs. Andrews if you’re not at all going to be listening to the answer nor care about what happened to her?
I think Visitor Jughead feels the same, because he activates the Not Alice and Not Polly clones that he has invented for this bubble universe. Polly is heavily pregnant, seated at Alice’s table fiddling with ribbons or decorations or something, and laughing and talking with Alice Cooper, who is wearing a flight attendant’s uniform. Time Travel Betty bursts in on them to say - You’re talking again! after noticing they are both alive and so young. They both laugh at her in an affectionate way.
This is how you know this is completely not real. I don’t know what happened to Polly Amorous Polly but she definitely did not come home to have her twins in the actual timeline. This is just Visitor Jughead making things nice for TimeTravel Betty.
In any case, Time Travel Betty and Not Alice have an exposition dump type exchange in which Time Travel Betty tells Not Alice that she divorced Hal and made her dream of becoming a stewardess come true. Betty insists she isn’t sick with mumps, and then has a really wonderful hug with Not Alice, followed by the same with Not Polly, where she tells them she loves them.
This sort of exchange never, ever can be possible between any of the iterations of Alice and any of the iterations of Betty. It is so absolutely not true to either of their characters that I vomited a little into my mouth. Visitor Jughead is a very sentimental fiction writer.
Sitting on the stoop of the Cooper house, TimeTravel Betty asks Visitor Jughead how this version of the multiverse of Riverdale turned out for Alice: “Was my mom a stewardess for very long?” Still in his very, ‘I don’t know these people’ sentimentalist way, Visitor Jughead makes up some stupid story about how she managed to land a plane because the pilot died mid flight. So then TimeTravel Betty picks up the story from there and further invents another OC who takes Alice out to dinner for sheer gratitude, after which they got married and the man took her around the world. TimeTravel Betty, at age 86 obviously has long since lost her mother, so she has to finish with her death, but in a really nonspecific way: Alice was sending post cards from new locations, and then stopped doing that and hence that’s how, in this false universe full of stories of things that never happened, is how Alice Cooper died.
As for Polly, TimeTravel Betty again leans on Visitor Jughead to give her the headcanon. The thing is, Visitor Jughead just doesn’t know a lot about Polly, so his sketch for her is the most ridiculously barebones - she had twins, “she was very fulfilled with her family” and ummm she also just stopped performing as Polly Amorous as soon as she was weighted down in motherhood with twins. There’s some nondescript dark haired white man in a suit in the hospital room when Alice and Betty allegedly meet the twins shortly after birth, but interestingly Visitor Jughead doesn’t say she got MARRIED, so I am feeling very validated in not believing Polly about her so called engagement to her so called uptown gentleman in the alternate universe that DID actually occur.
Visitor Jughead takes TimeTravel Betty to school.
The episode directly addresses the fact that everything that happened past the point when TimeTravel Betty walked out of the void into her ersatz bedroom to her ersatz version of her family did not occur. “Is this real,” she asks, “or a dream?” Visitor Jughead says what she’s experiencing is something ‘in between’ → it’s most definitely not real.
Time Travel Betty says some pablum about how everyone looks young and beautiful and are unaware of how special this time is and how it goes by so fast.
I guess this is what a fabricated flashback to a day that never happened feels like to someone who peaked in high school? I really wish I could find some way to connect with Betty, since they’re making her the focus of the show’s final episode, but really, I feel nothing but irritation about everything she’s ever done or said.
Thankfully, we run directly into Veronica. Betty is ecstatic to see her. So this Not Veronica’s appearance managed to make Visitor Jughead completely stop existing. The two of them march into school, and they talk about how emotional they feel about this day when they are about to get their yearbooks.
Toni comes onto the intercom to tell everyone that she is senior class president. Then she recites a poem as “the final” one as Weatherbee looks on in adoration. My schools did not have this thing of having some kid make an announcement first thing in the morning, and thank god. Some girl reciting a poem like this before 9 a.m. followed by some earnest speech about ‘making lasting change’ after ‘dreaming it first’ would’ve ended my high school ‘career’ prematurely with murder charges. In any case - this is odd because in the early episodes of this season it was Cheryl who was making these announcements. So an ‘improved’ world is one where Cheryl doesn’t say anything and Toni forces her political views on people.
We’re at the Blue and Gold office now, where Visitor Jughead is suddenly back. There are a lot of framed articles on the wall, all of which are Social Justice oriented. Time Travel Betty says that Toni always insisted that they report on national news about race issues. Visitor Jughead says that engagement with the “larger world” would continue, then starts to speak of Toni’s future when Time Travel Betty stops him. She doesn’t want to know, yet, so she requests that he doesn’t tell her. Look like he has a thousand more things to say, Visitor Jughead simply says, “ All right, I won’t.”
The slightly embittered expression, laced with a sadness, that Visitor Jughead keeps on his face is the only thing keeping me watching this saccharine disaster. Who the heck is he?
Next we’re watching Cheryl hand out Yearbooks to people standing in line, behaving as though she’s the principal handing out diplomas. Somehow she knows precisely which illness Betty had on the actual day, so she is very alarmed. (“I don’t want your lumpy cooties!”). She hands a yearbook to Betty but refuses to sign right then, because she will see Betty later. They’re having an event at the Dark Room, and then a party at Thornhill.
The first person seen signing Time Travel Betty’s Yearbook is Fangs, who is with Midge, who tells Betty that Fangs has a song on the charts. The huge accomplishment of a hit single got Midge’s parents to agree to let them get married. Fangs adds on that he’s going to go on a tour. Betty starts to cry immediately.
Visitor Jughead is with Betty again. If I’m to posit that whatever it is Visitor Jughead tells Time Travel Betty was “Really What Happened” to the S7 characters in their timeline, I’m supposed to believe that 86 year old Betty simply FORGOT what happened to her mother and her sister but had total recall of exactly how and when Fangs died. Which is a very long winded way to say, I don’t believe any of this happened to the actual people we knew from 1955 S7.
Dementia from old age manifests in people in a LOT of different ways, and I’ve read about examples of people who remember their earlier lives but not their adult ones, sure, but the framing device for this - that this is the alternative, fanfiction, The-Way-She-Wishes-It-Was version of the day she didn’t get to have because she was sick in bed - makes me doubt everything about the life stories that are told by Visitor Jughead.
So, to return, I don’t know what Visitor Jughead’s reason is, but he gives Fangs a pretty dire ending. The tour bus crashed in the Rocky Mountains and he died immediately. He was the first one of ‘us’ to die, apparently. Visitor Jughead invents a super successful posthumous music career for Fangs - his songs made so much money that Midge and daughter were able to live off of it forever.
….Sure OK yeah.
Time Travel Betty says that she’s ‘remembering’ more and more. Disbelieve. Truly. It’s more like, you’re getting a comforting false memory implanted into your head by Visitor Jughead who, like all fanfiction creators, is trying to make sure his audience stays engaged with his vision.
Visitor Jughead disappears in a jingle of bells again when Kevin enters the room to fetch Betty, who is wiping away tears. She goes out to sit with Kevin and Clay for lunch. Kevin signs her book while waxing sentimental about this is the last time they will do this experience, of sitting to lunch together.
I think I get what my problem is with this episode, and it’s deeply personal (but hey this is my blog and my reaction). High school was not a good time. I only endured high school as a way to get to college and then grad school (and yeah I planned to go to grad school well before I graduated from hs) then on to my adult life, which I expected would get exponentially better the closer I got to adult life. And I was right, by the way. Being an adult has been awesome so far, incomparably so compared to how life was daily in high school, so I feel zero nostalgia or warmth about high school whatsoever. So for me, the last day of high school was not this like, sniffle-sniffle Farewell My Friends type of a deal. I was very much uh, come to think of it, ETHEL as in - I AM FINALLY GETTING OUT OF HERE, NOBODY CALL ME, BYE BYE~! This is yet another thing I do not understand Betty about, at all.
Anyhoo-
Riverdale, possibly because of the educational pedigree or, more likely, the educational insecurity of the maker, is very snobby about school. Instead of saying “going to school in New York” like most normal people who go to any school in NYC, Clay specifically says I AM GOING TO COLUMBIA and KEVIN IS GOING TO NYU. He also says that they decided it “made sense to get an apartment together.”
It…. really doesn’t. I am not going to bother looking up where NYU was located vis a vis Columbia University in 1955 but no, it doesn’t. If one of you was going to Fordham, maybe? Or Julliard? Even then it’s quite a distance between Lincoln Center and Harlem.
Kevin admits as much - he immediately adds that this is the excuse they each gave Kevin’s mother and Clay’s father, and even made lovey dovey eyes at each other right there, and even reached out and held each other’s hand, and both parents (a white woman whose former husband is fucking Uncle Fucking Frank and Clay’s African American father) seem extremely pleased with everything. In 1955. So, this is something I very much like about Riverdale. If you’re going to imagine gay people, then HELL YEAH imagine for them good supportive families that are happy that they found love. This show is more than half magical realism fantasy anyway, so go with that. I’m all for it.
There’s that jingling sound effect, and Visitor Jughead is there, sitting in mimicry of Clay’s pose, across from Betty and visible only to her. TimeTravel Betty asks what happens to them, but then she puts in a specific fan request: “Nothing awful, I hope.”
So, in acquiescence of her request, Visitor Jughead makes up something that I think he thinks the very stupid 1955 Betty can handle. He tells her a ridiculous fairytale about an interracial gay couple in NYC who lived there through more than one race riot, Stonewall (1968) and Studio 54 (the 70s) and AIDS but had the most insulated, untroubled life on planet earth. Like, THEY NEVER EVEN HAD TO MOVE. I guess they got one of those super prized rent-controlled apartments that I’ve read so much about and just lived in that one place for sixty years. What??
See, this is how you know it’s a lie. Betty pretends that she remembers visiting them - at this point I wonder if Visitor Jughead is just implanting memories in her head the way that Angel Tabitha could edit the Riverdale S1-7 episodes to be only good memories (such as, erase the homophobic abuse that Cheryl suffered but recall the happiness of Toni coming to Cheryl’s rescue and their romantic kiss).
Clay got tenure, Kevin ‘started’ a theater company, and they both lived into their 80s ,and Kevin died first (causes unknown but given his age probably just old age) and Clay died very soon afterwards.
I want there to be more story. Like, if Kevin was in the theater arts, and even moderately successful, he would have experienced the decimation of the performing community that happened in NY in the 80s. He did zero AIDS related activism? OK wait actually, 1955 Kevin was a self serving hideous asshole, so he might well have. But Clay??
Visitor Jughead only relates the very start - they moved in together into an apartment in Harlem, which to reiterate they apparently never moved a single time, IN NYC, for SIX DECADES (sorry, I’m hyperventilating from all the trauma of apartment hunting in the same city omg), and the sequence of their deaths. The rest, 1955 Betty is too stupid to understand. She cries very prettily about it, thinking about their deaths.
Somehow, Kevin notices her tearing up, asking if she’s OK. She tells Clay and Kevin that “you two are soulmates.”
I despise this. Kevin really REALLY REALLY needs to be taken to hardcore TASK for how he abused Betty during the time he was using her as an unwitting beard. Betty rolling over like this makes me not respect her at all, whatsoever, given how vicious she can be about her mom in the 1955 universe.
Then Kevin, on the day that never happened, asks Time Travel Betty, who is getting fed fiction by Visitor Jughead, asks if “the four of you have figure out what you’re gonna do yet?”
Time Travel Betty has no idea what he means by “the four.” When she says as much, Kevin tells her that she is not only dating Archie but she’s also dating “the others.” Time Travel Betty still has no clue what he means. So then Kevin says she can’t “suddenly have forgotten” that she “Archie, Veronica and Jughead have been in a quad this entire last year.” Time Travel Betty has no idea what a quad is either.
When she looks over, the other three wave at her, with the tall boys flanking the very tiny, very happy looking Veronica on either side. The waving clues her into what a ‘quad’ means.
There’s a cut to commercial.
Then Betty is in the bathroom, smiling blissfully into the mirror. Cheryl comes by to wash her hands, wanting to know why Betty looks so smug. Betty tries to explain that she is in a very different place from “a year ago” right before The Teenage Mystique came out. Cheryl impatiently waves it away - “Yes yes, we all read The Teenage Mystique.” The last time, ahem, ‘a year ago’ allegedly, that Cheryl knew the identity of the Teenage Mystique author, she was a huge fan of it. She was an important part of the book. This is very not how Cheryl is about that book.
Time Travel Betty smiles to herself as she says it’s been a very fun year. Cheryl’s response is ‘ugh.’
Next up, Time Travel Betty has tracked down this alternate version of Reggie Mantle to get her yearbook signed. He expresses regret that the two of them could’ve had a fun time together if only she’d chosen him over Archie. Scooting closer, Time Travel Betty, who has completely bought whatever these Marionettes of Visitor Jughead versions tell her, tells Reggie about the Quad she is in with The Other Three like she literally had no idea what any of that was about until the Marionette Kevin put that in her head.
You know what I think? I think at this bend in the story, Time Travel Betty has become a co-writer with Visitor Jughead, for this final story. It’s just a story, remember? By telling Marionette Reggie this story, Time Travel Betty is making this real for herself in her fantasy.
So her version of the story is as follows: That after the visit of Angel Tabitha and the strange mind-wipe she sort of kind of did on everyone except for Betty and Jughead, Bughead and Varchie both had recalls of what it was like being in those couplings, so that the 1955- established Barchie and Jeronica (I refuse to call them Vughead) pairings felt that they didn’t have to make a single solitary choice, and could just do a mix’n’match among all involved individuals “at the same time.”
And see, this is the bit that rankles me. Archie and Veronica remembering their sexy times (without the burden of how their attempt at an adult relationship entirely failed, or um, how much Archie made Veronica cry, or how taxing and painful it was for her to keep it all together for the three of them after she discovered the Archie-Betty cheating situation) wanting to regroup, I can kind of understand. But Betty and Jughead chose to remember the bad with the good, did they not? Jughead also chose to remember Tabitha as she had been. So … Uh.. No. There’s something very fucked up about Bughead reuniting when they BOTH remember what happened in the previous seasons.
So.
I’m tired. I think the playfulness of the music and the very funny Marionette Reggie performance is supposed to inspire feelings of delight in watching exactly how this foursome supposedly worked in their senior year, but I am mute with disappointment and honestly, a dash of horror. But before we get to that - I wish we’d gotten to see more of this wide-eyed doofus funny 1955 Reggie in the previous season. He’s carrying a HEAVY load, here, being made responsible for selling this hogwash to me.
There were double dates among the four, which lead to Jughead and Betty holding hands. Then it graduated to Archie visiting Betty in her bedroom (which is permissible because Uncle Fucking Frank has been exiled from the Andrews house) and Veronica going home with Jughead. And other time, Archie would visit Veronica at the Pembrook, with Jughead being the lesser, unofficial partner and hence being unable to come to the Cooper house. Betty also visited Veronica a lot at the Pembrooke.
I would do some hollering about Jughead and Archie but the thing is, they were setting us up for there being no Jarchie in the mix even if Beronica is a reality in this bubble universe, because Jughead and Archie in the 1955 time bubble really don’t know each other very well at all. They are somewhat close at the start of the year - such that Archie is the one to tell Jughead that he sounds insane when he starts spouting off about the future from whence he’s just come - but as the season went on, they spent almost no time with each other. 1955 Reggie inquiring about Archie’s friendship with Jughead got an ice cold non-reaction from Archie, because whatever closeness they had in their preadolescence was completely obsolete by the time Archie wanted to take Reggie to fuck a prostitute together or whatever.
Reggie is upset that he wasn’t asked to join, and Betty says that this is because Reggie seemed too focused on basketball. Reggie insists that he would’ve completely made time for the sort of busy nights that Betty is making up - err, describes - had he been invited.
Betty had the flattering experience of Reggie competing outright for her against Archie, but Veronica actually got roundly rejected by Reggie for being too much of a handful and then had the missed connections problem. Plus, what was the highlight reel of ‘good’ that Reggie and Veronica would’ve been shown? Was NONE of it good? (This is where Time Travel Betty making up this quad completely falls apart for me- why it is that Reggie and Veronica don’t remember THEIR connection. Is it condemnation for the entirety of the Reggie-and-Veronica friendship, relationship and situationship in toto? But their relationship deteriorating was no more toxic than Bughead’s implosion and the extremely bitterness they exhibited about each other in S5.)
After the two of them very nicely tell each other that they would’ve liked to have hooked up but it’s too late now (but why?), and also say that they think the other is destined for greatness, Visitor Jughead is back. Time Travel Betty wants to know what happened, so Visitor Jughead says that Reggie Reggie’s life is Kansas State, then a short professional basketball career with the Lakers which apparently didn’t make him a whole lot of money because he still had to work the farm during the off season for his still very invisible parents, after which he had to sell the land upon their death. He had an unnamed wife who is killed the second she is introduced so she can be buried next to him (she predeceases him), and he had to return to Riverdale to be a coach, where both his sons were also on the basketball team. Betty tears up again, apparently in reaction to the thought of Reggie dying. Or maybe she’s crying because he ended up back at Riverdale, coaching
Visitor Jughead tells her that they have to go to the Babylonium now. She looks a bit scared. They’re showing “The Big Sleep.” Since Riverdale (intentionally?) misquotes cultural chestnuts all the time, I think the title “Big Sleep” is meant to be a pun on the fact that this story we’re being shown is a big dream that the 86 year old Betty is having. A lucid dream, in which she’s controlling all of what she allegedly ‘remembers’ via the narration of the invented Visitor Jughead.
Veronica’s opening line is “How’s that absinthe, Betty?” It’s in the middle of the day, so Veronica Lodge being an unacknowledged alcoholic is a weird theme they are carrying through to this season for reasons unknown. In any case, Veronica says she’s given Betty the alcohol because she has news which she hasn’t “yet shared with the boys.”
The news is that Veronica has been haunted by Josie McCoy’s kernel of inspiration about being a producer of movies, so she’s gotten herself a job straight out of high school to go work at a studio in L.A. Her long term plan is to work her way up the ranks to become a studio executive with the power to gatekeep film production in the future.
I really love the scale of Veronica Lodge’s dreams, and the fact that she just launches businesses and careers for herself all the time. Whenever she works at a place, even as an actual child, like the Diner, she goes, OK but one day I’m going to OWN it and then open a bar underneath it and also I’m going to be the direct producer of the alcohol that I sell in the bar under the diner that I own. So Betty, looking very very teary eyed all over again, says that what Veronica has set out to do seems like “the opportunity of a lifetime” then adds “of all the businesses that you’ve started, this move feels the most right.” Veronica says it feels like destiny.
When Betty says California feels so far away, Veronica says they will always be in each other’s lives. They tearfully hold hands.
OK so this is the second time that California is talked about like it’s Cape Good Hope, and I would think that for small town upstate New York people, New York City also feels very far away, no? I mean, Frank Sinatra used to sit on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River, which is literally a mile wide, and stare across at the City vowing his dreams to himself, because NYC felt unreachable.
Another woosh, and Visitor Jughead is back, pretending like he has ever seen a single movie at the Babylonium. (No he has not). “I always loved this theater,” is what he says. So maybe this is one of those like, multiple eternal universes theories where every moment in every possible universe also exists for eternity? This Jughead has never seen a single movie in this theater, I repeat. He also says, “Lots of kids made out here” before flipping up the seat next to him to show a lot of gum stuck underneath - ew - and his signature crown graffiti as well as some other markings. The 1955 Jughead went to see B-horror movies and watched them with full concentration, completely ignoring everyone who was making out all around him.
Time Travel Betty asks what happened to Veronica. The usual lie comes out of Visitor Jughead - Veronica started out at the bottom of the corporate ladder (I mean, maybe the Hollywood nepotism helped??) then “within a few years” she was running the place, leading to “two Oscars” and she produced “iconic movies.” I’m happy that the two of them are concocting a nice narrative for Veronica’s life, but what I notice is that she isn’t given a wife or a husband or children. She just had her career, and was buried in Hollywood. Betty is crying again and it’s getting very tedious. She regrets that they - the two of them but also in the larger sense of the four of them, did not keep in better touch, because they were “so close.”
Um.
I think maybe you weren’t, Betty. I think 86 Year Old Betty is expressing some sort of Crone Sexualityawakening, something along the lines of - instead of fighting the one girl who I was really good friends with over the boy we both had the hots for I should’ve just fucked all my friends! The false narrative is that the four of them were “so close, inseparable” suddenly in their final year, and Betty can’t actually say the truth. “And then we just … dot dot dot.” That faltering has the truth hidden inside of it - none of this happened. They did not have this kind of senior year. And there was no quad.
Visitor Jughead isn’t really necessary anymore because Time Travel Betty has just taken over the fiction making, so he’s staring off, not even looking at her as she has her self-serving memory-induced breakdown about her lost friends (based on the fictional relationship she is just now coming up with), and the flat, cold way he looks down at her has that same eerie disconnect he was exhibiting earlier.
“That’s what today is all about,” he says, “Remembering. And getting one more chance. And no regrets.”
This long hallucination is that Betty remembers she was sick that last day of school, and then as everyone moved on to the next bit of their lives, they all grew apart, so her second chance is her wishing she’d had more sex when she was younger. She’s just getting to write a fix-it fanfic of her life.
So then we go to the Choni fanfic segment. I’m getting very tired. Cheryl and Toni are fully out, at least in the confines of the underground coffee shop. Cheryl says that “there’s no separation between our art and our love.” Toni just looks at her, but doesn’t say a single word of support about this so called perfect love, which fits in with how nasty a user fail girlfriend she’s been this entire season. When she does talk, Toni talks about Black Athena, her accomplishment she was very reluctant to take Cheryl to and from which Cheryl on her own cognizance banned herself.
The theme is “Beefcake Meets Cheesecake.” This seems like Toni forcing her bisexuality on Cheryl, who wouldn’t seem the type to voluntarily draw shirtless men. Time Travel Betty really likes the paintings.
The most important thing about this scene is that 1955 Jughead with his felt crown is there, with his arm around 1955 Veronica.
The very nice, kind future that Visitor Jughead weaves for Betty’s benefit about Cheryl and Toni is that Cheryl had a super successful career as a painter, and that Cheryl and Toni stayed together for life, in California (he says Oakland, and for some reason this doesn’t merit a third mention of how very, extremely far away California is), i na big rambling hippie house. They “lived as artists and activists” - I assume off of Cheryl’s family money. They also “had a son” which they named after Riverdale (poor boy). They both died “peacefully.” Time Travel Betty doesn’t really care about either of these people, so the details are extremely hazy - no age, no sequence of death, no cause of death, no place of burial. Their lives were long and sexy, apparently. OK Sure.
Visitor Jughead and Time Travel Betty take in Julian, sitting alone, taking a drink. She wants to know what happened to him. He’s the second man who caused problems for Betty, so he gets a really sad, bad ending. He was not “just a lost soul” - what, no invitation from Kevin to perform at the theater company he founded?? - and he died in Vietnam, leaving behind no lover, no children. I mean, the Vietnam War technically began in like, 1955, so it was already ongoing by the time they all graduated in 1956, but damn that’s cold.
See, and I understand now why Fangs had to be killed in his version of his life story. His impregnating Midge, and Betty’s very limited intelligence making her unable to understand how that happened was a pretty humiliating conversation for her. Fangs had to die for sins of his dick. Julian was the one that clued in Betty to the fact that Archie and Reggie had gone to a prostitute, so that’s why HE had to die. Poor Julian. He was 28 when he died, by the way, which means he would’ve died in 1966 (the US military presence in Vietnam peaked in the late 60s so this tracks, but what was he doing before??).
Nana Rose, who somehow is at this event, is asked after by Betty, and Visitor Jughead just makes something up - She reincarnated multiple times. (Rivervale is real?)
Weatherbee and Mrs T got married, late in life. (No other story).
OK so then we come to Frank Andrews, who Betty has a lot of reasons to be mad at, and Tom Keller, which she had less of an interaction with, also meet a bad end. WHY would either of those men be HERE at this event? They wouldn’t but of course, as I’ve been saying all along, this isn’t happening, not really. This is the dying 86 year old Betty telling herself a fanfiction of her own life. Anyway, what happened to them was this: “A hustler they picked up one rainy night named Chic” murdered them both. Betty in earlier seasons of Riverdale very much disapproved of gay pick up culture, so again, instead of dying of AIDS or homophobic attacks, these two assholes died of gay on gay murder. Uhhh. That’s a bit homophobic of you, Time Travel Betty.
Veronica, in the corner, is telling 1955 Jughead and 1955 Archie about her pending departure for California. Visitor Jughead says of himself and Archie, “We are not taking it well.” Betty says a true thing that was already established - she wasn’t there for any of these conversations. So Visitor Jughead offers her another fix-it fanfic writing opportunity. “You should be.”
The “boys” are very down in the dumps. Veronica calmly reminds them that they all knew “they would be going their separate ways after graduation.” Time Travel Betty is writing the story now, and marionetting all these people. They are all utterly silent and still and devoid of reaction as she catches them up to her fantasy’s narrative - that their senior year was “incredibly” physically fulfilling as well as emotionally a great experience. Veronica immediately agrees. Then Jughead says the most unJughead thing of all time, because Time Travel Betty’s narrative is forcing him to: “If I had to live through high school twice, I’m glad it was with you three yahoos.”
Jughead, you barely saw Archie all through junior year. We have no idea what happened senior year. He would not say this.
Betty says what she wishes she’d told all these people: “I love you all so much.”
This episode is her party and she can make it do whatever she wants it to do.
Betty does acknowledge that there were in fact “heartbreaks and all.” The four of them hold hands, so then Archie suggests a last ride to Cheryl’s afterparty. For some reason it’s not night time, so they have a long ride on the jalopy in slow motion.
Ok I really liked this. The world OPENED UP because we see the huge Canadian forest, the Sweet Water River, the bridge - just this big huge space the show used to inhabit before the cramping down of the available sets from both the pandemic and budget constraints. They start to look very bittersweet (emphasis on the bitter) as the ride goes on - Betty looking rather askance at Archie, not meeting his eye, Jughead looking away from Veronica at the river as she stares stony faced straight ahead.
Betty is outside the house, fidgeting, which then brings Visitor Jughead. He wants to know why she hasn’t gone inside. Time Travel Betty has fully bought into her own bullshit - this evening, this party and basically NOTHING FROM THIS WHOLE DAY ever happened, but she is now weeping because “this is the last time that that all of us will be together, ever.” Betty doesn’t want to say goodbye to these fictional versions of her high school friends she’s invented as she lays dying at age 86 on the other side of the close door void. She says even this idealized version, the act of saying a proper farewell to all her friends that she, even in her made up memories can’t help but decide she never saw much of ever again, woul d be too painful.
As Visitor Jughead looks at her with that same cold, disengaged affect he’s had this entire time, Betty regrets the entire venture - “It was a mistake to come back here. I should be at home with the mumps.”
Visitor Jughead gives her a weird little koan, that the whole arc of a life is to say hello, “walk alongside someone for a while” and then the relationship ends. This pat summary seems to upset Betty, but at the slightly threatening reminder from Visitor Jughead that “every minute counts” she girds her loins and goes into the party that didn’t happen and even if it did, she was never there.
First speaker at this event is Archie, who is going to read a poem. Julian ribs him meanly about being a poet (“You won’t shut up about it!”) and Reggie coos flirtatiously at him, (“Are you going to give us the weeps?”). I’m bracing for impact here, because Archie’s poems have been hideously painful.
What Archie mentions in his strange little ode reveals the truly bizarre things that apparently counted as worth being included in the “happy memories only” cut from Angel Tabitha that almost everyone opted for:
And here it comes: “And no, I won’t be mentioning the epic highs and lows of high school football.” This is said to ironic affectionate laughter. The scene in which it features, which happened in juvenile detention for Archie, and was mentioned a second time in universe by a very miserable grown up Jughead Jones when he was having to work as a waiter in the diner where sometimes he served his sneering students - made the cut for a ‘happy memory’ that everyone got to have via Angel Tabitha.
Betty Cooper having the serial killer gene which could also be set off by the word Tangerine (which was the incident in which the plot played with whether she really killed Jughead Jones or not) was another ‘happy’ memory that everyone gets to remember. And laugh about.
Veronica not ever being prom queen is mentioned by Archie (because??) and then also the fact that she was a human dialysis machine in S6 is also in everyone’s memory. Veronica even addresses this: “I specifically asked Angel Tabitha not to let anyone remember that.”
Jason’s death, his exhumation and mummification, then being hauled around the house while in such a state is another happy memory that everyone remembers.
????
Toni looks very displeased at this mention, but Cheryl acts like this actually was merely embarrassing rather than distressing.
Maybe I don’t know what happy means, after all, to Betty Cooper, because this is still Betty Cooper’s fanfic of what she thinks could have happened if there had actually been an afterparty like this.
Betty Cooper is possibly a meaner girl than I ever gave her credit for. Or Archie Andrews is. I don’t even know anymore.
Anyway, Archie really doesn’t have much to say about Toni in particular, other than to point out that Southside is one word not two, so the South Side Serpent jacket logo is stupid.
Heehee ha ha? (I think this might be both a cultural problem and a personality trait of mine coming together. I hate practical jokers - not the jokes, but the people who come up with them - and I don’t see the point of roasting. It’s hardly ever done well, and never has good consequences.)
We come to Jughead Jones, of whom Archie begins, “Jughead Jones needs no intro.” The first thing Archie addresses is the suicide of Chipping - “he made his teacher jump out a window.”
I mean. You got groomed and child molested by one of yours and tried to redo that relationship again in this timeline asshole, and also this is inaccurate. Jughead didn’t make Chipping do anything.
Further, why is everyone remembering this? This can’t possibly be anybody’s idea of a happy memory, least of a Jughead’s. Was Angel Tabitha fully lying about leaving only the happy memories for people? In narrative, that doesn’t seem likely, because there has never been ambiguity about Angel Tabitha’s goodness. Which brings me back to - this thing is being written by Betty, who remembers all the bad things along with Jughead, and she is the puppet master behind this Marionette Archie being deeply unfunny and meanspirited to everyone. Because my general thesis about S4 was that Betty was furiously resentful of Jughead being given the opportunity to ‘pull ahead’ of her by getting himself this plum spot at prep school, so the first major indication that things were about to go seriously awry for him (Chippings’ suicide) may well have been a happy memory for Betty after all.
I have also garnered from Tumblr fandom that the actor who played Chipping annoyed the writer’s room at some point by seeming to mock the plotline of which he was a part, so I think this may be them settling scores in a really bitchy fashion, and not giving a shit what happens to the character arcs by having ALL of these assholes laugh about someone’s suicide, regardless of how cartoonish.
The rest of Jughead’s ditty goes:
Thinks himself a private eye/ Chained himself to Southside High.
… Again this was, at the time of presentation, shown to be deeply hurtful to Jughead, because he was making a stand for something (in his usual grandiose way) and his person, who was Archie at the time, more than Betty, betrayed him in a publicly humiliating way.
This is so mean.
Betty the fic maker has Kevin eagerly volunteer himself for this put down which by rights in the flow of the story if it really happened should have been 90% utterly incomprehensible to him.
Archie starts out by saying that Kevin has a beautiful voice and should be singing always (fair point) but then adds: “But he spends most of his time Cruising Fox Forest.”
This! This is evidence absolute to me that Betty Cooper, the one who remembers, is the one writing this entire scene. The only person who was ever deeply upset about Kevin’s cruising was actually Betty Cooper. Fangs, his actual adult sexual partner, was puzzled by it but did not take it upon himself to mock Kevin. Cheryl, his gay semi-ally, knew about his compulsion but also never publicly attacked him or outed him or tried to punish him for this activity. It was only and ever Betty. And what a hypocrite 86 year old fanfic author Betty Cooper is. She imagined a very sloppy smorgasbord of teen lovers for herself (Archie AND Jughead AND Veronica but NOT Reggie oh my!) but she’s going to STILL DO THIS about Kevin’s S1-6 sex life. I want to chuck the angry spirit of George Michael, he of the immortal This Is What Men Do quote, at her.
Next up is Fangs, whom Archie-as-Puppeteered-by-Betty mocks as being “a long way from a cult member who stole organs to put in freezer.” Of course, Fangs and Kevin worked together to attack Betty when she tried to overturn the Edgar Evernever Cult. This is the only time that Fangs was significant in the life of S1-6 Betty. Other things he could be mocked for that were equally terrible- such as the killing of Tall Boy - did not have much to do with Betty, so she doesn’t mention them.
Archie-Puppet goes on to roast Reggie, to say “Pound for Pound/ You’re my closest equivalent.” To whom is this true? Since when? Possibly only in S7 when Reggie suddenly replaced Jughead as the primary best boyfriend and then got all the affection from Archie that Jughead never got? “But there’s that other Reggie/ So how do we know you’re even legitimate?” Then it gets weirdly racial, which everyone hoots about like it’s funny. “I’m going to need to seem some sort of birth certificate.”
You know how I have been curious about exactly how it is Reggie is American and 17 in 1955 when we never see his parents and he’s visibly biracial and it’s just not clear to me at all? This is not… funny. After creating a super awkward and strange episode dealing with Anti-Korean racism, they do this. Reggie answers, “You know I’m sensitive about that,” and it’s not clear if it means his immigration / naturalization status in S7 or the other Reggie existing at all.
Dilton, the other boy doesn’t get any sort of mention, and Julian, the other Better Archie than Archie, doesn’t get a single line.
They - as marionette by Betty - give him a standing ovation. God knows why. This is Betty applauding herself for being mean to these paper dolls.
As a grand finale, Archie comes to Time Travel Betty after everyone has left, to say a special goodbye to her in particular. “I know we’ll see each other again,” he says, including a very flattering confession that he’s always felt that it would be Barchie end game, because it started with them, “a boy and a girl next door to each other.” But just like she reacted to his proposal in S6, this Betty also rejects Archie. She tells him the future - that Archie settles in California for good. He marries some girl (unnamed), settles down in Modesto, has an unnamed number of children, he never breaks into publishing (“amateur writer”) but he’s content and happy. She even goes to invent a death for him - she insists that everyone has to fucking be buried in their place of origin - but she does get this right about him: Instead of being buried near is “sweet, strong” wife or his “beautiful” family of children, Archie Andrews in Betty’s imagining will seek to be buried next to his father (but not his mother).
After this self-serving self-insert fix-it fic is over, Betty tells Visitor Jughead that she has one last place she wants to go, so they visit Pop Tate’s grave. Even though Pop Tate in S1-6 got to actually have a retirement, and see his gorgeous, smart granddaughter take over his business with big ambitions for it and also not coincidentally take up with the boy he’s adopted in his heart (Jughead!), Time Travel Betty wants to kill of Pop Tate as soon as his usefulness to her as the proprietor of the diner is over. Self centeredness taken to the point of homicide is basically the show - not mine! - the SHOW’s repeated thesis about Betty Cooper.
Like any good improv partner, Visitor Jughead doesn’t argue with any sort of thing that Betty Cooper wants to do in this universe he’s created for her, so he just plays right along, to say that the death of Pop Tate was “a terrible blow” to the town.
What can I say- the cemetery is gorgeous, and I’m so excited (in this last episode) and sad to see the time and potential that was lost because of the limitations placed on television productions during the pandemic of 2020.
I can’t help but recall that 1950s Betty was much, much stupider and less creative than all the other iterations of Betty in seasons prior when she finds that she can’t imagine a theology of death for herself in her own self-insert fanfic, and has to ask Visitor Jughead about it. “What do you think happens when we die?” Visitor Jughead says that Pop Tate is still going to make burghers and making people smile FOR THE REST OF ETERNITY. This is extraordinarily cruel, and see, Betty can’t not recall Tabitha Tate, but she absolutely won’t mention her in the context of her own grandfather’s death.
Sitting at a bench in a really truly lovely bit of wilderness, Betty tells the Visitor Jughead, whom if she has any intelligence would know is NOT the 1955 Jughead that went on to die at 84 after founding “Madhouse Magazine,” that she read “your” obituary. But as I’ve been saying and the show has been showing all this time, 1955 Universe Betty is deeply, exceptionally, stupid.
The nice thing about this is that the show shows me more of 1955 Jughead’s obituary.
“Forsythe Jones III, Jughead to his friends and followers, passed away on Tuesday at his home in New YOrk State. Jughead took fledging Pep Comics, popular for it’s (TYPO IN THE TEXT, TRANSCRIBED FAITHFULLY) horror themed comic books in the 1950s and created the wildly successful Jughead’s Madhouse Magazine. Jughead spent his youth devouring comic books and short stories and turned that passion into a profitable enterprise that gave an outlet to the misunderstood, twisted minds of America’s teens for the better part of two decades. A young horror writer and [illegible] for Pep Comics himself, Jones [illegible] the magazine in [lots of words illegible] comics [illegible] back in 1955, [illegible] the first issue of Jughead’s Madhouse which still [illegible] high school in Riverdale.
Jughead is remembered as the…. satirical …[Illegible].”
Anyway, Time Travel Betty gives the Visitor Jughead (WHO WASN’T THAT JUGHEAD) her assessment on his life. “Yours was a life well lived.” Ever the faithful improv partner, Visitor Jughead simply Yes-Ands her. He pretends to be speaking for that Jughead, the 1955 one, by answering that “it was swell.” He knows what she knows, because he’s not living the narrative, and possibly has just read he recall of the obituary that she recalls reading earlier in this episode. “I put all my eggs in one basket.” When she tries to praise him about the magazine he founded being an institution, Visitor Jughead (oh whom the captions suddenly refers to as ANGEL JUGHEAD by the way) says modestly that it was “juvenile satire at best.” Betty keeps praising him, because Jughead, whom she has decided she would’ve had a fun time fucking in the 1955 universe but without the intensity and purity of the one-true-love type relationship that he tried to have with her from S1-4, is one of those who are going to be gifted a nice (enough, and according to her very twisted rules) life by Grandma Betty. Angel/Visitor Jughead keeps playing along, saying in answer to her saying that people adored his work 70 years in, that he had an audience of “mostly teens and adults” even though the ‘self’ we are shown in flashback is a mutton chopped, rather portly man who seems like a cranky middle aged dude.
Anyway, Visitor/Angel Jughead, now pretending to be 1955 Jughead, says he’s happy with the legacy (that Grandma Betty is inventing for him) and then asks what Time Travel Betty thinks about legacy. She says she doesn’t. Then, in improv partner mode, Visitor Jughead creates the most improbable series of events for 1955 Betty to have lived through: the Teenage Mystique becomes a “best seller” even though it was “self published.” Sure. Then there was an advice colum called “Betty’s Diary,” then it was New York City, then starting She Says magazine (a sort of Ms. I guess). “Exposing hard truths and still being published today.”
Time Travel Betty echoes more or less exactly what Visitor/Angel Jughead said about the life she wrote for his 1955 iteration, but saying she could have done worse.
Then the show drops some really, really weird summary bombs.
Bomb 1: Revealed by Visitor/ Angel Jughead - Betty never got married, but adopted a daughter, whom she named Carla. Carla is the mother of the dark haired Alice that we saw at the start, and Betty says she loved being a mom and a grandma. Then she says something incredibly retrograde to me - that her true legacy is her family. Okay sure. Even though apparently you didn’t have any sort of relationship whatsoever with Polly or your niece and nephew.
Bomb 2: Revealed by Time Travel Betty - Jughead also never got married and never fathered any children either. She’s only doing this because she’s just not very creative, and also because demonstrably mean. She doesn’t WANT Jughead to have moved on to some unnamed “sweet strong girl who makes you laugh” like Archie. She definitely doesn’t want Jughead to end up with someone like S5-6 Tabitha either. Visitor/Angel Jughead, speaking for all the Jugheads that have existed, sounds very, very sad when he says that he “sometimes” regrets “not getting circled” in her words. Her improv partner doesn’t like the direction she took his story.
Then because Betty is upset for the umpteenth time in this episode (I’m getting very tired of her tearing up non stop with no real reason for it. I feel absolutely nothing.) Visitor Jughead holds her hand. Betty expresses a strange wish: “I wish we could stay in Riverdale forever, with all of our friends, as we were. Young and beautiful.”
This is a very dangerous thing to say to a genie. He’s looking at her in that same calculating way, though his face is reflecting some of her intense emotion.
It’s only when she says something patently untrue and not shown so far that Visitor Jughead looks away. “Bursting with love for each other.”
Erm. Okay so the Core Four were rarely ever bursting with love for each other. Bursting with lots of other complicated emotions, yes, but if the show was about four people bursting with love for each other it would have been a) fucking boring and b) I wouldn’t be here writing an extremely long winded blog about it, trust you me.
She keeps fishing for reassurance from him, easing Visitor Jughead out of cosplaying 1955 Jughead for her into being his magical self, because she says “I know it’s not possible” twice, until he finally confirms, “No, it’s not.” But that strange ambiguity of expression remains in this Visitor Jughead’s face. She wants really not to return to her 86 year old expiring body. She says, in the end, that she’s ready to go back because he tells her it’s time.
We cut to Grandma Betty being taken to Riverdale by car by her granddaughter. She starts to say goodbye to things, out loud:
Town Sign
Sweetwater River and all its mysteries (there was only one mystery)
Fox Forest and its haunted trees
Red Door and secrets behind it
Room (empty), window, Archie’s room (empty) Pembroke (with furniture covered up) “with its crackling fires and sexy sleepovers.”
Then we are shown a really weird space. It looks like the bombed out remains of the train car that 1955 Jughead, except it looks cruddy without all the fancy improvements that 1955 Veronica made to it. Instead, what’s in it are a bare mattress, a cruddy couch, and on the floor, some weird objects that do not belong in the 1955 train car: a ceremonial looking bulls’ head mask (minotaur?? Gargoyle King????), and an abandoned G&G game complete with the gate prop. The voiceover by Betty describes this as “Goodbye to cups of coffee and late nights of writing.”
Then we move on to the emptied out set of Thornhill, and tumbleweed rolling across very inappropriately (Riverdale would not have tumbleweed) the front of the Babylonium, then “music and poetry and art” are bid farewell to the completely scuppered and emptied out set for the Dark Room/ the Speakeasy.
Next comes the farewell to Riverdale High, the basketball court set, with Betty solemnly intoning “Goodbye to basketball games and pep rallies and dances at the gym.” The main high school sets of the show are shown - the school hallway, the classroom where the beat poets and heteronormativity were discussed, the Blue and Gold workroom, the boys’ locker room, the music room, the time capsule…and time.
“I wish, I wish there were more of it,” Betty says.
OK so this last bit really did get to me. I did get verklempt. I also wish there were more of Riverdale.
The final place we along with Grandma Betty are taken to is the diner set, which has a leaf-strewn empty parking lot and is adorned with a for sale sign with this number (914-555-0157).
“It was wonderful getting to grow up here,” Betty says, and my sentimental feeling is entirely gone just like that.
No it wasn’t.
NO IT WAS NOT.
Granddaughter Alice tells Grandma Betty they are “here,” then looks around at no response to smile at her, telling her no-name male companion that Grandma Betty is asleep. The man, whose name is apparently [Robert] according to the captions, somehow knows on sight that Grandma Betty is dead. Alice sees is too, and start to get upset.
Then we cut to the ominous red lights of the Sweet Hereafter, or hell, or whatever it is, bathing Betty, young again, who opens the door to a different car (a 1950s design) to walk up to the fully functional diner as Visitor Jughead watches her approach the silent Jason, who is the doorman to the reanimated Diner.
A song creepily starts just before she gets there, and the lyrics are “You’re Miiiiine” and goes on to say, “And we belong together… for eternity.” Inside Betty’s personal afterlife diner, everyone is already dead and delighted to see her:
Toni and Cheryl in one booth. 1955 Jughead with ARchie and Veronica. Dilton sitting with Ben Button, and Dilton looks absolutely ecstatic. THERE IS NO ETHEL. There’s several black students, whom she did not interact with at all during S7, but they’re all delighted too. Julian and Reggie are playing Foosball together, and Reggie looks excited and Julian looks at Betty with a sort of brotherly affection he has absolutely no reason to exhibit. Betty gives Reggie a big hug as the song goes on to say “You’re mine” again as I break out in hives. The big pink ribbon tying up Betty’s long hair in a ponytail really bothers me. She then goes to greet Pop Tate who is going to be flipping burgers for her benefit for the whole of eternity. Then she hugs Kevin and Clay (song: “They belong to only me/ For eternity”), followed by Fangs and Midge. She skips over to Choni, and Cheryl is also ecstatically happy to see Betty, as is Toni. “I swear by everything I own…” says the song, as Dilton and Ben, who had been the most demonstrably happy to see her, get only waves, and no hugs.
She joins the core four booth, giving Veronica a hug, then reaching out hands to hold with Jughead, followed by ARchie. “You’re mine/ we belong together.” Archie tells her that her timing is perfect, and they have a strawberry milkshake waiting for her. She says thank you.
Cut to the outside of the Diner, which is bathed in that unholy red neon light. In a red T shirt with red flannel we see Angel/Visitor Jughead, who breaks the fourth wall to say:
“We’ll leave them here, I think.” His summary for what is going to be going on in the third iteration of the 1955 universe (this is another pocket universe, and Grandma Betty’s own personal afterlife, that she specifically order from this Jughead) is depressing and reductive as hell. These are “the moments that make up a life”: “Forever seventeen” and “always grabbing a burger” “always going to or coming from some dance” “talking about school” “who is dating who” “homework” “movie playing at the Babylonium.”
He brings it around to say that this is where “they”- quickly amended (lying?) to say “we’ve” - have ALWAYS BEEN, IN THIS DINER, IN THIS TOWN.
This is a magic spell/ curse that he’s weaving, to trap all the puppet version of all the 1955 Universe characters in the heaven/hell of Betty’s making, for her personal preferences.
He just names it: This is The Sweet Hereafter.
Visitor /Angel Jughead has been Death all along.
He invites all of us to come into this little personal afterlife he’s made for Betty Cooper, whenever it is we are destined to die. He says that we should come in, because we’ll “always be among friends” and “Riverdale will always be your home.”
To the sounds of typewriter clickety clacking, Visitor/Angel Jughead refuses to go into this little hell himself. and instead walks off.
1955 Betty got exactly what she said she wanted, at the end. Which is to say, perhaps, that everyone else may have as well. They may have ordered a very different Sweet Hereafter, from the one that Betty requested for herself. Jughead’s Sweet Hereafter was him inside the diner having fan meetings, AWARE that it was an artificial construct full of puppet versions of people, and enjoying himself so much that Tabitha couldn’t bring herself to yank him out of it. Betty, who was aware of all parts (well, as many as she considered salient and had the cognitive capacity to understand) of S1-6 summoned a Jughead shaped Angel of Death, as the prime fiction maker, to create her Sweet Hereafter for her, as well as a last-day hallucination of the life she did not live to send her off in comfort. The actual 1955 Betty’s life was not worth recalling for her on her last day of consciousness, because the quad never happened, and because people didn’t live in the ways or die in the order that she would have preferred. On her final day of consciousness, Betty got to rewrite Riverdale to HER tastes, and this is how it worked out. She made a thing wearing Jughead’s face give her the story she wanted, for herself.
I wonder what really happened to 1955 actual Betty, because it was NONE of this.
The least believable, most ungrounded portion of this very shallow set of stories Betty wrote for her people was the path she gave Jughead Jones. If anything, Jughead Jones has been a compulsive relationship maker. There is no way he never got married. He got married multiple times. There is no way he never had children, either. It’s just telling to me that the possibly infertile Betty refused to imagine a future for Jughead where he got to have even the short amount of time he DID have to Tabitha Tate before the world ended.
As far as finales go, I’ve seen better and I’ve seen a lot worse. I do appreciate the consistency - Betty Cooper is indeed a very dark character, not for the reasons her stans think is dark, but because of her hypocritical victim-stance-stealing malevolence and self absorption.
On a meta level, I also wonder if this is from the power of the actual fandom, the vast majority of whom I think really were Bugheads. They produce a lot of fiction and art - and the only way the show can avoid any and all accusations of cribbing from those fanworks is to work out a cramped ending like this- Betty never had a great love in her life, never got to have her own kids even though in the final analysis she found that her core value was motherhood, and oh fine, neither did Jughead!
What a strange, odd, supernatural way to end this strange, odd, lovable show.
Goodbye Riverdale, I will miss you!
#riverdale opinion#anti-betty cooper? I think?#but i call it as THE SHOW has shown it to me#i think this episode is a great prompt for future fanfic writers who engage directly with canon#each of the core four and choni besides would have a totally different final-day and sweet hereafter#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#riverdale episode recap
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Riverdale S7 E13 (Chapter 130) The Crucible
[Weird little translation note from an international viewer: There are apparently some titles that the Netflix Korea translator refuses to translate into Korean for the international release, and some they will translate. The Crucible is one where the title is sounded out phonetically, which is very funny because the Arthur Miller play actually has a well known Korean title. The other deemed-untranslatable episode titles were Peep Show, Dirty Dancing, Hoop Dreams, Halloween 2, and After the Fall)]
The music is all jazzy film noir-ish at the opening of this episode as we slowly zoom in on Jughead in his very luxurious train car. The sheer beauty of the innards of this thing take me by surprise every time. Jughead is in suspenders, with what for him is sort of his Little Black Dress - a white t shirt under a button up shirt with suspenders over it. He looks upset and wan.
How does a fire start? he asks, or rather, types.
The fire might start with the English teacher, who has thus far paid Jughead’s actual career as a writer zero attention whatsoever (but does Jughead even go to school anymore other than to yell at people about milk or to get yelled at by the principal in the office?) but is cultivating Archie’s gifts as a poet (by letting him come and sit in the classroom to scribble in semi privacy?). It might begin with Veronica Lodge, looking kewpie doll adorable in her perfect hair (that my very valuable mutual taught me was a wig! I somehow never thought about it being a wig!), startled to find a tall clean shaven man smiling down at her in her elevator at home. It took me a long time to realize this was GLEN.
HI GLEN.
Glen without facial hair and in 1950s get up looks disconcertingly like a young Harrison Ford and goddamn you Roberto I refuse to find Glen hot on principle so fuck off.
The fire may begin with Betty coming home to find that her phone has been confiscated (by her mother, most likely). Betty has an ugly little ornamental bear on her bedside table. Is that meaningful?
Or maybe the fire starts in a classroom, where Betty and Kevin are acting out some scene from Tennessee Williams, the themes of which are “Crisis in the South/ Mendacity/ Nihilism.”
The only play they could be doing is of course Cat On a Hot Tin Roof which … this is the one time a Riverdale reference to a classical literature work is actually spot on and it’s making me feel very sour. The teacher sings their praises, calling their performance better than what she saw on Broadway.
(Also scratch what I said earlier about Jughead going to school - he’s there in class in the back, two rows behind Betty). Evelyn looks very pissy about this whole situation. Why am I being made to identify with Evelyn?
Principal Weatherbee bursts in. As a repressed closeted homosexual in denial about his feelings for his best friend and coworker he is likely to be very triggered by Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. He just opens the door with “That’s enough.” He has Sheriff Keller and Clifford Blossom in tow (but not Werthers). In front of all her students, the teacher is led out like she’s done something terrible. Wearing an extremely campy red velvet jacket trimmed in black satin, Clifford Blossom steps into the class to stand right in front of a poster of Oscar Wild. I just now noticed that his hair isn’t red in this. It’s blonde. Why is it blonde?
The mayor takes it upon himself to tell the kids that the English teacher has been fired. Their new teacher is going to be - of all people - Penelope Blossom. Atonal demon music plays as Penelope saunters in right on cue - which means she just stood out there in the all while Featherhead did his bursting in and escorting out - wearing a necklace that looks like it’s made of black scarab beetles. Her outfit is the color inverse of her husband's - black with red color accents. The Blossom children have no idea what is happening but they know it’s really bad, giving each other “Are you seeing this?” type of looks. Archie was the only student to actually speak up in defense of the teacher, and he continues to do so now that the bad news has been announced.
Penelope Blossom just has so much presence! Can’t we have more of her and less of the very boring Clifford Blossom?
Archie continues to be the one to use his privilege for the good (unlike say, Julian Blossom or Kevin Keller, whose fathers are directly involved in this debacle), wanting to know what exactly is going on.
Mrs. Thornton is accused of being a communist! Dun Dun Dunnn~ Penelope intones that “The Red Menace has come to Riverdale.” Right on cue, Evelyn turns around to take a look at the known Lavender Menace in the classroom - Cheryl- as Cheryl realizes that this is not going to go away easily and already feels exhausted by life.
After the class, the core seven (this is um, NO JUGHEAD, but Toni, Cheryl, Clay, Archie, Kevin, Betty and Veronica) convene in the student lounge to try to figure out what is going on. Betty wants to know if Archie can shed more light, since he’s been getting special tutoring from Mrs. Thornton. Archie is in the closet about his poetry, so he sounds sus as he says that Mrs Thornton just isn’t like that. Veronica’s chest ribbon is HUGE and makes her look very very tiny. Cheryl says that there must’ve been some sort of cause, but Veronica says that the Red Scare in Hollywood was terrible. She starts explaining the McCarthy Era to the people who are still in 1955 which is so weird, because the televised hearings started in 1954, so this is another instance when the “1955” of this show has nothing to do with the real “1955” except for the part where Fred Andrews died in Korea.
Anyway, Kevin (because of course he does) staunchly defends his father (indirectly) by assuming that nobody would do anything bad to anyone in America unless they deserved it. (Unlike say, when your father hires a prostitute to force you into having het sex and things like that). Veronica disagrees.
Jughead does not give a hoot what happened to the English teacher. Ethel doesn’t either. They are off looking to celebrate the publication of the comic that Featherstone decided to publish last episode. The friendzoning continues - Jughead calls it “your” first comic to which Ethel corrects, “our” first comic. But her brown checked skirt matches his brown checked jacket! The vendor, who is a crusty old man, says he no longer carries “Pit of the Perverse” at all because it’s “unamerican smut.” All around him are faces of pretty girls smiling invitingly out from covers with titles like “Flash Bulb” and “Women of Today.” The man even yells at the pair to go away.
At Thornton House, Cheryl is being interrogated by her parents about her unamerican public kiss with Toni at the Halloween Party. Red Menace, Lavender Menace (which is a Betty Friedan phrase, the homophobia of which was one the major failings of the initial Second Wave liberal white feminist movement in America) - it’s all the same to Clifford Blossom. He wants it stamped out.
The thing is, the Blossoms are scary, abusive people but I weirdly admire them (no please, hear me out) for not being hypocrites. When they say they want to ‘stamp out’ unamerican (™) activities, they start by torturing their own kid.
Cheryl also has a spine of steel. Though visibly frightened (and fully aware of her father’s homicidal impulses and callousness about his children) Cheryl says she will not be naming names. She calls him a jackal. Bravo.
Sadly, they already have a list of names compiled for the targeting. What they want is for Cheryl to just corroborate. This will allow her to ‘redeem’ herself.
The names on this list are: Cheryl Blossom (as NUMBER 1), Toni, Kevin, Clay, and then a bunch of people we don’t know - Chris Henderson, John Maclean, Jessical Leetola, Connor Rielley, Colin Ellis, and Kathleen Ross.) Cheryl absolutely refuses, except Clifford has her number - he threatens the only thing she cares about, the Vixens. “Anything but that Daddy!” Cheryl pleads, but she is not granted clemency.
At the same time, Veronica comes home to find Hiram Lodge is in the apartment. The number of ways and things that Hiram lies about in his conversations with Veronica are truly very toxic. He says he missed her, to which Veronica is unmoved, so then he bribes her with a Faberge egg, to which she wants to know who he fucked around with on her mom. Infidelity is something he’s very willing to own up to. This toxic dad also knows his daughter’s main weakness - she is very lonely So he says that he wants to meet her friends as he offers her a hug. This, she can’t resist.
The next day, Veronica brings Hiram to school like it’s show and tell. She’s dressed in the most demure, matronly outfit I’ve seen her in to date, complete with a matching pearl necklace-and-bracelet set. So these are her group of friends yes, but like, it’s funny how she’s dated, kissed or wooed or was wooed by the majority of her friend circle. (Betty, Clay, Archie, Julian) leaving out only Kevin, Cheryl and Toni.
Kevin is so horny and shameless. Ugh.
Cheryl pointedly says that the first season of Oh Mija was the best one (hahaha) because it went downhill after that. Featherhead has asked Hiram to be a guest lecturer (because I guess even he knows Penelope Blossom may not actually want to teach the kids anything), especially because this is monologue day at English class.
Julian Blossom is up first!
He does the Hamlet To Be or Not to Be soliloquy. Apparently neither Kevin nor Archie knew that this was a speech about contemplating suicide. Hiram is weirdly macho about it, asking of Julian is a man, because Hamlet was a man. I mean, Hamlet was a man but his whole problem was being emasculated, I thought? He doesn’t really achieve any of his goals, has his place in succession stolen from him by his uncle and does literally nothing about it for months and months other than dither, kill the wrong person, and drive poor Ophelia to suicide.
For some reason, Hiram giving Julian what sound like pretty sound corrections to the way he’s delivering a speech that’s very challenging to sound convincing makes everyone chuckle throughout. Is this supposed to be in reaction to like, Hiram’s star power? They’re just delighted and nervous that a real life sitcom actor is giving their Julian Blossom an acting lesson?
After the class, Betty goes to see the principal, who tells her that the Blue and Gold is going to be defunded with the loss of Mrs Thornton, who was the faculty advisor. Featherhead has already made up his mind, so Betty charges into the newspaper room and liberates the typewriter there.
This is very interesting, that first Archie and now Betty are acquiring the instruments and drive for writing now that they never ever talk to Jughead Jones.
Cheryl has gathered the three other known homosexuals that were on the list into the music room, to update them and to freak out about potentially losing the Vixens. She doesn’t feel the need to inform anyone she isn’t personally friends with. She needs to know who sold her out. Who stands to gain the most from getting her off the Vixens?
Evelyn!
So she confronts Evelyn immediately. I love Evelyn and how Evil she is. She’s so calm and reserved and coiled and hateful. Cheryl is protesting entirely way too much, which gives Evelyn the upper hand.
In the principal’s office, Featherhead wants to know if Mrs. Thornton was trying to “indoctrinate” Archie, who doesn’t know what that word means. Werther says that civil disobedience and revolution is happening in Cuba and can’t happen here. I mean, it wasn’t necessarily due to Mrs. Thornton that Archie started that unionized coup against Clifford Blossom, but I don’t think either man knows about that.
Veronica is doing a full show and tell of her life, bringing Hiram to the movie theater. The one he wanted to raze and make into a parking lot. He tells her it’s tremendous, which is so insincere,but Veronica bless her is just too lonely to see it. As soon as Hiram is off to see the afternoon movie, in comes Glen, who wants to know what Veronica’s relationship is with Hiram. I see that even though he looks like Harrison Ford when clean cut, he’s still dumb as a bag of bricks because he did not realize that Veronica Lodge was Hiram Lodge’s daughter.
At Pep Comics, Ethelhead tell of their recent misadventures to Fieldstone. He already knows that his comics are being rejected, and that it’s an emergency. He’s very upset. They’re getting graphic hatemail. They’re going to “hunker down and weather this storm.” I like Fieldstone for how adorable he finds Ethel. Everything she says makes him laugh or call her Freckles or Girl Genius. Ethel wants a copy of her newly published work. Then Ethelhead, without having to even say anything, just read each other’s minds and take bundles to sell on their own cognizance.
At home, Betty is soliciting anonymous submissions to her magazine, “The Teenage Mystique.” …. I mean. Betty Friedan published The Feminine Mystique in 1963 and I am not ok with a seminal work of feminism being consumed in this way by this piece of pop media. Betty Cooper uses “The Girl Next Door” as her moniker, shoving her invitation sheet into every single locker.
Now that he doesn’t have a quiet classroom to write poetry in, Archie has to try to eke out some space, much like Jane Austen or Emily Dickinson, to work on his writing. He flips out when Uncle Fucking Frank barges in, demanding to know what he is up to.
Uncle Frank and his obsession with Archie is very disturbing. Also does he still live in this house? Does Mary just lock herself into the master bathroom and sleep in the bathtub at night? Anyway, when Archie who acted like he’d been jerking it to hardcore gay porn eventually says that he was working on his writing, Uncle Frank says he came in to police Archie’s sexuality again. But the scary interrogation of the afternoon has definitely taught Archie what “indoctrination” means. It’s not sufficiently heterosexual of him, as a man, to write poetry for any purpose than to make some girl swoon and “get with” him. Except given the events of the past season, they don’t really want any girl to “get with” him either. No peep shows through windows between houses like 5 feet apart with Betty. And if he had impregnated Cheryl they were both going to have to get married. So the repression that is being laid on Archie is just as contradictory and repressive as what is being laid on Betty (except she’s much more abnormal about how horny it seems to make her) . He can’t be insufficiently straight and manly, but being ultra straight and manly (i.e. succeeding in impregnating a girl) would also be a disaster.
Plus.
PLUS.
The very single, very childless, only works with minor teen boys Uncle Fucking Frank trying to control Archie’s outward behavior to keep him on the “straight and narrow” is fully ridiculous. I hate Frank so much. Why oh Why is Mary considered too inept to mother Archie, when she goes out of her way to cockblock Beronica’s kiss by essentially haranguing a doorman to let her break into someone else’s apartment??
At the Pembroke, Veronica wants to know why the FBI is following Hiram. Hiram says he’s being investigated as a possible communist, because he went to Cuba the year before to buy cigars. Another lie comes out before he actually says the truth - the lie was that he came to Riverdale to hide out. The truth is that he needs Veronica to lie for him to the government. She balks because lying to the government scares her. He pretends there’s an out for her - he’s “meeting with a lawyer” but in the end he trusts she’ll throw herself into the fire for him.
The next day, Glen is waiting for her at school. Glen says that he’s been assigned to her, and that someone else has followed Hiram to NYC. Veronica wants to see proof, to which Glen says to get into the car. She does!
Archie sees Veronica get into the car, and she sees him as they drive by. Of course, the place they go to is the diner. Glen shows Veronica photos of Hiram at the same table in Cuba as “Fidel Mastro.” The person that Veronica is upset to be seeing in the photo is the blonde lover at Hiram’s side.
Archie has tracked down his English teacher by looking her up in the phone book. She is packing up to leave, moving to Greendale, to be a library there as a volunteer. Apparently that River makes all the difference - it refused admittance to Julian Blossom, dunking him and making him come out the other end of it as someone who is an ally to Cheryl for one. Mrs Thornton says really contradictory things - that there’s a “job waiting for me” but also that it’s “volunteer.” OK but ma’am what will you live on?
No matter.
When Archie expresses his confusion about the state of the world, his teacher hands him a copy of The Crucible by Arthur Miller. Archie says he was going to do Biff’s monologue from Death of a Salesman, but now he’s going to pick something out of The Crucible.
OMG is this why Jughead picked the name Biff for Archie when they run away together in Season 3? The key bit of that monologue is this: “And I never got anywhere because you blew me so full of hot air I could never stand taking orders from anybody! That’s whose fault it is!” Biff is saying this to Willy, the salesman.
The teacher gives him a benediction, that strangely sounds exactly like what Hiram said earlier in the day to Julian: “Words have power.” She keeps telling him he’s “more than” a Biff type (when Jughead in the OG timeline reduced him exactly to it??). They give each other a hug of farewell.
Meanwhile, Ethelhead are running a brisk, literally under the table business, selling Pep Comic books, sitting back to back. I love their partnership. Jughead totally acts like he’s selling contraband weapons or something. He’s so dorky, I love him. he feels like he’s being such a badass, while Ethel just likes this entire exercise.
At the Dark Room, Cheryl is having another panic attack about potentially getting kicked out of the Vixens. The other gays have come up with a plan, to ape lavender marriages. Conveniently for them there’s one white and black person in each homosexual pairing, which obviates the need for a race discussion should it ever come up. Cheryl gravely says that going in the closet like that seems to betray Toni’s principles. Toni, who as we’ve seen all season doesn’t really have principles, lies again. Instead of saying, I want to hunker down and survive to see another day (like the much more honest Fieldstone), Toni says she’s allowing this charade for “all our sakes.”
Archie finds The Crucible extremely riveting.
Veronica is sadly mulling things over in her apartment, with liquor. Hiram comes in late from New York to say that his attempt to buy his way out of his problem did not work out. He needs her to commit perjury on his behalf. Veronica confronts him with the fact that his trip to Cuba was in service of an affair with a Kelly (the name of the actors’ IRL wife, which was a very cute reference). When Veronica sounds unwilling to acquiesce to his demands, Hiram reverts to villainy which is his true form and threatens her, saying that it wouldn’t be a favor for HIM if she commits perjury - it would be self protective for her, because he would lose everything if the story came out that he was in violation of his morality clause. Veronica shoots back that she already went through the experience of banishment and life in exile. She’s so lonely, as I’ve said, and she’s genuinely hurt that her initial intuition (Hiram would not show up unannounced and play all nicey nice unless there was a direct personal benefit she could do at her cost for him) was correct. “What you should be asking me for is mercy!” she cries, before storming off.
The next day, the Lavender Marriages storm the halls in patented Cheryl SloMo (™) which I don’t remember seeing much this season. Evelyn, wearing an appropriately lavender cardigan, is very annoyed by this workaround that the four homosexuals have found. Apparently, their queerness was an open secret, which is very very weird to me. Midge for one seems disappointed with Cheryl, who refuses to look at her. But everyone else is equally perturbed by these two pairings.
Archie is very nervous about trying to give his monologue from The Crucible. Penelope Blossom is teaching the class, sort of, I mean - she’s dressed up for it and in the classroom, standing like a Dior New Deal costume model in a very red dress. The thing is, she doesn’t seem to know what The Crucible is, which is surprising, and even more surprising, she didn’t insist on cross checking what the students were going to be performing before letting them.
Suddenly Archie is giving the John Proctor speech and uh -
I -
oh help-
I don’t want to be here.
This is the most grating thing I’ve ever seen on Riverdale and this includes a lot of the hideous singing and dancing and poorly transposed musical numbers and so on. I get very annoyed when shows do this, having actors “play” people who “play” at “acting.” It’s so self referential and masturbatory, sort of like how when movie people make movies about making movies they act like all the normal “This is what happens on a job” stuff is the most momentous thing ever and simultaneously they refuse to deal with the actual documented problems of their industry that are unique to just themselves
Ok so as far as that speech goes, John Proctor at the end of his rope, giving the thesis statement of the play etc, Archie (and KJ Apa’s) delivery is fine. He is doing all the correct actor-y things with his voice, going from screaming (but not to harsh) to suddenly dropping in volume (but not to the point of being inaudible), trembling with emotion but not enough to obscure diction, and his eyes also fill with tears but not enough to make his sinuses get sloppy. It’s all… fine. But this level of sincerity completely and high emotionality goes completely against the bouncy surreality of everything that S7 (and all the seasons before) have relied on to be watchable.
This is how Riverdale loses even by winning. KJ Apa works everything he knows how to do as an actor (activating tear ducts at will, flexible eyebrows, vocal chord range deployment, breathing techniques, working outside his native accent) so that Archie the character gives a professional-grade burst of emotion for his monologue class at school, and yet, because it just does not fit with anything Riverdale has ever done, it completely shatters the immersion in the narrative for me and all I am left with is
CRINGE.
But anyway. the power of Arthur Miller’s words supposedly gives Cheryl some sort of realization, because she marches down to the principal’s office to face off against her father, the principal and Werthers. She tells the three men that she will never cooperate with them, and has a wonderful moment:
“I, Cheryl Blossom, hereby and willingly, end my stewardship of the River Vixens.”
I really, really needed this palate cleanser after what they made Archie do. Thank god for Cheryl.
She also tells them of the Lavender Marriage workaround, before joining the gay kids of Riverdale club. “Clearly, we don’t live in a just world,” she says, bumping shoulders with Kevin.
The thing is, this feels like a course correction to the plotline that lead me to hate Kevin - that is, he was in the closet for real, lying to himself and to Betty and everyone else about what the hell he was up to. With this lavender marriage situation though, the show seems to be positing that there is such a thing as a ‘good and useful’ closet. If you construct it and climb into it yourself - and everyone sort of kind of knows you’re lying - then it’s fine. (Is it?) And I must still ask - WHY IS IT CHERYL THAT HAS TO GIVE ANYTHING UP? Because think about it - Kevin nor Clay nor Toni have had to give up a single one of their hobbies or group affiliations. It’s just Cheryl that had to give up something she held to a religious level of importance.
Why is Kevin not expected to confront his father about being a lackey to the mayor? Oh right, because even Betty finds his relationship with Clay ‘dreamy.’ [Vomit]
Cheryl says she’s happy to have even a small amount of space on earth to live her truth. Toni hopes Evelyn breaks her neck cheerleading.
Veronica approaches Archie to say that it was quite the speech. She gives him a kiss on the cheek, and then they kiss each other. Archie is very surprised, but not displeased. Veronica looks very serious.
Ok.
Ok SHOW?
FUCKING SHOW ME ANOTHER BERONICA KISS PLEASE.
Back at the diner, an Asian boyscout (or whatever they’re called) is asking for Pit of the Perverse #32 . Jughead has been marking up 10 cent issues all the way up to a quarter for his sales. The boyscout turns out to be a plant, and this is a raid. Keller is doing this with his time. The jig is up, so they have to turn over their stash to the cops. It’s very funny to me that Jughead completely expected to be SHOT for selling the comic books - he was this close to demanding that they not shoot.
Jughead has Ethel at his home again, and the two of them celebrate with milkshakes and a “god bless America toast” about the money they’ve made.
At the Pembroke, Hiram and Veronica are having dinner together (Cooked by who I wonder?). Hiram is trying to ingratiate himself to his clearly not very happy daughter, but all he can offer is his own show (“A new episode of Oh Mija!”). This is absolutely the wrong thing to say, and Veronica takes off in a huff.
The next day at school, Archie is taking things out of his locker. He seems to only have images of male baseball players on the inside - a cover of Batter, and a picture of someone pitching a ball but somehow also called the Bulldogs. Just then, a woman asks him if he’s Archie Andrews.
And it’s Geraldine Grundy, this time as an English teacher. She’s wearing a white cardigan with gold embroidery that I think is supposed to have some sort of angelic effect but I am too consumed with the question WHY THE FUCK IS SHE HERE to really be persuaded. She’s taking over for Mrs. Thornton. Archie looks very smitten immediately. Grundy claims to have attended Mt. Holyoke together with Mrs. Thornton and in the name of Emily Dickinson, I banish thee! Shoo! Away with you! So she seems to appreciate Archie’s poetry from what she’s heard from Mrs. Thornton. Archie wants to keep things discreet because his uncle hates the idea of his writing poetry. But then Grundy ruins it by whispering “IT CAN BE OUR LITTLE SECRET” like a total creeper, then she dangles her husband, an alleged poet.
In the Principal’s office, the hideous white men are going over their loot of confiscated comic books. There’s so many of these. Werther’s is very pissed off. There’s something about his presence that renders his lover (sorry, I just keep interjecting my headcanon about this but otherwise their relationship makes no sense to me) Featherhead completely mute. I don’t care about them enough to go all the way back and check, but I feel like at some point Werther’s dominance became such that Featherhead just nods and mimes with his face when Werthers is speaking. Werthers wants to do something he calls “Full measures.” Kevin’s dad makes like Kevin and is spineless.
Meanwhile, in English class, Veronica is doing King Lear. She’s giving Cordelia’s refusal speech. The person who understands exactly what Veronica is going through, with an overbearing, criminal father, is Cheryl. Betty is sad because Veronica is clearly sad, but it’s Cheryl that understands her. While this excellence is going on, Grundy is fucking making eyes at Archie, who reciprocates because he doesn’t ever not.
Later that day, Veronica brings an affidavit with the correct set of lies to her father. She says she did it for her mother, then starts laying out conditions. She wants her father to tell her mother that he’s cheating on her. She also wants the title to the Pembroke. The way this father daughter pair constantly fight over real estate, and the supreme importance of paperwork to their relationship is an odd constant. I have issues with Cordelia - The great tragedy of King Lear, to me, isn’t that King Lear has evil daughters. It’s that King Lear is a deeply stupid man who favored the child who most directly inherited his deep stupidity, the extremely stupid Cordelia. I am immensely satisfied that Veronica finds a very Goneril/Regan type of solution to her Cordelia problem. Good for her. There’s a reason I love her so much.
At the post office, Betty collects a literal BAG of mail. Did post office rules in the US change sometime after the fifties? Because you can’t actually send things that are addressed to something like “The Girl Next Door.” The US Postal Service literally will not deliver if you give your addressee a title like that. Oh but I guess this is Riverdale, not the US of A? Or did Betty somehow manage to like, actually establish an LLC or something with the name “Girl Next Door”?!
Hermione has come home to the Pembroke literally the afternoon of the morning Hiram left, I guess. Veronica says as much. Hermione says that Oh Mija is going to shutter after “seven long seasons” because she is “ready for something new.” She has extremely nervous hands while she’s announcing this plan to Veronica, fidgeting with her gloves and twitching her fingers. I think she has to let out her feelings in this digital dance because the expressive muscles of her face do not move much at all. She also adds almost like an afterthought that she will be divorcing Hiram. Veronica seems not particularly perturbed by this news. She reacts like she’s Hermione’s older sister, rather than her daughter. “What will you do?” as in - how will you cope? But also What will you live on? and so forth. Hermione manipulates a promise to not have to spend Christmas by herself from Veronica, as though none of the rest of the season have actually happened.
What absolute assholes both Hiram and Hermione are. They both abandoned Veronica, banished her, locked her out of the house rendering her homeless on purpose in order to punish her for getting in the way of their parking lot real estate deal, but when the going gets tough, they both come to see her to demand her company, her fidelity and her services. And she gives it to them, because Veronica is second only to Jughead Jones as the most love-starved character on Riverdale. Poor baby.
Jughead gets to school the next day to fine that the whole student body is lined up with armfuls of comic books, trying to sell them to Werther. Dilton doesn’t see what the harm would be, but later we are shown. There is a cartoon Nazi style book burning which I would bet is taken shot for shot from Indiana Jones. Cheryl is standing in for the Nazi Elsa (which is so not fair to her but ok) crying tears over the destruction of free speech and art. The Riverdale Adventure Scouts stand in for the Indiana Jones Hitler Jugend.
#riverdale season 7#riverdale episode 130#riverdale 7x13#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#riverdale episode recap
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Riverdale S7 E19 (Chapter 136) Golden Age of Television
There are so many things you can say about Riverdale the show that are completely wrong, but one of the most wrong things you can say about it is that it is made in some sort of careless or haphazard way, without due care and consideration.
The penultimate episode of Riverdale the TV Series, which launched in the final years of the most recent Golden Age of Television, and is likely to be one of the last shows to have this full 22 episode, multi-year arc of classical American TV, opens with a wide open outdoor shot of the river, the forest with huge trees, and the sign that looked old fashioned and worn even in an 1950s context which they never changed into 2017.
The picture-perfect shot of the Riverdale-Town-With-Pep sign is transitioned perfectly over to an actual postcard showing a pictorial representation of that sign, stuck to the window of Jughead Jones’ souped up train car. The fact that this person who lives in Riverdale has purchased (or was given?) a postcard of the town sign and put it up on his window as the sole decorative touch when he is IN the town is so funny. Jughead has said that Archie is the spirit of Riverdale in all seasons other than this one (he just isn’t as interested in Archie in this alternative universe) and yet he’s the one that is completely obsessed with what it means to be Riverdale in a way that not even the people running for mayor (who are all of his friends’ moms and dads) have bothered blathering on about.
In the 1950s alternate universe, Jughead Jones has this to say about his location:
“For years, Riverdale had prided itself for being the town with pep - safe, innocent, utopian.”
Alas, but this is not real, apparently because he’s learned about the “darkness that churned beneath Riverdale.”
Life in general is at best a mix of good and bad things happening. There are some eras though that are convinced they are the good times when they are happening, which then provides endless fodder for people to argue with in subsequent generations. The 1950s for the United States is one of those eras.
Possibly in this spirit, Jughead Jones loathes to write meanly about the things that he loves, so our narrator is being a bit indirect when he tries to describe the “churning darkness” but that leads to lying by omission. The Town’s Mayor turned out to be a Soviet Agent hiding a nuclear bomb warhead in his ancestral mines - rather more dire than just merely prejudice and fearmongering, and unrelated to inequality!
See, even now, even after all he knows in the 1950s universe, Jughead doesn’t want to write his town off as the hellhole that it often actually has been! (Look what they did to Ethel! And the man summarily executed in the town square by Sheriff Keller as his skin sloughed off him in layers!).
1950s Jughead is not the insomniac-due-to-homelessness of the other time line Jughead. He’s just a morning person who gets up early enough to get the morning paper, read it, and then start writing while the sun comes streaming in. On the table next to the typewriter is a copy of the Riverdale Register with HIS PHOTO, posing moodily against the big phallus of the palladium bomb. First, this is a very funny photo for the Riverdale to use with the headline PROJECT MOLOCH FOILED! Why not use a photo of the mayor and his soviet spy wife getting arrested or their mug shot or something else? Why use this photo of Jughead Jones? Secondly, the idea that something as major as a world-ending bomb being discovered by two high school kids in abandoned mines in upstate New York getting no New York Times or other major newspaper coverage is pretty funny. What’s even funnier is that maybe it DID get national press coverage but Jughead Jones is so absolutely parochial that he only cares what the Riverdale Register had to say about it. Or! And maybe this is the truth - he only wanted to see himself in this off beat beatnik type of photo on the front page of a paper. Vanity at its most potent!
Because think about this - he’s wearing stripey pajama pants and the patented slutty tank top (in the 1950s these were undershirts, right? So he put on a brassiere for his early morning writing bout) but then remembered to comb his hair and pin (it has to be pinned) his felt crown just so on top of his head before he could sit down to write his commentary about the recent events which showed that Riverdale is not in fact a perfect haven.
Anyway, I am happy that he’s narrating again. I missed Jughead narration.
We cut to Archie who is reading On the Road, in bed, first thing in the morning. Jughead tells us that there’s “some new thinking that is required,” thereby presenting us with this as one of the major indicators of “new thinking.” Except Archie has been trying out experimental artistic writing and reading all season, so this is not in fact new. Jughead of this world simply doesn’t know Archie Andrews very well at all.
At school, Principal Featherhead is packing his personal items into a cardboard box under the watchful (but useless) eye of Sheriff Keller. Jughead, at school well before the rest of the student body, gets to witness the very unhappy and angry Featherhead leave the premises. Featherhead gives him a nasty, I blame you for this! glare. Narration Jughead explains that Featherhead gave an official ‘personal reasons’ explanation for his losing his job, but the real reason was “an anonymous accuser” identifying him as part of “Mayor Blossom’s Soviet Shenanigans.”
Was that Jughead, who made the accusation? Or was it Cheryl?
Featherhead’s boyfriend the Lolita-fetishist comes out to see him take his leave of the premises, then makes sure to give Jughead the same I Blame You For This glare too. These adults do not have any qualms about not treating these kids like they are kids. Jughead has been feeling himself of late - he’s wearing suspenders and a t shirt under his button down shirt.
We cut to Hal and Alice reading out the news. They are looking for another principal! Then we cut to the extremely colorful Cooper house, where Betty is giving her parents maximum disapproval in glares as they work out how they are not going to separate or get divorced but instead will simply live apart on different stories of their house - Hal in the basement, Alice on the second floor where the bedroom is. Betty wants to know why Alice won’t simply divorce Hal.
The simple answer is that Alice loves being on television, and the sexism of newsmedia (which is STILL EXACTLY THE SAME IN 2023) means that there’s no way a woman in her 50s who looks like she’s in her 50s, no matter how gorgeous, would be allowed a head anchor job, for one, and for another, she might simply not be good enough for any other television job not given to her by her husband. This is the simple answer as I say, but Alice is not someone who has a clean relationship to the truth, so in response to Betty’s question she says a lot of other things, all bullshit, about staying together for her daughters, not breaking up the family, blah blah. She does mention the inability to open a bank account again.
Alice says something else, that I find rather terrifying, but Betty isn’t horrified by it. Alice would rather have her cheating troll of a husband live with her in the basement like a literal troll, and sit next to him smiling on their television show, than be alone, because she doesn’t know how to be alone. The music they play is sympathetic, but I feel no sympathy for Alice. There are no excuses - none whatsoever - to the way she treated Ethel from end to end, including that ridiculous offer to ‘adopt’ her. Fuck Alice, and also, fuck everyone who is scared to be alone. You all do the worst shit to other people.
Nana Blossom meanwhile is holding court in front of her two grandchildren. She calls her son “idiot” and her daughter in law “viper,” then prays that they rot in a “Russian gulag for the rest of their miserable lives.” Why would it be a Russian gulag though? Having committed treason, wouldn’t they just be executed in America?
Both of the Blossom children hated their parents as much as their grandmother did.
“From your lips to Moloch’s ears, Nana,” Cheryl says. This is one of my most cherished Cheryl lines ever, right up there with “You’re looking especially Dilfy today, Mr. Andrews.” Julian chimes in to say that he always knew there was something squirrely about his parents. I mean, bless Julian’s wonderful singing voice, but he’s only being like this because he’s pissed that his father brought in Reggie Mantle, no? Cheryl has been put through it - about her sexuality, about her art - by both of her parents who threatened her directly. Julian has had either favored-child or ignored-child status, so it’s quite dark that he hates them so. They both look very psychopathic as they put their indifferent two cents in.
Nana Blossom, who anyone with sense has to admit is the best character on Riverdale bar none, starts to say that it’s up to the three of them now to "ensure that the Blossom rise from the ashes like phoenixes” which scared me for a moment because I thought for sure she was going to suggest Julian and Cheryl fuck each other but she does not. Instead, Cheryl, looking very happy, says she knows just what the first thing to do should be.
The school bell rings, and we see the important kids all seated at the student lounge together, worried for the future, “with Featherhead gone.” The seating configuration is interesting. Counting clockwise from Betty, it’s Veronica, Jughead, Clay perched next to Kevin and touching him with his body, Kevin, then Reggie perched next to Archie and touching HIM with his body, Archie, who is seated as far as possible away from Cheryl while still adjacent, who is next to Toni. The bi-girl Beronica couple are not touching, and the gay-girl Choni couple are also not touching, and I object to all of this.
Jughead is very worried that it might be Dr. Werthers as the replacement. Kevin doesn’t like that idea at all. He’s seconded by Reggie, who says Captain Hook or Godzilla would be a better replacement. That joke lands flat because Archie is really worried they might ask Uncle Fucking Frank ‘to step up.’ Reggie is wearing a black and orange striped shirt and it can’t be a coincidence that Archie’s T shirt has the same orange shade at the neck.
Toni says she knows a great candidate, who will need a boost from the PTA. Betty tells her that Alice is president of the PTA, urging Toni to give Alice another chance at “doing the right thing.” Now that I’m typing this out, it seems telegraphed in the most blatant way - Toni brings it up, and this is supposed to be a redemption opportunity for a white woman - but I truly didn’t glom on to who this candidate might be when I was watching the the first time, because of the strange way that Jughead takes leave of his friends.
Right after Betty says that thing about Alice (“A lot has changed for her”) he jumps up to say he’s going to pay a visit to Dr. Moldy, then significantly nods in general at the silent group before taking off to no fanfare. I also couldn’t tell who this ‘Dr Moldy’ was that he wanted to pay a housecall to.
It turned out to be Dr. Werthers, who is also packing up his things. I mean, it was only fun for him to work at Riverdale HS because his boyfriend ran the place, so of course he’d be leaving now that he’s gone! Jughead doesn’t yet know that gay people exist, maybe, since he hasn’t been in the Grundy writing class nor getting recruited by Clay, so he jumps to the opposite conclusion. “Featherhead is barely out the door and you’re already trying to take his office!?” he says, after groaning, Oh I knew it!
The phrasing of this is so funny - he’s just out of a job, Jughead, not dead, but okay, sure, say it like that.
It turns out Werthers is going “off to do real work, in Washington.” This has Jughead very concerned, so he steps decisively into the room. Werthers is extremely smug, saying he is going to be working on a presidential committee on juvenile delinquency, with a specific focus on the evil of comic books. Jughead sarcastically says “Well Golly!” at him in a nasty way before telling him not to let the door hit him on his way out. Werthers won’t of course let that be the last word: “My tribunal will still be doing the important work of regulating comic books.” Jughead spits out that what that tribunal does is Censorship. Werthers doesn’t skip a beat - he anticipated that Jughead would come barging in here, like this, at this time, so he had a final nasty piece of news ready: The latest issue of Pep Comics that Jughead and his editor submitted for approval has been rejected by the Tribunal. Extremely pleased with himself, Werthers basically tells Jughead that he knows he put this entire comic publisher out of business, and he did it on purpose.
This is the second time in this show that Werthers/Dupont has completely derailed a Jughead Jones creative career endeavor. Oddly powerful, this wizened turkey necked man, isn’t he?
Outside, Archie is working off some steam he built up about literature by shooting hoops in front of Reggie, who tells him “you still got it.” Archie has been so enthused about the On the Road book that he’s committed pieces of it to memory. He has decided to just live out the book - to ride the rails, hit the trails, hop trains, explore the country, sleep under the stars, and write. This has to be a little dig to someone about the relationship that Jughead and Archie tried to have with each other in the other universe. Those two actually did ride (well, walk along) the rails, slept under some stars, and so on. It’s really surreal that Archie is saying this to Reggie, even if this an alternative universe!
Reggie wants to know how Mary is going to take these vagabond wild man writer fantasies. Archie confidently tells him that since he will do these adventurings during summer vacation, nobody can stop him. Meanwhile, I am reminded of that Sylvia Plath journal bit where she is annoyed that she doesn’t really get to have experiences like On the Road, of hopping on a motorcycle and just taking off to ‘rough it’ - not worrying about where she’s going to sleep and if she’ll be safe from, variously, rape, violence, attempted murder, murder. Reggie is all about his ‘best basketball camp’ experience that he’s looking forward to. He shoots a basket casually, making Archie look at him in wonder.
My bitterness about Jughead-Archie not happening aside, the relationship that Reggie the good hearted basketball star has with Archie the small town boy with bohemian writer aspirations is quite sweet. Almost wholesome. (Insert “We could have had a good life” speech from Brokeback Mountain about Jughead-Archie here). IF we’re still positing that all these people are existing in the Angel Tabitha created world which is supposed to solve the problems of all the satan-riddled other Riverdales, the fact that Tabitha thinks that the deep relationship that Jughead had with Archie was fully toxic and in need of eradication is, to say the least, disturbing.
Speaking of Jughead, he has run straight to Veronica, to nurse his wounds about the latest issue of Pep Comics being kiboshed by Werthers. They’re calling it Zip Comics right now. Veronica is in her Movie Usher uniform, because I guess Clay and Kevin haven’t reported into work yet. Jughead speculates that it’s due to “The Comet” story that the latest issue was rejected. He mentions that Tabitha “clued [him] in” last time she was in town. Veronica is upset, because in her opinion that story was wonderful. “It’s so romantic and philosophical,” she says, reminding the audience that this is a story about a comet that hits NYC, with two survivors, a black man and a white woman, who fall in love.
WINK WINK HINT HINT hey because Season 6 of Riverdale ended with a comet hitting a town and obliterating it, ending the lives of a white man in love with a black woman.
In any case, when Jughead makes it clear that he thinks it’s the interracial nature of the couple that got the entire issue killed, Veronica looks a little surprised. Jughead looks concerned in a filial way when he tells her that he hasn’t yet told his publisher the bad news, because it will “crush” Featherstone.
Veronica says that the comic and the story was a masterpiece, adding she thought it would make a great movie. The single page of the comic they show us involves rather tame looking panels of one white man asking another white man if we hadn’t passed through the tail of a comet before, and the other man replying this was a different comet.
Jughead apparently adores the budding movie mogul side of his girlfriend, because he can’t contain his excitement even though he tries to -his eyebrows waggle up then down and back up again, as he starts to smile. He tells Veronica that if SOMEONE wanted to get in touch with DuBois, the original author of the tale, he has “all their information.” He means for Veronica to pursue it! Jughead Jones s7 being the most supportive friend to women who want to make art (Ethel! Veronica!) is a great touch. I’m very for this. Veronica’s face goes from being just wistful (I thought it would make a great movie) to disbelieving (do you think I can do it?) to being scared but excited (Maybe I *can* be the one!) It’s very lovely to watch.
At the Cooper house, Betty and Alice are sitting on the sofa as Toni makes her case from their armchair. When Riverdale High School integrated they shut down three (three??) black high schools, summarily firing all the teachers. Three? THREE all black high schools existed IN Riverdale?
Toni is lying. She has to be. There are definitely not enough black people in Riverdale to sustain a single all black high school, nevermind THREE. Either that, or there is some sort of terrifying deep apartheid going on because no.
But anyway, all three women are wearing belts with the most outlandish buckles of all time. Like, hideous monstrosities. Is this each of their armor, to protect their fragile navels from each other now that they have to discuss race?
Toni says that one really incredible teacher has been driving a cab the past year. I try not to look too closely at the racial history of Riverdale especially as relayed by Toni because of all her bullshit both as a construction and as a person, but she does have one thing right - in talking about race to a white woman, she takes on a quiet, almost pleading, nearly weepy super-soft tone, to prevent a freak out and flight. Even so, Alice still tries to wriggle out of it - She the Good White Person is of course in support of justice in theory, but she does not have the power to wrangle other white people of the PTA.
Betty calls bullshit on that immediately (good for her!) telling her to make it work.
And voila! Alice made it work. “Now is the time for a fresh start.”
Hey it’s Weatherbee! He’s now principal. His speech is about change and new ideas (things that the previous administration was against.) Betty and Veronica are sitting with Jughead, wearing hers and hers similar outfits (tight fitting bodice, flared skirt, bow at the bust) in pink and purple checked patterns.
Weatherbee starts to give an extremely political sounding speech that I would find very confusing coming from a high school principal. “If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem.” “The challenges are enormous and systemic” he says, adding “Be kind. Be decent. Be better!” Toni leaps to her feet, applauding, which then makes everyone else do the same, though I don’t know what this pseudo Obama first-campaign styling has to do with running a high school. Why is the show making me be like Evelyn Evernever? She is the last last to get to her feet, looking extremely annoyed.
Archie goes to visit the principal to advocate for a “top not teach” - Mrs. Thornton! Weatherbee is all about bringing Mrs Thornton back to work at Riverdale. As he leaves the office, Archie grins maniacally to himself about this.
Part of the uh, doing better also includes Cheryl crashing the rehearsal for the cheerleaders. She singsongs, “Hold on to your pom poms my beloved paper shakers, because I’m ba~~~~ck!” I wish I had her confidence. Evelyn has all the girls lined up in a rigid grid. She tells Cheryl that she isn’t invited to the “private practice of the Vixens” because Cheryl is the “has been daughter of Russian spies.” Cheryl says she’s launching a coup because Weatherbee is “ushering in a new era.”
This is just like Kyle’s dad from South Park screaming Obama~ in the streets of their town causing mayhem after the election because that one change was supposed to fix literally everything all at once.
In any case, Cheryl challenges Evelyn to a dance off. “Winner takes all.” Evelyn refuses, but she doesn’t issue the refusal in a powerful way. She stammers a little, which then allows Cheryl to insist that refusal is not an option.
We get a final (sob) Cheryl Blossom cheerleading dance-off routine, ending in slow motion splits, with lots of little skippety hoppity steps and rather muted whooshing sound effects. I really can’t tell anything about cheerleading technique (repeat viewings of Stick It and Bring It On notwithstanding). At one point Cheryl drops the pompoms altogether to freestyle before retrieving them in a basic crouch. She has great chaine turns and flexibility.
However - What does having solid ballet training and the ability to do a solo dance have to do with cheerleading? When will the cheerleaders ever have to do chaine turns like this or be allowed to kick their ankles up to their ears in conservative 1955? Why is it necessary for the captain of the cheerleading squad to be able to do an impromptu dance? Furthermore, Cheryl’s dance-off proposal is patently unfair. It tests for improv skills that are not necessary in cheerleading, where coordinated movement with other cheerleaders is more important, plus Cheryl had time to pick the music, create the choreography and practice the thing before ambushing Evelyn with this whole set up, whereas Evelyn has presumably been busy actually running the squad and teaching them to stand in straight lines (this is, by the way, no small skill - ballet companies as great as the New York City Ballet consistently suck at getting professional ballet dancers to stand in straight lines to move in unison).
Cheryl inevitably wins but sheer charisma and starpower here, but I am (once again, sigh) full of sympathy for Evelyn here. Evelyn just freaks out, screaming, and then leaves the rehearsal. I have this weird amount of faith that she was a better squad leader, that the caliber (?!?) of cheerleading under Evelyn must have been superior to the self-aggrandizing that my beloved Cheryl Blossom can’t help but engage in.
Case in point - Cheryl grandiosely announces that this is a ‘new era for the Vixens’ but then only talks about herself. She comes out to the group as a lesbian, in order to “live in the light.” Except she issues a dark ultimatum - if anyone has a problem with a very rich lesbian who does great at solo dances leading the cheerleading squad, they can henceforth eject themselves from the squad. Umm team building? I guess??
Another couple outs themselves from within the squad - a white girl and a black girl. So at this point 100% of the black people who ever spoke and are queer can only date white people. That is so strange.
Jughead shows Fieldstone the “rejected for not promoting traditional American values” notice about the latest issue of the comic the two of them put together. Featherstone decides he’s going to publish the issue anyway, “send it out into the world, hope for the best.” He is with Jughead - the reason this issue was rejected was because of the miscegenation in the Comet story.
Fieldstone the editor has a bomb of his own to drop. “There’s not gonna be a next time, kid.” He’s proud of the Comet issue, can’t imagine a better swan song, and will let his business die on a high note. As people always do, in every universe, Fieldstone asks Jughead Jones to write a eulogy (in this case, the last editorial). Fieldstone turns out to have had a heart of gold after all (sort of), enough to give Jughead a heartfelt “It’s been an honor kid” double handed handshake. Jughead looks very moved, and very alert - he’s trying to learn how to let go of something he loved, which is a skill no adult ever really demonstrated how to do. Fieldstone takes an unsentimental look around the place, then says, “Well, it was a beautiful dream while it lasted.”
Speaking of dreams, Betty goes to pick up a special package from the post office. She unwraps it right then and there. It’s the Teenage Mystique, self published! The nice lady at the post office says something generic about how proud her parents must be. Betty doesn’t know how to tell her, No, they aren’t.
Then we catch up with Kevin, who fills me with dread every time I see him this season. Room 309 opens to reveal his dad evidently shirtless (or less, ew) in just a robe. Kevin was being a good son - Audrey (from the Sheriff’s office?) told Kevin his dad wasn’t feeling well, so he brought his father some soup. That’s really sweet.
Unfortunately, this is the exact time with Uncle Fucking Frank decides to come out of the bathroom in just a towel. He tells a ridiculous story about the shower being on the fritz in his room because he is also allegedly staying at the hotel. Why the hell didn’t he just stay in the bathroom if he was going to lie? This is a very Frank Andrews move, isn’t it?
Looking utterly terrified, Sheriff Andrews invites his son into the very red interior of this old man yaoi fucking room. Oh no, is this in the same motel that Twyla prostitutes out of? Christ in heaven SAVE ME.
Kevin looks as horrified as I feel. He can tell these two have been fucking.
At the Cooper’s, Betty shows her mother the self published book. She very much wants Alice to read it, and Alice immediately refuses. Betty begs her to read it - “By getting to know me better, you might get to know yourself better.” Alice refuses to touch the book.
Archie is meanwhile hanging out with Mrs. Thornton, who has been employed lickety split back at the school from which she was fired. She says Geraldine and she have been discussing Archie’s writing, which Mrs. Thornton wants him to continue with. Archie proudly tells her that he is “gonna hit the rails” with the dream of writing a big juicy poem. She wants very much for him to see what the world beyond Riverdale is like.
Veronica approaches Clay to ask him whether he knows The Comet as a story. When he gives a very enthusiastic affirmation, she floats the idea of his writing a screenplay of it for a major motion picture. I really love this about Veronica - when she sells an idea she sells the idea big. I should do this, but I don’t. She’s literally never made a movie but by god it’s gonna be MAJOR, you know? Anyway turns out Clay is one of those prepared people that god smiles down on, because he’s “actually been fiddling with a screenplay version” of this exact story. I am going to take a page out of Clay’s book and say the equivalent of this, because I’ve seen now so many men volunteer for things that are a) way beyond their capacity and b) based on lies along the lines of “I’ve Been Working On That Exact Thing For Years!”
It turns out Veronica actually used Jughead’s contacts and straight up bought the rights. She even has casting in mind (“Sidney Poitier!” they both shout actually). They then immediately decide to work their connection to Josie McCoy to get it rolling. Veronica sets the Cannes premiere 4 or 5 years from now. They embrace, giggling.
Archie comes home to find Reggie sitting disconsolate next to the lilacs. The dates for the basketball camp that Reggie has been so looking forward to will fall right in the middle of a key harvest at his family’s farm. The harvest can’t be skipped - it’s the one month that ensures survival for the rest of the year. “My parents need me,” Reggie says, his voice seizing up with tears. Reggie starts to cry in earnest. So then Archie says something completely amazing: “I’ll take your place on the farm.” He goes on to add that “Whatever else I had planned, it’s not as important as getting you set up for college.” He even gets a little poetic about how farmwork could actually be “exactly what a Beat writer should be doing.”
I’m very moved by this, because 1950s Archie is very kind in a way that the other universe Archie is not. (I mean, I’m a little bit anti-other world Archie because he’s so unpredictably violent. I’ve never forgiven him for smashing up his tv with a baseball bat as his terrified mother screamed in fear. Mary Andrews is useless, I grant you, but this is personal.) Anyway, Archie actually setting aside a personal dream (which is pretty harebrained, honestly) and wanting to commit to provide an actually useful material good for someone else!
Archie mentions the two people who can never been looked at directly on screen in S7 - Archie’s mom and dad - because they made things too complicated about how and why the biracial Reggie who identifies very strongly as a Koraen can exist as an American citizen in 1955. Archie talks about breaking bread with these unseen unseeable parents as though he’s really looking forward to it. Reggie, still getting over crying, tells him it sounds good, and then they embrace.
Archie says he loves Reggie, and Reggie says it right back.
OK so I’m discovering from watching this that I am actually a Jughead/Archie shipper at heart because THIS SHOULD HAVE BEEN A STORY WITH JUGHEAD. Why the fuck is Reggie usurping Jughead’s position? I understand that this world has been put together in some ways by Tabitha but in the context of the show, this storyline with the I Love Yous and Archie demonstrating that he is actually the golden hearted person that Jughead has for YEARS wanted him to be - this belongs to Jughead!
Betty wakes up without screaming to find her mom sitting creepily on the edge of her bed in the middle of the night. Alice is upset. She says she’s read the book, “and I’m speechless.” She’s belatedly proud that Betty wrote “a whole book.” Alice is weepy about how she did get to know Betty better and how she got to know all the young girls “so full of thoughts and fears and struggles and dreams” through the book. Alice of course can’t really spend a lot of time thinking about anyone other than herself - so she immediately turns the discovery that girls are not just a problem for her to quash but people in their own right, and sneers at herself about her limited aspirations that were of the limited times she was raised in.
I really resent the ways that this show keeps insisting that I hear Alice’s side of the story. Actually she’s a piece of shit. There is no her-side of the story. Betty is trying really hard anyway, trying to tell her mother both that it’s not too late for her, that she can be happy.
They embrace to stirring music, but I am unstirred.
Instead of worrying about the world ahead for the women who are coming up behind her, or trying to apologize to her daughter or Ethel (I mean really, Ethel is owed), Alice uses this opportunity like all other opportunities to think about how life has not treated HER very fairly, with Betty in full support.
Jughead has hauled the very heavy typewriter all the way to the diner, to type at the booth. This is very funny actually - he lives in a train car, and his favorite place to be outside his home is another converted train car. He’s composing the final letter for the final issue of Zip Comic, put out by Pep Comics. “We here at Pep Comics refuse to kneel to unAmerican censorship.” He’s very haunted by the bonfire of fascism from a few episodes ago. There’s a slowmo insert scene of all the now out of work writers and workers of Pep Comics reading through the final issue together in the office. Fieldstone comes to put a proud and grateful hand on Jughead’s shoulder. Jughead says that even though the final issue is being published without the seal of approval, he still hopes the issue will make it into people’s hands. They show people in the town square publicly reading the final issue. Jughead hopes that the comic will make people think, and help them feel a little less alone. We see Dilton holed up somewhere (is it the bunker? or just his room?) reading by flashlight, looking proud and sad.
Jughead goes to visit the emptied out offices a last time, as he listens to his own final message for the readers of Zip/Pep Comics: “It is easier to tear down than to build up. Try to be a builder, not a destroyer.” Wistfully, he swings the magazine rack, then he wanders into the editor’s office. Fieldstone has left him a little present - a photo of him and Jughead, holding a copy of what must be Jughead’s first issue, looking very grandpa-and-grandson, with the handwritten note that says “Keep Going, Kid.” The message that Jughead explains to his would be readers about W.E.B Debois is that there’s always a possibility of a greater, better future. Jughead is very moved by the gift and the encouragement, looking infinitely sad that it only came at the end of this entire enterprise.
Much like Archie sacrificing something he thought he wanted for pure vanity and personal aspiration to be actually useful in a direct and generous way for someone else breaks him out of a rather bad cycle that his character kept repeating, Jughead being able to see something come to a non-violent end, sort of land the ending, as it were, and then furthermore receive encouragement from a male authority who actually survived his mentorship relationship with Jughead is a huge thing that has happened.
Jughead comes home from the visit to the empty offices to find that Tabitha Tate is sitting in his train car, waiting for him. The music whooshes to let us know that this is the 2023 Tabitha, not the 1955 Tabitha. She’s not wearing her glasses. I also don’t know if 1955 would’ve just barged into someone’s residence like this one has, but in any case, Jughead is immensely pleased to see Tabitha. He gives her a hug, then asks where her glasses are. She’s also managed to haul a TV into his space.
2023 Tabitha lays out the very strange things she has to tell him in a very straightforward way- she’s not the Tabitha traveling with the NAACP. “I’m the Tabitha that you’ve forgotten.” Jughead makes a choked sound if disbelief at this crazy thing she says (which was actually a really good, grounding performance choice. I liked this throat sound a lot.)
Tabitha invites him to sit down in his own armchair. Jughead looks at her askance, but he isn’t sure that this isn’t some sort of joke, so he keeps grinning awkwardly. Then Tabitha switches on the TV, and in full 2017 digital color the show Riverdale starts playing.
Our story’s about a town, Jughead narrator is saying over the drone scan over the town of 2017 Riverdale.
Is this a color television?? Jughead shouts, looking very elated, then he starts to hear what the narrator is saying, “From a distance, it presents itself like so many other small towns.” He recognizes himself, and he does that thing that I think most people do when encountering their recorded sound in an unexpected way: He lowers his own voice, by a lot, to ask “Is that my voice?”
Tabitha is in some sort of rush, because while she’s showing Jughead the first episode of the first season of Riverdale while making a cameo appearance as a pivotal character in the penultimate episode of the final season of Riverdale all she can think to tell him is to “Just absorb.” She says that she will “explain everything” after the absorption.
The Jughead S1 narration is still going on: “The name of our town is Riverdale” and as though in answer, the soundtrack song starts with, “Tell me.” (Oh I see what they did there, lol).
We are watching the TV for a moment from Jughead’s point of view, and he gets sucked into the screen. (Uh, much as I have, for the past several years.)
Cut to later. Jughead looks completely destroyed. His eyes are wet with tears, his shoulders are up around his ears, his hands have no strength. Tabitha pushes a cup of tea at him, prompting him to say something. With his voice shot, Jughead says, “I remember.” Tears fall down his face, and he says, as he looks up at her, “I remember everything.” He is so upset - and honestly, Jughead has a lot to be upset about in the course of Riverdale.
Tabitha either is very impatient and kind of brutal or she has a huge amount of faith in Jughead’s mental resilience because she is relentless in deluging him with very difficult pills to swallow. She has the power to send people back in time, there was the Bailey’s comet, etc. She calls this timeline “dark, and nihilistic, and hopeless” but credits “all of you” with helping making it less so. Meanwhile she was trying to untangle jumbled timelines and shore up the multiverse.
Uh.
OK I need - I need someone to write me a companion book about what the hell she’s talking about. Fic writers, is this in the works? Can I commission one? Fantasy-scifi is not my genre, at all.
Jughead is still crying, but he’s trying to keep up. I kind of wish she’d take a breath and ask him what he’s most upset about, because he’s clearly thinking about whatever it is made him start crying while she’s throwing all this jargon around about the timelines.
He wants to know if he and his cohorts were successful in making this particular timeline less terrible. Very kindly, Tabitha tells him that thanks to their “innate decency” all of the work that they did have “started to reshape this town, this world.” She assures him that things will keep getting better. Still shaky with tears, Jughead gives an appropriately happy response. Then he asks her if she was successful on her crazy sounding mission.
Tabitha says that she gave up trying to untangle the messed up timelines and instead chose to weave each strand (??) into this particular timeline, to make it more stable, “to fortify it.” I think Jughead doesn’t understand what the hell this means any more than I do, but ‘more stable’ and also ‘fortified’ sound like they are good things, so he says, “Great.”
Then, looking very remorseful, Tabitha says that stabilizing this timeline meant that she lost the ability to move anyone back to the original timeline. “I can’t send anyone back to 2023.” Jughead, who had been leaning towards her, rears back, looking betrayed. He wants to know if this means the others “won't remember anything about everything that happened before?”
Are we including the Rivervale storylines into the “everything that happened” part of this?
Tabitha confirms that the other lifetime that Jughead just watched, the one where his life ended in 2023, is closed off to him forever. Jughead continues to look crushed. As a strange sort of consolation, Tabitha instead offers to show all the others what she’s just shown Jughead (uh, Seasons 1-6 of Riverdale the American TV shows) and “they can then decide whether or not they want to remember their other … adventures.” After loading a lot of editorializing meaning into that word, adventures, Tabitha further commentates by adding, “let’s call them.”
There is so much happening. Tabitha the Angel Time-Weaving supernatural person has somehow obtained the ability to watch and to show others the whole of Seasons 1-6 of Riverdale, when she herself was a featured character that grew increasingly important after being introduced in Season 5. And furthermore, Tabitha Tate, the most loving girlfriend Jughead Jones ever had, the one who never hurt him or disappointed him or lied to him, has OPINIONS about all the stuff that people did to themselves and to each other in Seasons 1-4. Jughead is crushed & appalled about being the only one in the 1950s timeline with the dual knowledge of both The Present and The Other Time, but Tabitha already thinks (has thought all along?) that many of the others actually would prefer not to remember.
As he did months ago at the start of this timeline, Jughead gathers a lot of people - a lot more people now actually - to tell them what they have no reason to believe.
This time, because he’s just watched six seasons of Riverdale in one sitting, he is a person of charisma and gravitas who must be taken seriously by everyone who hears what he has to say. Assembled are Cheryl, Toni, Dilton, Fangs, Kevin, Clay, Julian (Julian??? Why is JULIAN here?), Reggie (again, this Reggie doesn’t really have a relationship with this Jughead, but I suppose he came here as Archie’s +1), Archie, Betty and Veronica.
Very somberly, he tells them (some of them a second time in the same school year) about ‘the future’ then adds this additional detail that they now cannot return to their previous lives, but he has a method to help them remember, if they want to keep the memories he’s going to show them.
The reactions are as varied as the disciples reacting to Jesus’ announcement in the Da Vinci painting, only more depressed. Cheryl has legs crossed and is hugging herself defensively. Toni, seated, and Dilton, standing, have their arms crossed. Fangs massaging his forehead. Kevin and Clay, standing and seated with legs the identical width apart have their arms crossed in the You Talk But I Don’t Believe You crossed-arms stance of mental ward orderlies in movies. Julian, as the most competent dancer, is in the most interesting pose - feet, knees, hands, elbows, shoulders are each at a different angle. Standing ramrod straight next to him is Reggie, and this talk is giving him a bit of a migraine. Archie is staring open mouthed at Jughead, while Betty and Veronica look worried.
Jughead continues to speak with his Post Riverdale Bingewatch Charisma, so nobody dares to contradict or even ask questions. He sounds so serious as he says “you know where to find me.”
Betty does a mean-girl gaze-slide towards Archie, except Archie is focusing very hard on Jughead. He seems to be trying to figure out why Jughead is doing this after he more or less threatened him with incarceration in an insane asylum earlier this year and also simultaneously wondering if this whole monologue is some “Howl” type of poem. Anyway, Archie in this world loves two people only, and Betty isn’t one of them so he doesnt care what message she’s trying to convey. Cheryl looks with a ‘What Fresh Hell Is This?’ sort of expression towards Toni, who looks back at her with ‘This is some White BS.’ Veronica, this Jughead’s current girlfriend, appears depressed and looks at no one. Jughead looks keenly towards Veronica to see if she is willing to give him support, but she won’t look back.
So, all alone, as the bearer of a bizarre and unwelcome truth, Jughead leaves the silent room.
Back at his home, Jughead is making what looks to me like a mayonnaise and lettuce sandwich. He wonders if “any of them would take me up on Tabitha’s offer.” And of course, one of them does! It’s Archie, who makes it very clear he didn’t want to be here. “I drew the short straw” he says, before adding that he thinks this insanity that Jughead has been spewing might be good grist for his poetry mill. Oh, so I was wrong. Archie loves *three* people in this world - Fred, Reggie, and Allen Ginsberg.
Jughead takes the whole thing in stride, which may be one of the “dark, nihilistic” things that Tabitha thinks has been fixed through effort - the Jughead of S1-6 would be absolutely crushed to pieces at Archie’s, I Don’t Want To Be Here With You clumsiness. He started to cry when he realized Archie didn’t believe him about the comet and time travel at the start of the season, you know? By the almost end of S7, Jughead no longer makes Archie a priority in any part of his life.
Is this what healing looks like?
I suppose. I mean, it’s one form of healing, but it’s not the one I was hoping for, for Jughead.
At the bunker, where the Riverdale viewing will happen, Jughead thoughtfully leaves out a box of tissues for Archie before he puts the show on for him. “In the future, this is called binge watching” he says, lowkey sardonic, before taking his leave of Archie.
Some time later (I mean it would take at least 13 days if you were watching 9 episodes per day, right? If you increase it to 16 episodes a day it still takes 7.3 day) Jughead and Archie are at the diner, when it’s bright outside, to discuss. Archie looks shell shocked, slumping down in his seat. Jughead looks at him with some warmth. Archie then does what the other Archie also used to do: he talks about himself, first and foremost. He lists all his various roles & jobs first (boxer, prisoner, football player, soldier) before immediately moving on to his perennial other topic of interest, his father. It takes less than a minute for Archie to say “my dad” as the thing he found most meaningful from watching 117 episodes of Riverdale. Jughead’s gaze flattens completely as Archie starts to tear up about his dad, about Fred dying again.
Archie, burdened with grieving double time for two Fred, says he’s not sure what he’s going to tell the others when Jughead, looking at him with very cold eyes, asks him. He doesn’t even care what the others want to know - “I didn’t think I’d ever see my dad again… so I’m glad about that” is all he can say. Archie thinks that Riverdale the show is not to everyone’s taste (“I don’t know if they will want to see what I saw.”.).
Jughead doesn’t disagree, but he wants to help Tabitha do her mission, so he offers to be available to anyone else who wants to see what Archie saw. Archie takes off without a word of farewell.
Later still, on a wholly different day (because he’s wearing a totally different outfit) Jughead is still in that same booth, now reading a comic book. He’s approached by his (ex?) girlfriend Veronica of this timeline and his ex girlfriend of the other timeline, Betty. They are wearing the same shade of purple but in different designs. Veronica looks wary and sad, which makes me think they’ve broken up. They tell him that they’ve heard from Archie (I’m assuming that Archie was too busy weeping about the two Freds to go tell anyone anything, so Bee and Vee went to interrogate him). They want to see what he saw, but together. Jughead takes them to the bunker, where they sit side by side. After putting the show on, he leaves via Veronica’s side of the bunker, but he doesn’t touch her and she doesn’t spare him a glance. Before he leaves for good, he takes a short look first at Veronica then at Betty.
At the line “The name of our town is Riverdale” Betty and Veronica give each other alarmed looks. Is this because they recognize Jughead’s voice by this time and come to realize, Wait, HE is the NARRATOR?
A week or two later, Veronica and Betty have watched all the way to Episode 117, The Night of the Comet, and have come to confront Jughead at the diner. It’s night now. “You could have prepared us a little more for that, Jughead Jones,” Veronica says, dolefully
I mean probably, but also you dumped him a second time and without saying so, Veronica, for one, and for another, how can anyone really prepare someone else for Riverdale? Betty starts crying immediately, thinking about it all. The first thing she says though is “darkness” and immediately I am so bored. I am bored by Betty’s obsession with her personal darkness. All the kids of Riverdale S1-6 had huge problems, so it’s hard to determine who had the roughest, but honestly the one who complains about it the most is Betty, so here we go again.
Betty can barely breathe as she says, “My family!” right after bursting into tears about darkness, while seated next to Veronica Lodge. Whose father was actually a killer and more competent about it than Betty’s father, for one. And also Veronica herself is a killer (of a husband and then that same father) which they just watched. Also Veronica was a conflicted mafioso daughter whose father waged war of various kinds on her boyfriend/obsession Archie Andrews and her childhood male frenemy/ adult colleague type friend Jughead Jones. Betty is so self absorbed and tactless - she’s revealing that she really only watched for her scenes, and took in none of Veronica’s story. She doesn’t say OUR families, OUR fathers - she’s all me me me. Veronica frowns, can’t make eye contact, during all this.
“My father was a killer!!” Betty says, vibrating with grief & outrage which… okay fair, but also? What did I just say? So was Veronica’s! And the entirety of Jughead’s sufferings in S1 came directly from HIS father being a falsely confessed killer! So much of Betty’s externally expressed self-understanding is This Isn’t Supposed to Happen To Me! which is why I remain highly wary of anyone who is a Betty stan. Those people are the scary types of Americans, lemme tell you.
Polly being murdered and coming back to life is the next major thing that Betty of 1950 remembers of the series she just watched, but not that heaven is real, not the bit about Sabrina the Witch and her reanimated Jughead Body boyfriend telling her about the Book of Revelations actually being very relevant to the spiritual realm (Whore of Babylon = Betty etc).
Then Betty looks at Jughead, saying “You and I were together.” Which is the weirdest summary and as tactless as saying “my father was a killer!” to Veronica Lodge. S7 Jughead Jones, because he has zero feelings about Betty Cooper whatsoever, laughs because she’s being a bit ridiculous, quips back, “Yeah, till we weren’t.” And of course, the reason they weren’t is because Betty crushed him at least twice over, but S7 Jughead saw what he saw and doesn’t feel any particular need to advocate for his alternate universe self. Since Betty can’t really come up with something to say about why Bughead is no more that makes her look good, S7 Betty behaves just like the other Betty and abruptly looks away to stop talking.
Veronica jumps in with “I was with Archie,” which I think is an act of aggression of the most passive variety against the whole hideousness of Betty’s self serving and self pitying (to the max!) summary. The immediate next thing she says, “I killed my husband, Chad, AND my father” is more of the same. Like, how to tell the silly self absorbed girl next to you to shut the fuck up without addressing her directly. Veronica properly took in what had happened to her in the other universe, so Jughead looks at her with concern. It also deserves some note that “being with Archie” is said by Veronica with the same level of shellshocked upset as mariticide and patricide.
I guess Veronica and Betty jointly and severally decided that they couldn’t be the only ones clobbered with the trauma-smudged other lives that they led, so the immediate next scene is Jughead doing his bunker presentation, once again (“What you’re about to see is your past, but it’s also your future” delivered in the most doleful tone), this time to Toni, Cheryl, Fangs, Dilton and Reggie.
“Some of it may be disturbing” has to be the understatement of the year.
Then in a cute little wink to the four Asian boys playing two Asian characters switcheroo that has happened with Reggie The Character and Dilton The Character, Jughead specifically tells Reggie 3.0 that “at times, you might not even recognize yourselves.”
Kevin and Julian had no interest in seeing stories of a universe in which Clay and his human corporeal self don’t exist, respectively. I hate Kevin this season so very much (because let me say, tiresomely, again - he’s a misogynist and a manipulator unlike in other seasons) but this is an interestingly loyal choice. It doesn’t make me forgive the shit he pulled on S7 Betty, because I never will, but nevertheless, he earns half a point back from me. And Julian is just practicing good mental health and self preservation. Kudos.
Jughead doesn’t immediately exit the bunker once he turns Riverdale on the tv unlike what he did with Betty in the room (because beating a hasty retreat really was about Betty, right?). He starts to look at everyone as they settle into the story.
A couple weeks after THAT, they all reconvene, now with Angel Tabitha leading the discussion. Everyone looks deeply dissatisfied. “Now you know what your lives were like before the comet.” Because they all look so disgruntled and resentful, Tabitha tries to give them some perspective: “The people you loved, the people you’ve lost…” only to be met with dead silence. Jughead tries to brighten the mood with, “The good. The bad. The bear,” the last one delivered with a knowing glance at Archie. But Archie is still upset, I guess, that Fred Andrews dies in Archie’s teens not one but two alternative universes, so he is in no mood to smile about a pithy quip.
Since they’re getting nowhere with these people, Tabitha swiftly moves on to say an amazing thing: If they’d rather forget their past lives, she can make that happen. She delivers this line with the same level of calm like she’s offering everyone a cup of tea instead of a mind-wipe. Jughead tries to make it so this isn’t terrifyingly ominous by explaining that this is because Tabitha is “an angel” which he seems to conceive of entirely in the Hallmark greeting card/ Sistine Chapel baby angel sort of way. Angel Tabitha finds this adorable because it’s wrong. She’s the type of Catholic Angel sent down to kill the first born of Egypt, you know? The ones that have to tell shepherds and virgins, Do Not Be Afraid when they show up, because when they show up some unhinged shit is about to go down.
The quickest on the uptake is of course, Veronica Lodge. She was the group leader, I suppose, and is now speaking for the group. She announces that as a collective, the main cast of Riverdale opt to NOT remember the vast majority of Riverdale S1-6. The equivalences she lines up are once again very funny: Not Good Times = Serial Killers = Superpowers = Gargoyle King. I mean, Veronica’s superpower was toxicity where she, the person most touch-reliant for stress relief could touch nobody, so for her this is very true.
Angel Tabitha initially disapproves of this request, in a silent, nostril flaring way. Jughead the narrator, the truth teller & observer, immediately interjects, saying “It doesn’t exactly work that way” even though he doesn’t actually know exactly what Tabitha’s powers are or how they function. Tabitha corrects him immediately, that she can do a special (angelic?) kind of brain damage that leaves people with selective memories. She can in fact reshare “only the good memories” because she is merciful and thinks they “deserve at least that much.”
They do?
What follows is really the most unhinged thing ever, because we get the supercut of the “only the good” moments of Riverdale. Apparently. Allegedly. Which are:
-The core four laughing in a diner booth in S1.
-Archie bursting through the banner for the Bulldogs at the football game grinning (with the big where Cheryl hallucinates Jason and runs off crying deleted)
-Veronica zipping Betty into her cheerleader outfit.
-Kevin leading the kids in a sing along during Heathers
-Fred and FP reminiscing about the old days at the diner booth as their boys smile at them and each other (seconds before it got tense about who was going to pay)
-Veronica and Toni hugging and singing at the speakeasy
-Cheryl in a red unitard doing the Stupid Love number (which weirdly cut to Tabitha who was never there looking nostalgic about it)
-Cheryl running into Toni’s arms as she got rescued from the Sisters of Quiet Mercy conversion prison (but then without the ‘bad’ memory of being committed to that institution this upset-looking embrace would make very little sense) (cut to Choni looking very moved about themselves)
-Shirtless Reggie tossing a football at shirtless Archie (the day before Archie is supposed to go to prison) (cut to Julian, who for some reason is present to watch the ‘good moments’ reel making a meaningful face)
-The teenage boy objectification carwash where Veronica is bouncing around (but they failed to raise enough funds at that one) (Archie reaction shot goes here)
-Betty and Alice Cooper at graduation, holding hands and putting their heads together as Jughead forlornly watches his father drive off with his sister to join their mother, abandoning him once again (da fuck? whose happy memory is THIS?)
-The core four in the Jalopy (Archie shirtless and Veronica in a headscarf etc) (again, this Archie’s friends desperately giving him a ‘one nice day’ because he’s on trial for murder)
-The core four at the quarry, jumping into the water (same)
-The reformed Josie & the Pussycats performing, to everyone’s general glee . In that episode when Josie, the only one who achieved her teenage dreams AND became objectively successful came back to tell everyone how much they sucked. This cut is inclusive of the kiss that Archie plants on Kevin’s cheek. (Reaction cut to Clay making the smarmiest face at 50s Kevin, who absolutely refuses to react, sitting there completely stony faced).
-Kevin in full Hedwig regalia planting one on Archie’s lips is shown immediately after, which is weird because Hedwig comes way before the Josie & Pussycats episode. I think that’s because the song that’s playing has the lyrics “Deep in the dark/ Your kiss will thrill me” right this second and whoever edited it (Tabitha? God? Sabrina??) thought they would suit action to the word. (Reaction cut to Archie laughing about it while looking at Betty, who looks only patiently indulgent, while Jughead leans over, smiling, trying to catch Archie’s eye, but fails)
-Kevin-Hedwig again, this time in a 2 header shot with Fangs, singing (This shot DOES get a reaction out of Kevin, who looks not at Clay but at Fangs, but Fangs doesn’t look back)
-All of them tossing their graduation caps in the air (reaction shot to s7 Dilton giving that shot a soft smile, even though his other universe self had died by mutilation well before this point)
-Reggie kissing Veronica at her Speakeasy in silhouette (Reggie looks very pouty about this)
-Veronica kissing Archie in the closet at the spin the bottle party that Cheryl set up (which gets a smile reaction shot from Veronica while Jughead for some reason also looks entranced)
-Betty in her beautiful prom outfit coming down the stairs to Jughead with his corsage looking completely in love (which gets a Betty-and-Archie thoughtful looks reaction)
-Betty cheating on Jughead by kissing Archie because she doesn’t love Jughead anymore in Hedwig (this immediately follows the prom outfit reveal scene and I feel insane) (Reaction cut is Betty and Archie unreservedly pleased with this bit, but also Tabitha looking fond which - I mean that is so crazy making - Tabitha is pleased about the Barchie Cheating Kiss of Hedwig because this set Jughead on the path to his relationship with her, I suppose??) (The lyrics that are playing just as we cut to Tabith are “I fall in love again/As I did then.”
-Tabitha and Jughead kiss at the Diner when she’s his boss and his life is a complete shambles
This last ‘good moments’ bit makes Jughead look over at Tabitha, who is standing in the liminal space between the theater and the hallway, and pursues her as she starts to walk out. He follows her all the way outside, calling for her to ask, “Is this the part where you ghost me??”
She says she doesn’t need to stay to see how “the movie ends” since both of them know how it ends.
Jughead asks her to “stay.” She can’t because there would then be two Tabithas. Apparently other Tabitha can never enter Riverdale while Angel Tabitha is here. Tabitha wrote her other self a really exhausting life story - law school, biz school, civil rights advocate - and one that resolutely DOES NOT have Jughead Jones in it. Even though he’d been watching a whole reel of him kissing Tabitha with his arm around Veronica, Jughead insists that 50s Tabitha and himself never getting together means that Angel Tabitha should stay. (Logic does not compute).
He wants to know if the whole of Jabitha was real - where they had a life together, cohabited (set fire to newspaper publishers etc) and so on. Tabitha passionately insists that “it was all real. It all happened.”
Tabitha sits the two of them down to ask Jughead if he remembers their “epic date” at the end of the world, where they had two kids and grew them up and then yeeted them out of existence to be old together. Actually she doesn’t say that - she says “watched Titanic, ate at Pop’s” and it’s Jughead that says “we had a family.” She says that the time bubble where Jughead had a stable, happy, heteronormative married life with a kind, lovely wife and 2 kids “still exists.” Unfortunately, there is one path forward now from here. Here being 1950s Riverdale alternate universe where the youth of Riverdale collectively decided to give themselves selective amnesia. “And that is a good thing, Jughead, trust me!” Tabitha practically shouts.
See, they do this on tv - put words in the mouth of an unassailable character, to say to a beloved character - when they pull one over the audience. We generally trust Tabitha, and she’s staking her name and honor on this point, so we have to go with her on this one. The thing is, Jughead starts crying immediately - he looks crushed.
After a long moment of silent staring with very very sad eyes, Jughead quips that it’s very sad to him that Tabitha had to die to make all this happen. He’s made the logical leap that Tabitha can’t stay because she isn’t just Angel Tabitha she’s Dead Tabitha.
Tabitha retorts that she didn’t die. She says the comet was taken care of, that it won’t happen now because … reasons. Jughead makes an impatient “Augh!” sound, summing it up with “Classic time paradox” which earns him a ‘Oh, you’ type of headshake from Tabitha. They look sadly at each other until Jughead asks to kiss her goodbye. She agrees. The movie theater marquee says “Angels in the Outfield” is coming soon, which… wasn’t that made in the 80s? Anyway, Tabitha flirtily agrees (“Jughead Jones, You read my mind”). Jughead and Tabitha kiss in glamorous slow motion in front of the brightly lit marquee of the movie theater before Tabitha freezes time again and steps away from Jughead.
Jughead is all alone once again, standing there kissing air. Narrator Jughead intones that she’d given them “the greatest gift of all - our memories, edited for maximum joy. The good ones.”
The thing is, Jughead chose to remember all of it, because of course he would. That’s why I love him. He thinks it his duty as “the unofficial chronicler of their town.”
He goes back to the theater, to watch the deceptive super-reels. There’s Kevin? I think? in a tuxedo and bowtie which I assume has to be from prom (in which they all were forced to watch a traumatizing video that Jellybean made to attack her brother and Betty Cooper with). Jughead says that Betty was another person who opted to remember the dark times rather than just get brainwashed by the supercuts reel. “Betty understood that we are made up of moments of both joy and pain.”
I am taking this to mean that 50s Betty was cured of her very alarming stupidity by watching the smart S1-6 Betty do her thing (Because as deranged as that Betty could be, she was never as abjectly stupid as S7 Betty). 50s Betty is shown standing in front of her mirror in what looks like a blood flecked nightgown (that embroidery is horrible), recalling how her other self used to self-harm by digging her nails into her palms. She cries out of pity for herself, apparently, which doesn’t make me like her any better. There’s a lot to cry about in Riverdale, but I don’t know that THIS is the thing to focus on.
We cut to the diner where Jughead is being served coffee by Pops. Jughead is typing away in his booth. He says this is a “cosmic reshuffling.”
“But the stage was set for the final chapter of our epic saga about the Town With Pep, one that could only be called: Goodbye, Riverdale.” The song that plays as he says “Goodbye, Riverdale” is the opening song to the first episode, the one that goes “Tell me/ That I’m your baby/ And you’ll never leave me.” Jughead looks very sad as he looks down at the words, Goodbye Riverdale.
Who is saying this?? Which Jughead? Does 1950s Jughead have his narrator powers back now that Tabitha has gone? And WHERE has Tabitha gone? I mean up until now it’s really been Tabitha that was the Invisible Hand, right? He’s just been told by Angel Tabitha that there is only one path forward, so why is he calling this the FINAL CHAPTER? How does he know that it’s the final episode of the TV series he’s in? Was this the gift of Tabitha’s final kiss?!?
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Riverdale S7 E 18 (Chapter 135) For a Better Tomorrow!
Jughead Jones is definitely established as a weird weirdo in this universe, yes, but the way he is doing his relationship with Veronica Lodge is very funny. He says, as a boy person at his indisputable sexual peak, that one of the “distinct advantages” of dating a movie theater owner (the very sexy teen witch cosplayer Veronica Lodge) is being able to score free movie tickets for his friends. On the one hand, Jughead is a true one, because despite getting a cool girlfriend he just hangs out with all his old dorky friends - I like this. On the other hand, how in the heck is getting to make out with THE Veronica Lodge one of the UNDIFFERENTIATED OR INDEFINITE advantages in life? Que???
The makers of this show are doing the most, I suppose, in order to check all the possible boxes for what Jughead Jones’ sexuality could be. We had the yearning homosexual Jughead (Jarchie - not canon), the clueless lesbian coded Jughead (with Bret Weston Wallis), monogamous romantic prince (Bughead), slutty famewhore who sleeps with his groupies, toxic failboyfriend (with the evil drug dealer girlfriend). We now get Wide Eyed 50s Teen Boyfriend Jughead in the Jeronica relationship, but also asexual Jughead who has no reaction whatsoever to two people sloppily making out next to him as he happily tosses popcorn down his throat, bracketing the central Ethel and Ben couple with the Emasculated-By-Racism- Big-Dick Dilton on either side. All FOUR of them are the only people not making out at this movie theater for this screening.
Ethel. Ethel! If you want to get action you can’t be taking TWO hangers on with you to the movies!?
In any case I’m glad to see that Veronica’s movie theater business is doing very well despite the immense number of movie tickets she seems intent on giving away for free. Is this like a Helena Rubinstein/Estee Lauder way of doing business, where you give away product in order to keep customers? But isn’t she the only theater in town? Veronica Lodge is an improbable creature - an ethical monopolist??
Jughead and Ethel are happily chatting, smiling about the movie they just watched. As Jughead says they’re about to walk into their very own “science fiction tinged B-movie.” The screen goes to black and white. The B&W episode referencing Chinatown was great, so I have high hopes for this one.
Segment One! Jughead Jones In The Mysterious Melting Man!
A man walks towards Jughead as bits of skin boil painfully off of his body and face. Jughead seems to have the most curious frozen response to this. He doesn’t scream, he doesn’t try to get away and he doesn’t even look particularly upset, to be honest. He just looks merely interested. He also doesn’t do anything to rush to that man’s aid. But then again, if confronted with such a sight I’m not sure what I would do either.
The horrendous police force consisting of the extremely incompetent Sheriff Keller shoots this man from behind, but actually he’s aiming his gun IN THE DIRECTION of a crowd of theater goers that have just left the cinema. The Americans of this time (or maybe now) are so desensitized to gun violence that they don’t seem to clock that a) cops or anyone do not have a supremely high marksmakship rate especially of a moving target and b) the gun was pointed directly at each of them during this entire time. They just watch a man get gunned down by cops on a Saturday evening right in front of them in the open town square and don’t scream or blink or duct. They just look a bit inconvenienced.
Keller claims later that the man was a) a vagrant (who can be shot on sight apparently) and b) suffering from leprosy which is why he looked like that. Except, Jughead supplies immediately, that Ethel recognizes what the man was wearing because it’s the uniform of the Blossom maple factory.
Jughead decides that all this is bullshit so he takes it upon himself to hunt down the answers.
DOCTOR CURDLE JUNIOR IS BAAAACK !
HI MY FAVORITE LITTLE TALL GIANT MAN!!
So, Dr. Curdle (not Jr!) is all about gruesome comics, which Jughead still has copies of when he nicked them from his employer, and is now dealing like they’re some sort of hard street drug.
“Worthy of a quid. Pro. Quo.” God I love the way Dr. Curdle talks.
Jughead responds, “keen-o!” Which I quite like. I tend to say Okedoke in an effort to not be offensively autistic when people give me unnecessary boring bits of information at work, and I think I might add “keen-O” to my roster. Jughead wants to know about the “mysterious melting man.” He didn’t actually have to say all three words, but he was very happy to be alliterative so he couldn’t pass that up.
The answer is “acute radiation poisoning!”
Sadly, Curdle didn’t get to have a lot of time with the body, but it was Mayor Blossom who came to collect the body. Curdle confirms that the man was in fact an employee of the maple factory. “That stinks like a rotten fish!”
Bright and early the next day, Betty bounces down the stairs to ask if Ethel wants to go to school with her. Hal suggests that Betty permit Alice to drive them both, but Betty is firm in her rejection. The cold war between mother and daughter post-slap seems to be something that is giving Hal indigestion. Further, Betty apparently will just not eat breakfast unless her mother will make it for her, and then to up the ante it seems as though Alice is still making breakfast for everyone in the household who isn’t Betty - inclusive of Ethel. It’s getting very complicated. Anyway, Alice tells Hal that at some point the weather will be terrible because they’re in upstate New York that isn’t America, and Betty will “finally let me give her a ride.” Betty remains just as pleasant in her hatefulness when she informs Alice that she will not ever be needing that ride from her mother because she’s taking Driver’s Ed at school and pretty soon she will be able to drive herself wherever she wants!
This is Segment 2: BETTY COOPER IN DRIVER’S EDUCATION!
We’re suddenly in black and white again.
Oops except we’re not.
We’re in the Andrews’ kitchen as Frank smugly informs Reggie that he got into a really great basketball camp. He’s being very nasty to Mary’s son right in front of Mary first thing in the morning, sneering at him about how there is no camp for poetry, and so Archie is without a fun set of summer plans to look forward to. His sneering is very heavy handed. He even calls Archie ‘Shakespeare’ in the most condescending tone of voice. It brings out the CAN YOU SPELL IT in me.
Segment 3 is going to be ARCHIE ANDREWS IN SHIPPING OUT!
Everything is in black and white again. Mary is for once not being completely useless, which I can’t tell if it happened in the technicolor real-life of this season or is possible because it’s not real, just the B Movie version, because I don’t know yet what these black and white transitions mean. Mary as I say isnt completely useless, only merely mostly useless. She says that Archie can pick up a summer shift or two at Pop’s or come help his mother out at the dress shop.
Frank doesn’t even respect Mary enough to look at her as he sneers about HER BUSINESS which is what he must have been LIVING OFF OF when he first moved to Riverdale with no job. What the fuck, Frank. He brings all his patented boring ass toxic masculinity to the fore - oooh yer gonna be workin’ at your mom’s *dress* shoppe~~ I mean. You get to interact with all the pretty girls in their super tight body-con dresses at the dress shop. What’s your problem?
Archie looks angry as he stomps off.
We switch to the Blossom household, where Julian is willing to give Cheryl a ride to school. He’s a dickhead though, because she’s walking RIGHT NEXT to him, clearly ready to go, and he’s still gotta voice the threat about how his “train is leaving with or without you.” Hon, your schlong isn’t that big.
On a brighter note, I do like how much white Cheryl has been wearing with her red ensembles. I love the cherries on her shirt. They both see a military someone salute their father. They smirk at each other about his ridiculous it is to see someone give Clifford Blossom a salute of any kind. Julian wants to know if he’s enlisting. Clifford hates both his children equally, apparently, because he calls them “asinine” and then says that this was a General Taylor from Washington who was “delivering unto me a gift.” Then he brings them into his study to show them a cock-less Baphomet, whom he calls Moloch. Seriously. Moloch is not hiding anything under that skirt. He has Barbie Genitals, you know he has. Anyway, Clifford makes ridiculous statements about how this ancient deity can only be appeased by child sacrifice, and tells his very physically mature children that they should be frightened, implying he’d kill either or both of them “should you be inclined to give me any more grief.”
A pompous father who can’t take any sort of joke about himself so that he always responds to anything that isn’t flattery and obsequiousness with threats of violence? Oh hey that was on my Riverdale is my life Bingo!
This is Segment Four! CHERYL BLOSSOM IN PROJECT MOLOCH!
At school, Jughead approaches Ethel in the black and white world. Jughead asks if Ethel’s father ever got sick. She says he was a janitor at the maple factory, who had joint pain, stomach pain, and hair loss, all in a chronic way. Far away, Dilton hears this list of symptoms. He looks very disturbed immediately. Jughead thinks that the Blossoms are hiding something, because Ethel’s dad, the melting man and Brad Rayberry all being former workers at the maple factory dying very strange deaths is not a coincidence. He wants to get everyone closure about what happened.
Ethel shakes her head. She wants to move on with her life. She’s going to get her driver’s license, she is about to get the car from her Miss Teen Queen win (it’s still not clear to me if the prizes were OR or AND but I hope it was AND so she can get the car AND the scholarship AND the screen test). She tells Jughead that she is also going steady with Ben, to which Jughead says “our Ben?” and doesn’t believe her. He turns around to stare at Ben.
Why is this surprising to Jughead in a world where he’s going steady with Veronica Lodge EVEN AFTER the milk screeching incident and all the other weirdnesses of before?
Ethel is trying not to be annoyed at this reaction of Jughead, so she just sums up, to say she is trying to put the bad events behind her, so he should take of.
The teacher starts showing them a scary movie about what happens to people in an atomic blast. Some of this looks like it’s real period product. All the students are freaking out together in the lounge about the atomic explosion.
Jughead is seated holding court at the big armchair, which is really weird because why is Cheryl permitting this? That used to be HER seat?
Oh because this is the B&W B movie universe of Jughead Jones in The Mysterious Melting Man. Veronica is wearing her not great napkin=bikini ribbon floof dress again, perched like a good little housewife on the arm of the chair that Jughead is sitting in like a king which -=VERONICA WOULD NOT. Behind them, in a weird echo, are Ben and Ethel, leaning their butts against a table as they stand.
Jughead states the obvious, that “in truth, most of us wouldn’t likely survive an atomic explosion.”
Archie has never heard of Japan, Nagasaki or Hiroshima. He did not understand that the atomic bomb would kill him. He wants Jughead to spell it out. Veronica says that there is an underground CITY levels of basements at the Pembroke. She invites Juggykins to come with her. Jughead doesn’t seem to feel any better, but Cheryl is outright disgusted at this display of heterosexuality from Veronica Lodge. The thing is, she also has a place to go in case the bomb hits - she thinks. She’s going to go to the mines which have “stood strong since before the Revolutionary War.”
I can’t remember anything anymore but wan’t there a caving in of those very same mines in S6, some half century after this conversation, in the other universe? It doesn’t immediately occur to her to invite Toni, so Toni prompts her. (Oh and I forgot they are not out).
Reggie is going to go to Duck Creek to climb into the mines. Archie is going to drive all the way to California (he’s very California fixated in this universe) while trusting that the Rockies will serve as a general kind of radiation shelter. Ethel says wistfully that out west does sound nice, to which Ben agrees.
I don’t think any of the characters, nor the people making this, realize how very funny this is. This is the most ridiculous display of the American delusions of both exceptionalism and extreme individualism. When something bad happens, they refuse to imagine a possibility that they will come up with a community solution because they don’t want to include certain people in that community (be it Catholics, Protestants, Mormons, Italians, Swedes, Germans, Asians of any stripe, or black people etc etc). People coexist in America, apparently but they don’t live together. This is funny especially because in Korea everyone assumes that if we get nuked by the evil fat boy up North (each generation has gotten one of its own for three generations) we all die, and then those that don’t die will have to suffer and rebuild, because we had something akin to a nuke level disaster happen in 1950 and that’s what we did. We don’t coexist very well among ourselves (the viciousness of our press makes Fox vs CNN battles look trifling) but we do actually live together.
The heartlessness of these announcements by these people in front of their friends, and the extremely calm, almost non-reactive responses to the heartlessness makes everybody sound psychotic. They all say, more or less, I hope I don’t die, and I don’t care about what happens to any of you.
The surreal Americanness of this matches the cop pointing his gun in the general direction of children in the hopes of hitting the one person he wants to shoot dead in the street.
Anyway, Clay gets especially annoyed at Archie wanting to drive away from the imaginary nuke. The fact that those who have means are only creating solitary survival plans doesn’t bother him at all, even though those plans seem just as silly to me as driving away from a bomb.
Kevin takes the conversation to surreal heights by saying that the inside of a refrigerator is going to be a good bet to not die in a nuclear blast. Immediately, Toni and then Betty point out how dumb this is. (“What would you do about food and water?”) Kevin though has a funny enough answer that lightens the mood - “I’d be inside a refrigerator.”
Fangs actually saves the day (what the heck?) by saying he doesn’t want to plan to hide from anything. Clay mentions that there are communities in Nevada that have built nuclear bomb shelters, a “lead lined bunker,” in case of a nuclear war. Betty tries to see if the small town she so wanted to burn to the ground last episode might have some redeeming qualities after all: Maybe it’s too insignificant to be the target of a bomb like that. Jughead thinks that “an atomic drop could drop anywhere, even here, in Riverdale.”
Well yeah.
Later on, the gay boyfriends are trying to tie a sailor’s knot. Because Frank was so heterosexually ugly to him that morning, Archie is wanting to hang out with the gays. He shows them how to tie the knot, saying all this stuff about a rabbit and a tree and a hole. Archie asks them why they want to tie knots, after he drops his competent one on the table. They say that they want to join the Merchant Marines, which is not part of the US Navy but is instead a civilian job, where you are on merchant boats I guess and “travel around the world.” Clay starts to recruit Archie to the Merchant Marines.
OK so Clay has a thing about white boys, I guess? He spent a lot of the past couple episodes trying to ease Archie into the idea that fucking men didn’t mean you had to stop wanting to fuck women, for one, and also that fucking around in general is really great for writing material. I am not at all sure about that but OK. He drops the names Ginsberg and Kerouac as having both “done time on the Seven Seas.” Too bad he doesn’t know Archie likes to jump into the (ahem) deep end so he lost his virginity on the same night that he also had a threesome and prostituted a woman plus he developed a taste for middle aged woman.
Archie is very susceptible to specific, easy to understand suggestions, and is like this in every universe. Recruiting pamphlets are designed for people like Archie Andrews to get themselves into trouble. His priorities are first, to get away from Uncle fucking Frank, second, See The World, third, Have Adventures, fourth, enrich his writing, and uh finally, tie a lot of knots. The recruiter is coming tomorrow.
Grundy is the driver’s ed teacher. For some reason the driver’s ed class is fully gender segregated. Why is this? Is this something to do with the laws? I really like the cool desktop dashboard these girls all have. I want one of these just to have it. They’re going to practice parallel parking tomorrow! Grundy seems like a good teacher.
At dinner, the three men including Frank are eating the food that I assume that Mary cooked. She is trying to make conversation within the very surreal seating arrangement. She and Uncle Fucking Frank sit across from each other like they’re a married couple, with Reggie and Archie occupying the sides. She wants to know if anything interesting happened at school. Reggie tells her that they were shown a video of what happens if you get nuked. ARchie says he wants to join the merchant marines. She wants him to finish high school. She also wants him to go to college.
Frank is still on his Must Make Archie Stop Writing Grief Poetry About His Father bender, so he says that the merchant marines might be better than going to college to learn poetry writing like some sort of man who has sex with other men. He doesn’t say this last part, of course. Reggie searches Archie for his reaction. Archie though does have a spine. He tells Frank directly that he is considering going out to see expressly so he can pursue his poetry better. He even name drops The Beats. Then he actually takes a jab:
YOU WOULD KNOW THAT IF YOU EVER CRACKED OPEN A BOOK.
Well OKAY Archie Andrews! Unleash that bitchiness! Feeling bitchy makes you smarter! Embrace it!
Frank is not amused at having the tables turned on him, and yet again, Mary is not as useless as she used to be (but this is a fiction within a fiction, because in-universe actual Mary really is quite useless - case in point, FRANK STILL LIVES THERE). Mary interrupts what’s clearly an attack that Frank is scrambling to put together against her son by saying, “No one is joining anything tonight.”
Meanwhile, Dilton has come to visit Jughead. “You don’t have to worry Jughead. [blah blah] If anything bad were to actually happen I’d take care of you. You’d be safe.”
This is as clear a declaration of love as I’ve ever heard anyone make in Riverdale short of Jughead’s I Love You Betty Cooper all the way back in Season 1. But Jughead, in the same way that he did not pick up that he should date Ethel Muggs, doesn’t understand what Dilton is saying as a love confession. Poor Dilton.
Instead, Jughead wants to know what the hell Dilton means by “keep him safe.”
Dilton takes Jughead Jones to THE BUNKER!
Hi Bunker, my old friend!
Jughead sounds like James Stewart from Mr. Smith Goes To Washington as he exclaims, “How does your family have a bunker!?!” He sounds like he should be married to Katherine Hepburn in a movie. He sounds like this a lot this season and I thoroughly enjoy it. The tribute to Stars of Old is at the level of Josie McCoy being rendered an Eartha Kitt tribute character last episode, but much more subtle and baked into the general character portrayal for this season.
Anyway, Dilton is very proud of his dad. He grins like a little kid, excited because Jughead is excited, as he tells him that “we’re deep enough to survive an atomic blast, and any radiation after the blast.”
Jughead wants to know why the science teacher built this at all. “What does your dad know that we don’t?”
Dilton starts to unpack all the secrets, literally from his bag. He hands a little chunk of palladium to Jughead from his knapsack, saying Mr. Muggs came to get this assessed by the elder Doiley saying that Clifford Blossom was doing something with palladium. “Worth killing for?” asks Jughead.
Apparently, in its purest state, palladium could be “more volatile than plutonium,.... and more destructive than a hydrogen bomb.”
Palladium is a highly useful narrative tool, that’s for sure.
Jughead says reminds him of something, and then he is madly digging through his collection of comics. Jughead seems to have a photographic memory of every comic he’s ever read. Not sure this talent will ever get him any money, but it is a talent. The story he was thinking of was written by Rayberry, called The Palladium Incident! “Had he seen or heard something while he worked there??
We cut to the science teacher bursting in to make the announcement, in a hysterical scream of unhelpfulness, about “This is the big one.” In response, all the children in the class start freaking out too. The only one with a slow response time is Jughead Jones. Everyone else is hollering, on their feet, moving around, flapping their arms. Jughead acts like he’s sleep walking. Cheryl is the one that goes running to get him to some sort of safety. She is shouting at him to “Get away from the!!!” as he walks, fascinated, to the window which is getting brighter and brighter. As the bomb explodes, Jughead still has this very ‘interested’ look on his face from when he was looking at the melting man get shot in the street.
This turns out to be a nightmare of Cheryl’s. She had a dream about trying to save Jughead Jones when the bomb hit. I’m very moved, actually. She curses his name before she goes to fetch herself some water.
On her way back to her room, she hears her parents having a discussion. IN RUSSIAN. Clifford says that things are in readiness (apparently - I really have no idea, and I have my suspicions about American/Canadian actors’ capacity to speak passable Russian) to which Penelope says that it’s unfortunate what happened to the man, but Clifford is fine with the state of Project Moloch. Then they are going to return to the motherland.
Cheryl Blossom speaks … Russian? She is understanding this? Clifford apparently has been promised something by the Soviets. Penelope is a Russian spy! Cheryl runs away.
At the recruitment presentation by the Merchant Marines, Archie wants to know if he gets to explore the places they can visit. The answer he gets is very unkind - “This isn’t a pleasure cruise” plus “no one here is guaranteed a spot.” Well, ok sir, but I thought the point of your visit was to RECRUIT.
In the hallway, Jughead is approaching Cheryl. He actually does a little sing-songy “Hi Ho~~” which is very cute and again for some reason reminds me of Jimmy Stewart though I’m sure he’s never done that. Who knows. Cheryl is very annoyed to be approached by Jughead, which is not improved when he opens bluntly with this question: Has anything weird been happening at your house lately?
He really doesn’t know what a can of worms he’s opened. Cheryl is making a face at him like, oh you sweet clueless child, you have no idea what you’re about to unleash. What she says is, “Why do you care?” Jughead says that he’s interested in the location of the mines she mentioned yesterday vis a vis the maple factor. Cheryl confirms that the factory is built right on top of the mines. Jughead says, going straight to the point, “I think you father is up to no good,” and then without even taking a break to let that settle in her mind he jumps right to accusation: “I think he is involved in the Milkman murders.” Then he adds the mines are palladium mines, plus not abandoned.
This is a method that Jughead is pretty consistent about throughout the seasons - he gets a set of facts, intuits something, gets a clue or a hint that he might be on the right track, and then goes directly to the source to launch accusations. The thing is, it WORKS this time because he went to Cheryl and not to Clifford Blossom, and even if she doesn’t like Jeronica, Cheryl definitely wouldn’t let Jughead just die if she could do something about it.
As a sort of unintended test, perhaps, Cheryl brings up that she thinks her father might sacrifice her to the pagan god Moloch. Jughead blinks about it but he doesn’t laugh or run away or attack her, so he passes this test.
As a result, Cheryl feels free to tell him forthwith (they’re being very forthright with each other here, which is great) that her parents were speaking in Russian with each other (she didn’t understand what they said, though, alas). Jughead, having found a kindred spirit in an unexpected place, immediately asks her to “get in there and play gumshoe.” At the thought of finding “something incriminating” against her parents, Cheryl looks bright eyed, bushy tailed, and inspired. She’s never looked at Jughead like that, ever.
OUtside, in the parking lot, suspenseful music plays as the girls are gearing up for their first parallel parking lesson. The performance anxiety of doing this in front of like A DOZEN PEOPLE is horrifying to me, but Ethel does a wonderful job. They all passed the written and practical portions of the test! Grundy is going to be taking all of them to the DMV to get their licenses! She says that they must bring their birth certificates, because the DMV “needs to make sure none of you are Russian spies.” She says it in a way that makes it clear she thinks it’s silly, but Ethel suddenly looks sad. Oh dear. Does she not own a single valid form of ID??
Archie is working out using a rigged up rowing machine in the garage. Uncle Fucking Frank of course has to investigate. I feel like there’s something off kilter about the way Frank keeps such close tabs on Archie. It’s most like Archie is a girl whose virginity is supposed to be safeguarded. Apparently everyone rows at least an hour a day to stay in shape, so Archie is trying to get a head start.
Frank has the temerity to give Archie a man to man, I Know I’m Not Your Real Dad speech, unprompted. Against all available evidence, Frank claims that he wants “what is best” for Archie, and that what he wants is “same as” what Fred would want. I was very worried for a second that he was going to sexually molest Archie, because this sounds like a sexual molestation set up. But it isn’t. Instead he gives Fred’s dog tags to Archie. Then he tries to get Archie to enlist in the army.
Fred apparently wasn’t drafted. He volunteered for the army. This is supposed to make Archie feel better? I mean it makes ME like Fred a lot, because it’s MY democracy and MY freedom that people like Fred suffered and died so far from home, but I don’t see how Archie, who is so terribly wounded about his father’s death is supposed to feel better. Also why oh why does Frank want Archie to die so badly, like WHAT IS HIS PROBLEM? “Drop this poetry nonsense and join the army!” Turning that spooky sexual maniac look on Archie again from before (it’s the same face he made calling Betty a ripe peach - vomit, phlegm, poop, bile, all the vileness, FIE) he says that “the best part about joining the Army” is that he “doesn’t have to wait until graduation.”
I mean. OK so in th 1950s Americans weren’t all having to earn PhDs in order to get entry level jobs like they have had to recently, but this still strikes me as absolute shit advice, AND going expressly against Mary’s clearly stated wishes.
Meanwhile, Cheryl is exploring her house using a three color candelabra at the dead of night. She is so dramatic omg I love her. “Let’s see what you’re hiding, daddy,” she mutters to herself in an empty room like a totally sane girl. She finds a hardhat in his desk with a lamp attached to the forehead portion. The candles react to a draft she wasn’t expecting to exist in this room, so she pursues the source of the airflow and finds a SECRET PASSAGE hidden behind a portrait!
Oh my gosh I love Thornhill so much.
This hidden compartment reveals A DOZEN milkman costumes!!! Complete with full pristine sets of glass milk bottles!!! Ooooh!
The next morning, Archie is being haunted by his dad’s dog tags which make his world tilt at a weird angle. He wears the dog tags to breakfast, freaking Mary out. She’s innocently asking about how many waffles he wants, but her world is about to implode. She wants to know why Frank gave those to Archie.
At the same time, Ethel wants to talk to Betty. She doesn’t have her birth certificate because it’s somewhere in her house. Betty is so kind to Ethel, immediately offering to go get it for Ethel. The document is probably inside Ethel’s mother’s crafting desk, which held all her important papers.
At school, Cheryl sees Jughead coming towards her, so she grabs him firmly by the lapel to drag the physically head-and-half taller boy forcibly into the music room. This is. uh. This is very hot to me even though I know Cheryl is a gold star lesbian in her heart. Anyway this is a first time experience for Jughead, being grabbed and tossed by a girl. I bet he didn’t know that cheerleaders have good upper body strength and powerful grips.
Immediately after, Jughead gets to have another new experience: A person with no reason to be particularly nice or supportive of him telling him that You Were Right. He’s so flummoxed by this reaction that he seeks reconfirmation: “About which part?” The answer is ‘Everything!”
She brought one of the giant milk bottles in her purse, which did not look like it could fit something that big.
Jughead has been saying an interesting series of oaths this episode (“Holy crapola!” in response to the bunker, “Holy Moley” about something else I forget) so he busts out Holy Toledo at the news that Cheryl’s father has sets of milk bottles and the uniforms that go with the milk bottles hidden in his study. He concludes, “The Milkman must have been working for your father! Doing his bidding!”
And because he’s a sweetheart who reads a lot of scary fiction, Jughead immediately asks Cheryl, “Are you in danger?” to which Cheryl has the coolest like, pretty girl working as an agent of the Resistance during Vichy type answer, which is “No more than usual.” She does look extremely worried. Cheryl had an extremely busy night of investigating, because she is also able to confirm that the mines a) do produce palladium and b) are not abandoned. She demands that Jughead bring his camera to her family estate that very night. She further instructs that he “pray an atomic disaster doesn’t befall us all before then!” before she takes off.
Betty walks into the abandoned murder house to try to do a nice thing for Ethel Muggs. She’s very brave. I would not be able to do this. She’s shifting through the desk, and finds a lockbox. She opens it with her hairpin! Her skirt pattern is very pretty. She finds what look like a series of receipts - that Hal Cooper was paying the Muggs for. And then she finds a photo of Hal Cooper HOLDING A BABY. What? What??
At dinner that night at the Andrews house, Mary has some things to say. She informs Frank that Archie has told her about the whole thing with the dog tags. “You used his father … to try to manipulate my son into joining the army. How dare you Frank? Especially when you yourself never served.”
Frank tries to speak homophobia code to Mary: “It’ll set him straight!” he says.
Mary however is too obtuse to pick up on it. She still thinks this is about Archie writing poetry. She finally - FINALLLYYYYY - lays down the law. That Archie can make whatever choices he wants with his life after he graduates high school. That is non negotiable for Mary, this high school graduation. Archie indicates with a nod that he gets the message.
Then she says that she “can’t have Frank here anymore. It’s time for you to move out.”
You mean to say that she had the power all this time, to kick Frank out, and DID NOT?
Then her sexist homophobic brother in law and her clueless sexist son have a dick measuring contest IN FRONT OF HER about who is going to be the man of the house. Frank is an underhanded piece of shit too, reminding her that she’s the one who invited him to Riverdale to ‘help.’ (So really, Mary is doubly guilty, first for inviting him, and second for letting him punish Archie for existing like that). Mary reminds them both that she’s the one who pays for the mortgage which.. again… HOW? She doesn’t have a bank account, right? Or did she inherit Fred’s when he died?
Looking suddenly at peace, Frank says that he’s going to “shack up with my old pal Tom Keller.” He makes a deeply inappropriate comparison between himself and Keller - Keller is being divorced by his wife of almost twenty years with whom he has a son. This is not the same relationship that Frank has with Mary!
Mary doesn’t care what Frank does as long as the “bullying uncle” is out of the house. Frank was living rent free in this house, yet he was so desperate about Archie’s poetry that he was willing to make him drop out of high school to join the army!
Betty goes home to ask her parents why they were writing checks to the Muggs household. Mrs Muggs was their housekeeper! is the first lie that Hal tries to tell. Betty then wants to know who the baby is. It’s Ethel, so Betty has to cross examine her dad. Hal says that it’s because he’s Ethel’s godfather. Betty wants to know why she’s never heard of any of this.
Alice stops Hal from telling any more lies.
“You’re Ethel’s father, aren’t you?” Betty concludes.
Alice kicks Hal out of the house for a bit so she can share an alcoholic drink with her daughter. the real story is that Mildred Muggs was their housekeeper before Betty was born. Alice suspected an affair between Mrs. Muggs and Hal which was confirmed when Ethel was born. The reason they hid all this was because of the TV station. Everything Alice says after that first thing is a lie - she doesn’t give a fuck about “us, our family.” She wanted a tv career because Alice has always has had a career obsession. When she says she ‘had no choice’ she means there was no other way for her to have a career on television than to be married to Hal Cooper. So the arrangement was that the Muggs would raise the girl ‘as their own’ (which she was, she was Mildred’s own) while the Coopers sent money every month for support (from Hal).
Betty puts it together again. That this is why Alice took Ethel in, but hated her, humiliated her, had her forcibly imprisoned in the child abuse nunnery and so on. And that this is why she was on such a rampage about Betty coming to adulthood. Except Betty doesn’t say that - she concludes that Alice didn’t “want what happened to you to happen to me.” What, your husband a middle class white man predating on a working class woman? How would having Kevin pin Betty over Archie fix anything? Kevin is much more likely to have impregnated a lot of women in his life if he’d not been able to actually come out at least to himself by Betty dumping him. This doesn’t make sense, but then, Betty in S7 is really stupid, and so is her mother so I guess this explanation is enough for both of their levels of intellect.
Alice starts weeping about how she failed as a mother and she’s sorry, but like I said, I don’t believe that motherhood, her daughters with Hal or “doing what was right” was in any way part of Alice’s calculations. She simply wanted to hold on to having a tv career above dignity, above her own sanity, above her sexual well being. Betty says that she thinks Alice did the best she could, because Betty is a kind person, but this is categorically wrong. Alice has acted purely out of malice towards Ethel and sexual jealousy for Betty (in that Betty had youth and an unblemished future without any bad compromises spread out ahead of her).
Betty says that they need to call Hal back home so they can all tell Ethel she is a Cooper. I hope Ethel axes them all to death in their sleep.
Meanwhile, Cheryl and Jughead are having their adventure in the dark of night. Jughead takes a hugely flashing photo of the night guard at the mines, who is watching Oh Mija. Then they sneak past him to the mines. The cooperative bickering-affirming dynamic they have between them is truly great. When Jughead wants to know why there aren’t more guards, Cheryl points out that secret projects should maybe not call “undue attention” upon themselves, which Jughead concedes immediately is a good point.
Jughead even gets the mojo back to narrate for a bit, as he says that while Cheryl and he were on the verge of a major discovery, Ethel was “experiencing emotional shockwaves about learning the truth about her life.”
Ethel says that she always felt like her parents’ discord was her fault, and that there was a lot of discord. “That explains things” is what she says, with so much dignity. The Coopers offer to adopt her, to “make things right.” Extremely elegantly, Ethel rejects their offer immediately. She says that what she wants is to be happy, which you can’t possibly be with Hal and Alice Cooper as your parents in any capacity. She wants nothing to do with these people. Ethel is the only one with a brain cell in this entire community. Good for her, and her smarts.
Frank is finally leaving. The little family is seeing him off. Reggie first. Then Frank finagles a final invitation to a regular home cooked meal (“Sunday dinner”) from Mary, who apparently is wonderful at cooking as she is at dress-and-halloween-costume making. She still invites him, which is a level of forgiveness that I don’t think I am capable of mustering, even to be polite. As he says goodbye to Archie, Frank asks that Archie not “hold things against him.” Archie tries to teach Frank that writing poetry is not an emasculating activity. He specifically says that men in trenches in the fields of war have written beautiful poems. Maybe that’s my path, he says, and Mary shakes her head a FIRM FUCKIN’ NO about dying in war. They send him off. They’re playing sentimental music over this, but I have to confess I do not understand why. He’s been hateful, overbearing and condescending to them the entire time he’s been here. They had a big blowout fight after he tried to induce Archie to drop out of high school to join the army, which is both expressly against Mary’s wishes and without any consultation with her. Why are they making nicey nice?
Can Frank please die now? I am tired of hating him (though the hate is still going very strong.)
In the photo development room, Cherly and Jughead are talking about what to do with the evidence they have found. Cheryl wants to take these to Sheriff Keller. Jughead disagrees, saying Keller might be in on it too. “He’s just a dimwitted small-town sheriff that’s in over his head,” is Cheryl’s fantastic little summary of the stupid father of the awful Kevin. Jughead wants to make this federal, not local, and is going to tap Veronica’s contacts with the FBI from when they were investigated her father. Cheryl is impressed that Jughead Jones is capable of this much serious, rational thought. I also wonder if she likes the idea of getting the feds involved or not. In any case she calls him, playfully, “Sherlock Jones” which is some Veronica level moniker coinage, I must say.
Cheryl now wants to know if Jughead and Veronica are “officially an item.” She …
I.
Cheryl and Jughead have actually friendly banter! I am pleased as punch. They have really nice chemistry! Cheryl says, gently teasing, that she suspects Jughead might be “in over his crown” in trying to be in a relationship with Veronica Lodge, to which Jughead snaps back, bringing some bravado to it, that he is “holding his own.”
One of the photos they took is of Jughead leaning very suggestively up against the very phallic looking palladium bomb.
Cut to the family meal at Thornhill when they get an unexpected banging on the door. Cheryl leaps up, offering brightly to “go get it.” Ooh ok so I was wrong. She was purely pleased about involving the feds in this. She lets in Glen(!) and the other G-Men. She apparently even summoned them at this exact time.
Clifford’s full name is Clifford Marion Blossom, and Penelope’s name is
Penelope Pavlina Novikov Blossom.
Which I am going to commit to memory immediately.
However, point of order here - shouldn’t that be Pavlina NovikoVA Blossom??
The Blossoms are arrested for “treason, conspiracy, and advocating for the violent overthrow of the American government.” Moreover, the FBI is going to shut down “Project Moloch” which makes Clifford jump with surprise.
Cheryl manages to get the last word in: “You did a bad thing, Daddy.”
She stole wholesale, all of Veronica Lodge’s bag from right under her. No conflicts of interest despite being the daughter, either. Because Veronica always waffled over Hiram. Not Cheryl. My hero. MVP of Riverdale for real.
Jughead sounds excited as he relays that the world eventually learned that the American capitalist had been seduced by a Russian sleeper agent,. The plan was thus:
From the A-bomb to the H-bomb to the P-bomb!
Clifford Blossom pretended to be developing the P Bomb for the US government but in fact was going to sell it to the Russians. The FBI took credit for foiling this plan, which Jughead says was “fine by” him except it wasn’t because he’s setting the record straight here. In any case, he says he did manage to “put the rest of the pieces together.”
Jughead still needs to worship a father figure, and fortunately for him FP doesn’t exist in this AU and Rayberry died, so he’s quite safe. His hagiographic treatment of Rayberry is that even though all Rayberry did was use what he was worried about from his job at the maple factory to write obscure stories in an obscure comic book the “brilliant, terrifying” nature of these stories is enough to stand him in good stead. The thing is, Rayberry apparently died directly because he fell in a sort of love with Jughead Jones. When he invoked the First Amendment on Jughead’s behalf, he “spooked” the powers that be, which made Mayor Blossom sicc his hitman on him.
By the same token, Mr Muggs somehow, as the janitor, obtaining proof positive that the Blossoms were sitting on top of a stockpile of palladium similarly made him a target. We are shown Ethel pack up her bag to leave to go somewhere. Her last meeting in town seems to be with Jughead, who really just does not really care what the plot was, because she paid all the prices for everyone’s secrets from day 1 to literally the moment when Alice Cooper decided to do a nice thing for Ethel purely (and I do mean PURELY) for the purposes of fucking Betty over.
But Ethel is unendingly kind to Jughead who is very obtusely obsessed with telling her how bad it all was, when all she wants to do is LEAVE. She tells him, with the same dignified graciousness she’s exhibited throughout, that all his crazy eyed efforts make her “hope for a better tomorrow.” To his credit, Jughead seems very moved by her elegance, looking at her with misty eyes as she departs with Ben.
Ben calls her Lovebug!!!!!!
Alice is deeply resentful (because she is evil) of Ethel getting to leave Riverdale and for Hollywood, to get a real job at a real movie studio, based purely on her talents. This is not a caliber of career that either of her daughters is ever going to achieve. Of course she’s going to try to stop her. As usual, Veronica has taken care of everything like the generous queen that she is - gotten Ethel a job, a connection to a powerful person who will feel obligated to look in on Ethel and give her some protection while she figures out the ropes and a place to live.
You know, Tabitha may be the Guardian Angel of Riverdale but Veronica is the patron saint of Riverdalian hopes and dreams. “Give them hell Ethel!” Veronica says. Betty says she wants to visit Ethel. Jughead and Ethel hugfarewell. “I’ll miss you. You always were the best partner in crime,” Jughead says.
Why do I still get the feeling that Ethel is just a little bit in love with Jughead Jones? She pats him gently on the face, telling him not to be “too sad” because they will “always have Pep Comics.” Jughead really does look very sad about her departure.
Alice tells Ethel that she’s going to be just fine, and keeps touching Ethel and I wish she wouldn’t. Because I don’t trust Alice at all.
Jughead says that Ethel was the first to leave Riverdale. (Ben Button is apparently going with her to California but is going to come right back? Or is he so irrelevant he doesn’t count?) Ethel drives out to the tune of NOTHING CAN STOP ME NOW! in her wonderful looking yellow car. I’m glad the pageant didn’t stiff her with the car. Jughead has this to say:
“All of the pieces were falling into place, but it was just about time to find out if our little town would be avoiding an even greater cataclysm.”
I’m so glad Ethel got a great exit. I really am. I still think she should’ve gotten to fuck Jughead though, just to realize it isn’t all that.
#riverdale opinion#omg it's almost to the end and this was actually a good episode#ethel muggs#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#riverdale episode recap
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Riverdale S7 E9 (Chapter 126) Betty and Veronica
Jughead Jones is mourning the death of Brad Rayberry. Even though he’s in his happy place, the Diner, all around him feels like a black void where he is cast in a chilly blue shadow. (I assume this is a reference to Joan Didion’s book about the death of her daughter, Blue Nights, published in 2011). He’s not so much as narrating the story to the audience as telling himself how he’s feeling in order to cope with the magnitude of his emotions. The soundtrack though is being breathtakingly unkind - it plays “Ain’t that a shame” over his grief. The lyrics are as follows: You made me cry when you said goodbye/ Ain't that a shame / My tears fell like rain / Ain't that a shame / You're the one to blame/ You broke my heart when you said we'll part.” Not the most tender, either in content or delivery. Poor Jughead.
Maybe like all intense life events, the death of someone important to you brings out whatever is your strongest (or possibly weakest) emotional color. Jughead is the saddest boy in the (television) world to ever be sad, so in grief he finds the world itself has a slow, sad rhythm, distorted and gooey, as even the big cupfuls of sugar he downs to try to make himself feel better don’t pep him up. He does look so very bereft. He’s reading all of his mentor’s work, maybe in chronological order, as his grieving process. (When I suffered the catastrophic loss of someone, I was not sad. I was furious. I’d be walking along, and suddenly remember they were dead, and then my vision would literally turn red, forcing me to stop walking for a bit because I was actually blinded by rage.)
Jughead is too disheartened to narrate, so the ‘show’ takes over.
Betty is sitting in a fetching red gingham dress dead center of the screen, facing off against Werther who is behind is big desk. Above her head flashes her name, Betty, in the famous Riverdale comics font - hot pink outline, pale pink innards.
Werther acts like he didn’t realize that cheerleading was a sexualized environment, which he might well have, I suppose. Werthers says that Alice agrees with him, which is very strange, because it was HAL who was the one to tell Betty she has to join the Vixens, and HAL was the one who called Clifford Blossom, who forced Cheryl to make room for Betty. It was Werthers, Hal and Clifford that decided to put Betty into the cheerleading squad to both her and the cheer captain Cheryl’s chagrin, and yet, when the time comes to recognize that this was a stupid thing to do when the goal was to force Betty to stop thinking about sex, somehow Alice is brought into it. Werthers disclaims responsibility for this little cheerleading foray, absolves the two other men for going along with his stupidity, and somehow foists the blame for this on Alice.
Betty thinks Werthers is a very silly man. She has a hard time keeping a straight face as Wethers says odd things. She questions her interrogator right back - How does Werthers see high school as an institution, if to him it’s not horny at all? “As an academic institution meant to provide a safe environment where students can challenge themselves intellectually…” blahblahblah - a holding cell to safeguard young people’s virginity, apparently. She isn’t even a bit abashed. I am in awe that her confidence seems so genuine. She thinks she’s talking to a silly, out of touch adult who is participating in the continued wasting of her time that her parents keep pushing her into. Werther is very annoyed about his failure to intimidate Betty, so he tries a different tack : You stripped in front of your window! You flashed your underpants on live television!
Betty’s glow does dim a bit at this attack, so he turns quite vicious. He calls her all the things Kevin Keller did - nymphomaniac, sexual compulsive, exhibitionist. Betty has been called these insulting things when it really mattered, so she’s insensitive to it now. She wants Werthers to get to the point. (Again, I am so in awe of her not being crushed by the weight of his disapproval. Catholic confuscian little old me could never have dared. But then, nobody thought I was especially sexual. This specific form of torture is being inflicted on Betty not just because she did those things, necessarily, but because she is beautiful and desirable to older men and so people like Werther want to talk to her about sex. If you’re not attractive and yet still horny, you get treated quite differently.)
Werther’s for example wants to know about Betty’s first sexual memory. Fortunately, it turns out to be just thinking her friend Archie is super handsome when they are playing Operation! together, but we all know that if it turned out to be something more upsetting, there is no way Werthers would have been able to cope. Betty lies and says she can’t remember, so Werthers moves on. “How often, Betty, would you say that you think about sex?”
The show, that played the sarcastic music over Jughead’s grief, decides to play the Lollipop song that was the ring tone for when Betty was getting terrorized by the Black Hood i.e. her dad, who wanted to recruit her into being a serial killer with him in 2017. And she did just recently suddenly start with eating actual lollipops, didn’t she?
When Betty opens her curtains first thing in the morning, Betty has no choice but to look out across the way at Archie’s bedroom. She imagines him shirtless with rippling abs, and she imagines coming in from behind to wrap her hand around the back of his neck to kiss him good and proper. Her hallucination of early morning horniness includes her hopping onto his waist to be on top even as they’re standing. Betty Cooper likes to ride on top whatever the universe.
The day continues with her encountering a mint green gas guzzler of an American vehicle, which she gives an affectionate pat as she skips her way into school. On the steps is Fangs, who his combing his hair handsomely off his handsome face. Betty immediately imagines laying him out on the hood of the car she likes so much, to get on top and have her way with him. The Lollipop song’s opening is going on forever, but then it seems to have a POP! smooch! sound.
Betty is walking down the halls looking a bit freaked out as the song continues to play. She’s wearing a pink flower print dress with a tightfitting green sweater and a red belt. Here comes Jughead Jones, wearing the green vest over a pink shirt combo that he was so perfectly matched with Tabitha in on her first day back in Riverdale. Uhhh I guess this outfit really did it for all the ladies of Riverdale?!?! He starts out scowling, looking cranky, but because this is Betty’s fantasy, his faces relaxes as he sees her looking at him as they walk towards each other. In time with the lyrics “His kiss is sweeter than apple pie,” Betty grabs Jughead by the arm, spins him around, and they are in an embrace, lips locked.
This song is hyper sexual - I call him Lollipop! - like did everyone who liked this song know that this was a fellatio pun?
Then! In the girls’ changing room Betty looks up from lacing up her pure white sneakers to see Veronica Lodge, shiny of hair, red of lip, almond of eye, looking meaningfully over her shoulder at at her. This is artwork stolen straight from the cover of a pulp novel, except in this instance the blonde is the aggressor. Betty slams Veronica up against a locker before kissing her.
Back in the hall, Betty looks more unsettled than ever, when she slams into Reggie. And Reggie gets the steamiest fantasy of all - she’s right back in the shower room, making out naked with him under running water. This is actually how she and Archie have sex for the first time as adults in the future, so basically, they kept Betty’s favorite positions and sex locations consistent this season. Why the fantasy about Reggie is so much more advanced than her thoughts for the others? Maybe she just desires him more.
Then she walks into science class, where Dilton has set off a mini volcanic eruption.
Having made Dilton Long Duk Dong coded, the show can’t bear to give him a kiss scene with Betty. Lame!
And anyway, after that glowing fantasy with cheerful music, we are yanked back (with a record scratch sound) to reality with Werthers who keeps insisting on saying the word SEX to Betty. Betty tries hedging the answer to the question about how often she thinks about sex. An average amount → every seven seconds like Kingsley’s study concluded → “I think about sex all the time.” She’s pushed into saying things by Werther who really wanted her to give this answer, by goading her into it. He needs a number, he keeps insisting, so she gets annoyed and says she “thinks about sex all the time.” This is the same kind of ill judged, rebellious energy that had her doing the panty flashing to begin with.
But I also do this and have done this, just not questions about sex because this particular issue (being viewed as hypersexual) has never been a problem for me. I have, however, reacted this way about other things, so I’m inclined to generalize and say that most people would respond to this sort of aggravating stimulus in the same way. At some point when you push and needle and harass someone long enough, in a nasty enough way, they will give you what they think you want them to say, to just get you to stfu. Poor Betty. I can’t believe they’re taking her out of school for this, to have this conversation about sex with this crusty old man. (There is so much fucked up about Confuscian cultural heritage when it comes to gender and sex but THIS particular iteration - of having a young girl isolated with an old man to talk about sex explicitly - would never be permitted no matter what she’s done or what his qualifications are, so, uh, thanks for the small reprieves, I guess?)
But I mean - there’s a reason that Betty is in a way forced to think about sex all the time. She’s beautiful and sexualized by all the adults in her life well before she herself is ready. They’re doing this TO HER.
Werthers asks WHY she thinks about sex all the time - and the real answer is what I’ve written above. But Betty keeps answering in a straightforwardly honest way - She’s curious about how it feels.
Oh, the other solution to her horniness, assuming it’s genuine and self-produced, is to make her take tests constantly, publicize her rankings in school, train her to see all classmates of any gender as competitors, and put the terror of utter failure as a person by hinging success on acceptance into three university options and then make her do endless rounds of rote memorization punctuated by spot quizzes non stop from ages 10 through 18.. i.e. Give her a S. Korean college prep education. That really squashes the horniness out of your teenagers, lemme tell ya.
Betty wants to have sex for pleasure. Werthers snaps that sex is for reproduction only. (So in this way he’s very Catholic priest coded - a celibate gay man who hates women wanting women to suffer lots of unwanted pregnancies before dying young). (I joke about this but though I’m sure they’re cohabitants and gay together I doubt Werthers and Featherhead can actually bear to touch each other, hence celibate.) Betty snaps back about men’s use of pornography to question this “sex is for creation of heirs inside a marital relationship.”
The fact that the Coopers go to church at all is surprising to me, but that’s because I temporarily forgot this was 1955. The thing is, having the structure and community of church seems to have no steadying effect on Alice Cooper whatsoever. Her hankering for that kind of connection is what led her to keep shoving her daughters into the hands of the Sisters of Quiet Mercy and definitely what made her so susceptible to the Farm in Modern Times. In any case, Hal keeps his porno in his sock drawer AND
ALICE AND HAL DO NOT SLEEP IN THE SAME BED.
The girl on the cover of Prance has Veronica’s raven hair, strong eyebrows and her penchant for killer heels. The cover says “In Broad Daylight, A Nude Lighting Study” and “Twisted Sisters; Beverly Barry on her blasphemous defection from the convent.” Betty is very turned on by the centerfold of the dark haired girl, who is very gorgeous and looks very happy. (That’s kind of what I like too about these old Vargas style pictures. The women look so happy.)
Betty, ever quick on the uptake, retorts that she isn’t a child, either.
Werthers, as a celibate, is very not into talking about a person who has undeniably had sex with another person at least twice in his life (Hal Cooper), when Betty wants to talk about it. The reason he gives is that he is “a CHILD psychiatrist.”
She’s so smart.
That evening, Betty is sitting in a very uncomfortable posture on her bed, trying to get what looks like math homework done when the overly friendly looking Alice Cooper bursts in with a whole clutch of wedding magazines. At first, Betty thinks her mother is being silly. Possibly cute. But as Alice’s strongsuit is not subtlety, the comments she emits keep getting more pointed. “A girl can daydream about her wedding” and”When I see you in that white dress, standing at that altar, it’s gonna be the happiest day of my life.”
Because yeah - you wouldn’t really be asking these horrible slavering questions about “how often do you think about sex” to a child, would you? Once she has the advantage, Betty tells Werther that his attempt to enforce compulsive, correct (read, repressed) heterosexual norms on her have utterly failed. “I don’t think I want to get married.” When she says that she wants to have “an impact in the world” rather than “just have a family,” Werthers is so upset at the extent of his failure that he looks like he might cry. Betty Cooper is some sort of peak genius person, because to get ‘I want to have a career and possibly never get married’ from the weeks and weeks of slut shaming disguised as therapy is a rare accomplishment of historic proportions. Round 1 for Betty!
This is Riverdale being (intentionally? accidentally?) brilliant. The loveliness of the wedding, the joy of wearing a pretty dress and having everyone fuss over you and celebrate you on that day, is a recruitment tool for the female side of the marital union (legally speaking, the female side of marriage has always been absolutely shit, you know it has, even if the union itself is happy and fulfilling and loving), exactly like how really gorgeous army uniforms (the ones that are recycled and referenced even now in high fashion and consumer items!) were a major way to get young men to sign up to be exhausted canon fodder. Moreover, it’s not the enticement of the clothes and the ceremony itself that suffices - there needs to be a concerted societal effort to brainwash the hapless participant into truly believing that joining up has immense meaning. Without this concerted effort, marriages don’t happen and neither do military volunteers.
At school the next day, Veronica Lodge, is promoting her theater by giving out free tickets to a showing of a James Dean double feature: East of Eden and Rebel without a cause. She’s flanked by her two gay boyfriend minions, who are dressed the same - checked shirts covered up with a Mr. Rogers style cardigan with contrast piping. She keeps wearing purple, and her clothes are still quite demure, for Veronica. A dark purple dress with a full skirt below the knee, high neckline, short sleeves, and a big bow sash at the waist. You can see what a tiny human she is by how gigantic the girls and boys who are getting their free tickets look next to her.
With a KSHH! sound, the ‘show’ tells us that this is Veronica’s arc by writing her name across the screen in Archie Comics font - ice blue edges outlining a bright white center. Cheryl, as ‘president of the James Dean fanclub’ want to know what all this is about. She’s rather irked that Veronica has decided to do this celebration of James Dean without involving Cheryl. Riverdale is as much a hick town as Veronica has already called it, because they’ve been waiting months for a chance to see East of Eden. When Veronica says she has a print of East of Eden, Cheryl counters that she prefers the screen at nearby Greendale because it’s larger. She also coins a new term, too, does Cheryl- Deanizens - to denote her posse. Veronica offers her free passes, which Cheryl jumps for, so Veronica attaches conditions: The club has to spread the good word about the Babylonium. (Wealthy Cheryl jumping to clutch free tickets is very apt commentary on the wealthy).
Cheryl is ultra powerful - she can deliver the James Dean Fanclub, the Vixens and the Bulldogs. Archie when trying to console Veronica back in earlier episodes that Cheryl is “just like that” and “nobody listens to her” were all lies. Like truly - she is the most powerful girl in this school, and it’s not just money either, because Julian has access to (or possibly, is considered the sole true heir because the Blossoms hate women throughout time) the same money and yet he’s routinely punched in the face and overridden by others, and constantly has to bring up his daddy and his money.
Veronica refuses to concede influence of this magnitude to Cheryl. The competitive energy between Cheryl and Veronica in this universe - which was set up and dissipated almost right away in the OG universe - is sort of funny. Veronica is so obsessed with Cheryl that she is willing to throw business interests to the side to win a mere conversation. She should examine the intensity of her feelings about Cheryl a bit more closely.
Kevin because he’s stupid as well as hated by me dares to question Veronica’s tactic of giving away tickets to the movie for free (even as he’s been participating in doing this for some time). She explains that the real money is made at the concession stand, not via box office. Clay and Kevin together want to know why she entered that dick measuring contest with Cheryl over inviting the Bulldogs - “Is it all the Bulldogs or just one Bulldog in particular?” they ask.
See, this is the problem with gay boyfriends in fiction - they goad the girls they befriend into going out on risky limbs in wonky ways. Actual gay boyfriends tend to make you sit down and examine yourself closely.
Veronica has taken it upon herself to break into the boy’s locker room to distribute her free movie tickets. This is some gender outlaw behavior to me. I had to try to uh, rescue a very upset little boy who got overwhelmed by his first solo trip to the men’s room (because his mother, my relative, was preoccupied with a nasty diaper disaster in the women’s bathroom) and even though the boy was visibly standing there in the middle of the bathroom crying every time a man went in or out and I was clearly there to fetch him, I found it too terrifying to actually GO INTO the men’s room, and instead eventually coaxed him out by cooing at him from afar (my throat almost collapsed from the strain.). I just couldn’t do it.
Anyway, so she’s in there, timing her visit to meet the boys just as they would be done with practice. There’s like, barking noises the guys are making at each other as they enter because that’s normal human behavior (Sports people are SO WEIRD). Fangs, Archie and Reggie are shirtless, displaying their obviously oiled bodies that scream that none of these guys ever eat carbs, but they initially looked comical to me because their shorts seemed hiked up eunuch high. Then I paused the screen because I am a horny bitch and I realized that they were just super high waisted shorts. Oh OK .
Fangs is just a ridiculous, charisma free dumdum and doesn’t know the difference between Twinkle and Tinsel. Veronica offers him a free pass to the Babylonium James Dean evening anyway. Well, she offers his tits the tickets - eyes are on his face when she says “I want to personally” but at the word OFFER they go right downwards. She does the same to Archie (talk to his face out of manners but looks down because she can’t not and really truly, Veronica is a girl after my own heart in so many ways). She gives Archie less attention though, because she’s seen all that before.
Fangs is so pleased with himself for no reason that he does a walk like a 5 year old who has pooped his pants and is trying to pass it off as something cool (Dude WHAT is that WALK).
Reggie is one cool customer. He knows that Veronica is there for him and only him, so even though all the other guys move immediately to their lockers for their free tickets, Reggie keeps still, in his pec poppin’ pose, allowing Veronica’s approach. Veronica channels Lauren Bacall to ask Reggie if he knows what James Dean used to do in high school (it’s really the same tone as “You do know how to whistle, don’t you Steve?” aimed at Bogie). He was a basketball player, is what she tells Reggie, who apparently did NOT know (oh but yeah, because his town didn’t have a theater and he didn’t own a tv). Veronica is so cute when she singsongs - “a basketball star, just - like - you!’ I’m fascinated that she does NOT look down at Reggie’s pecs, keeping her bright eyes on his face the whole time. (Well done Veronica.).
Something about Reggie’s face indicates that somehow this gambit worked, when all the other ones have not at all, to date. Is it because she said the words basketball and star within 3 words of ‘you’?
Reggie shows up to the double screening, buying a quarters’ worth of popcorn. Veronica, instead of taking his money, suggests that he could treat her to a milkshake after her work is done. Reggie admires her - “You just keep shooting, don’t you?” is what he says, which is pretty neutral, but his face is fond. I also think it’s hilarious that someone as gorgeous as Veronica , complete with her knowing tone of voice, is supposed to be working this hard to get some dude (even one with Reggie’s face) to ask her out, but it’s television so I’ll let it pass. He says Sure, to the date, but then pays anyway. Oh what a great egg.
Kevin bursts Veronica’s bubble of happiness by summoning her to the projection room. It turns out these three children who are running this movie house didn’t check that the movie reels they were going to load into the projector for this big screening at this ‘sold out’ showing. I have no idea how movie reels and all that are supposed to work so if I am wrong about the projectionist capacity to check that the reels he’s received are in good working order before the day of the actual showing, please do let me know. (I suspect not, however, because Veronica didn’t seem like she was lying when she told Cheryl that she already had the films in hand for her double feature earlier on in the day (or week).
Veronica is someone who never lacks for courage, so she marches right down to her patrons to announce that there is, in fact, a problem. She’s trying to warm up to telling them the bad news when Fangs is the first to interrupt to tell her to hurry up. I hate Fangs second only to Uncle Fucking Frank. Cheryl knows what’s coming as soon as Veronica says ‘technical difficulties. Cheryl stands up to immediately demand a refund, and having received the tickets for free counts as nothing, because Cheryl knows how the movie house makes its money - through its concession sales. Again, Cheryl the wealthiest teen in Riverdale making this much of a fuss about money is saying something about the moneyed class and though it’s at Cheryl’s cost, I think it’s true to life. Veronica tries to parry by offering vouchers, but this ploy is so transparent that even Fangs catches on that it’s worthless. The audience starts pelting Veronica with the popcorn they want refunds for, with Cheryl adding the cherry on top of the turd: It’s like Jimmy Dean died all over again!
(If only she knew that Veronica was indirectly responsible for Jimmy Dean dying the first time! Apparently, 1950s Archie is not one for kissing and telling.)
As the last person gets their refund, Reggie, who has been patiently waiting all this time, approaches Veronica. She regretfully tells him that she just can’t do a thing today, but she wants to still go out with him. Smiling all cute, so cute I wanna jump up and down to try to reach his cheeks to pinch him, Reggie makes a graceful exit.
In the executive suite at the movie theater, where it looks messy enough for Veronica to be running several businesses, Veronica is on the phone taking the film distributor to task. The old fart on the phone is all oily, offering his “deepest apologies for this mishap.” She is not to be mollified - Veronica actually wants the prints of East of Eden. When she pushes he says there are no available prints. With her two boyfriend lackeys listening on the other line, Veronica has to endure a lecture from someone who sent her defective prints that as the owner, “it’s always your problem.” Clay finds it extremely suspicious that a studio would simply ‘run out’ of prints for its biggest release of the year. Kevin is useless because of course he is.
Veronica is in a very fetching seriously business colored navy dress. She wants the boys to work the phones, and somehow they are able to get all these apparently big-wig executives on the phone. She is hunting for something “exciting, fresh” unlike the crusty old East of Eden. She wants To Catch a Thief, or Oklahoma, or Night of the Hunter, but as one guy puts it, “Riverdale isn’t a market we’re interested in cultivating.”
This made me laugh. Riverdale, formerly not really in America somehow, is too cruddy for capitalist entertainment to be interested in its money. She’s also told that her particular theater is too small, so “please don’t call us again.” At the end of this very long series of discouraging phone calls, Veronica is finally given the hint: It’s her parents that have caused her to be blacklisted by every major studio in Hollywood. The Lodges of this universe want “to see everyone but themselves fail, including their own daughter.” The Lodges’ idea for what to do with this real estate of the theater is a nice Joni Mitchell reference but not a very good business idea - lack of parking does not seem to be a problem that Riverdale’s residents have ever complained about even in the future. What need is there for a parking lot in a town that’s surrounded by vast swatches of woodland?
Clay has an idea because he’s useful as a human. He suggests trying for independent films i.e. B movie studios. Veronica doesn’t even know what the names of these “small studios are” but it’s always so nice to see her perfect little face light up with the possibility of business revival.
In super tight close ups, which is glorious when it’s Betty and ovary-imploding when it’s Werthers, the two are at it again. This time, Werthers wants to know what Betty’s sexual dreams are. I think Betty answers because grotesque as her interrogator and this whole situation is, there’s really nobody else for her to speak frankly about sex with.
Betty dreams about being a teacher who molests Archie Andrews. This is apparently a score that the show’s makers still feel very salty about six years later. I suppose it’s hard to be confronted with the fact that you are Old and the Youngs have evolved beyond set ups that you were wrongly raised to think was hot in the ignorant before-times. School teacher Betty of her sex dreams (these aren’t so much dreams as her actual sex fantasies, I would think?) wears very tight fitting clothes that display bra straps and cleavage. And glasses, for some reason (Oh -because Grundy was bespectacled. Which as a spectacles wearer I object to, sigh. It’s bad enough being four-eyes, RAS.) She would slithery-sexy with Archie and Jughead, but she would beat Fangs with a stick and I am ALL FOR THIS. So, Archie, Jughead, Fangs, Reggie (who looks like he can’t believe his luck) and then - Veronica.
Veronica.
VERONICA??
So, to bookend how the show started, we are shown Archie as a minor making out with a teacher, except physically the actor playing him isn’t any older than he is (by much) and he himself looks the actor’s physical age. The soundtrack insists HE’S IN LOVE!! DOO-DOO-DOO as Betty-Teacher and Archie-Student make out in the sunlit classroom of Betty’s dream. The dream progresses to the Teacher laying Archie down on the desk to undress him and kiss his tit like we’re in some sort of gender-and-consent-flip schoolgirl hentai.
Look, Roberto, you were wrong to think anyone would find the Grundy-rapes-Archie storyline hot. I know that to you, the fact that much of the fandom would simply know to use the correct word - rape - when the ‘situation’ involves a pretty older woman predating on a handsome minor who is both taller and bigger than her, but you should’ve just taken your lumps. Because you were wrong. Your middle-aged-man self using Betty Cooper in her I’m a Sexualized Pretty Teen Girl Arc to insist that WE ALL have this teacher-rapes-a-child fantasy is actually quite ugly.
Plus I’ve been a teenage girl and NO WE DON’T. (Yes, I speak for all women who want to have sex with men and I am right.) NO WE DON’T! NONE OF US HAVE THIS FANTASY, IT’S NEVER EXISTED EXCEPT IN YOUR MIND. You were wrong the first time, and got defensive, and though you seemed to finally learn that this might have been a harmful, traumatic experience for Archie (and not just because Grundy was murdered by Betty’s dad), you’re regressing to your pre S1 creator self and honey, don’t do that!
Anyway, Betty says that her dreams get hot and heavy, until she realizes that everyone is watching. Everyone are: Reggie, who wants a better look, Cheryl frozen solid, Veronica wistful, Jughead looking very grim, Dilton fascinated, Kevin with his hands tensely clenched, Fangs open mouthed and Clay wondering why he has to be here and when he is expected to ever learn actual biology. (There is no Toni nor Tabitha.) There are eight more extras that I don’t care about. Betty-Teacher is at first a bit startled, but then decides this is also a turn on, and proceeds to molest her student some more.
Riverdale seems to think that a girl keeping a diary is a bad idea when her mother is Alice Cooper. Betty is really weird about her diary. It’s like she’s proud of keeping one, though those tedious women who wanted to marry the important Ernest also kept diaries and were ridiculous people. Even though she knows - or has good reason to suspect - that she is not being granted any sort of patient’s rights in this ‘therapeutic’ relationship she has with Werthers, she still nevertheless mentions that she puts all her sex fantasies /dreams into this diary. Is this a desire to be known better by her mother??
Werthers, after sexualizing Betty 1:1 all this time, has the temerity to ask HER where HER urge to be seen in “a sexualized way” comes from. Betty Cooper with her beautiful eyes looking right at me and saying what the narrative, the show, or maybe RAS wants her to say - that she’s doing all the things she’s done in S7 so far because she wants “to be seen, period” and also “as a person with autonomy and desire and self determination.”
OK so up until this point I felt very hypnotized because Betty is really so intriguing but then comes this asinine statement that means the middle aged men putting this show together are still trying to justify - and even worse - anticipate in advance the avalanche of negative reactions, ranging from mild distaste all the way to rage and bitter disappointment, of making Betty Cooper, sufferer of serial killer DNA, unwitting bearer of her mother’s trauma, survivor at the hands of an evil father, expert basher of people’s skulls - a kind of sex doll for this final season. “What better way to understand a person than to understand their desires?”
Oh get the fuck away from me. People waste time on all sorts of desires that have nothing to do with what they quote unquote really want from life. This feels unnecessarily condescending, and they are still trying to have the last word in this world where no creator can have that expectation. As soon as you release this thing, makers, it’s ours to pull apart and recook as we see fit. And you’re wrong. This arc that you’ve put Betty on where she acts out sexually in ways that give her no clitoral contact and hence no satisfaction but gives lots of voyeuristic unilateral pleasure to men (and mostly men) both in the show and I guess in the audience who are into that sort of thing TAUGHT ME NOTHING ABOUT BETTY WHATSOEVER.
Veronica goes to the Diner and she runs into Jughead, who still looks very sad and teary eyed. She calls in Holden Caulfield again, but he is too depressed for quips. She runs her only available movie idea by Jughead, and he says he loved the cool monster, “Mr Rayberry loved it too.” One of the things I really love about Jughead is that he freely shares a lot of ideas with women in his life. He was all about solving Betty’s mysteries for her, then ceding credit to her so she thought she solved it. Now, he nicely suggests, without mansplaining or other forms of condescension, that Veronica try a neat little 4D gimmick, name dropping “William Castle.” The Tingler had electric shock distributions under the seats. Veronica understands him immediately - “Sell the gimmick, not the movie.”
Betty comes home from doing a 1:1 with one gross wrinkly old man to be confronted with another one sitting with her mother. He’s here to hear her confession and uh, do an exorcism if need be, Har Har. It turns out that Werthers ‘prescribed’ the reading of her daughter’s sexually explicit journals to Alice which is - really, Alice is not my favorite, but erotica written by virgins tends to be REALLY TRULY very wild, so I can only imagine the afternoon that Alice has had. Betty suggests that Alice might be better off coming to therapy with her. Alice has a wonderful line - “I’m a grown woman, I don’t need therapy!” She thinks what her mother did was ‘breaking and entering’ rather than ‘violation of privacy’ or just, you know, ‘betraying my trust.’
I thought it was really very strange phrasing, until of course, Betty storms out of her home, muttering, ‘breaking and entering’ to herself like no person has ever done in the history of ever, and decides to ‘break and enter’ into Werther’s office. She manages to get his desk open, and finds comic books, slingshots, and a copy of Lolita. Any sort of hidden book she finds - starting with Ethel’s copy of the ‘sex book’ - Betty feels compelled to read, so she takes it. She clearly doesn’t know what it is.
She goes to the diner, where basically Jughead is making like Lucy Van Pelt at her therapy booth. He is just sitting and reading all of his mentor’s works one by one. He’s been having a sort of one man wake for his buddy the dead writer. I love Jughead for things like this. Brad Rayberry seemed like an exceptionally solitary, friendless person, so he must be very pleased in the afterlife that he made this much of an impact on this one kid. Betty calls Jughead a bookworm, then sidles in to ask him about Lolita.
Jughead knows exactly what it is. ‘Holy moly!” He calls it salacious, then describes the plot. When Betty hears exactly how young Dolores Haze is, she immediately draws something very close to the right conclusion. What she says is, “So it’s a book for perverts?!” but of course, the truth about Lolita is that it’s a book misread by perverts. Jughead says the silencing thing that men always say about things that get them off, especially if they know it’s objectionable on human rights grounds (i.e. on the grounds that female humans are fully human like men are): “Passing moral judgment on a work of art is a slippery slope.”
No, it isn’t, but I have no space to get into it here. Though this discussion intrigues Betty, what Jughead has to say about a book in which an adult ‘professor’ man ‘has an affair’ with a 12 year old child makes her not want to talk to Jughead too much, so she skips (literally runs) away, book in hand, to go find out for herself about this ‘work of art.’
Under her sheets, Betty is reading Lolita under a flashlight.
At school, Veronica is trying to sell the experience of watching “The Crawling Eye” at her classmates. She’s wearing blue check gingham, and Cheryl, who can’t keep her legs closed and keeps swinging them when she’s in Veronica’s vicinity, is in red check. This has to mean something. Veronica says that it’s playing for one night only Cheryl calls the film “dreck” as well as old (“came out a few years ago”). The depth of Cheryl’s film knowledge is startling to Veronica, but she soldiers on, stoutly touting that her film will be shown in 4D, insisting that it’s not 3D but a fourth, new dimension. At this moment, Long Duk Dong with an American accent (that is to say, 1950s Dilton, who I dislike 3rd after UF Frank and Fangs) bursts out with some dorky factoid that time is the 4th dimension. Cheryl approves of this, smiling smugly down at Veronica from her leg swinging perch. Veronica swats Dilton down with a simple “Shut up, Dilton.” She has her boys handout novelty eyeballs, which Cheryl wants nothing to do with, but they pop it into her little bag anyway.
Then Veronica forces Clay and Kevin (Klay? Clevin?) to cover their balls with newspaper. She actually says this, and says they have to dry the balls completely so she can do the “paint job.” She says these things like they’re some sort of sexual innuendo, but thank god, no. Then she goes to wait for Archie and Reggie, who she knows have to go home together because they sleep in the same room. Archie is extremely animated as he talks to Reggie, almost skipping ahead of him. “Just the two strapping he-men” she wanted, Veronica says. She’s there to hire them as performers for her 4d experience.
Archie immediately demurs - “We’re not actors!” they have KJ Apa say. He looks whole-milk wholesome and goofy as he says this, but then, as Reggie remains deadly serious, he alters his face entirely to imitate that weighty look, even lowering his voice a register or two, so find out “what exactly” he and Reggie are being asked to do. Archie has never been as adorable to me as he is this season, but if any one of the S1-6 Jugheads saw this he’d totally have done a murder suicide right there on the school steps. Veronica wants to compensate them handsomely for two minutes of work. Reggie can’t say no to an offer like that, so Archie is also down for the count.
Betty is just walking down the school corridor, and tells Werther that she will not be attending their session this day because she’s too busy reading something very interesting, which will be discussed tomorrow.
So it’s like I thought - she doesn’t necessarily HAVE TO do this. She kind of wants to do it, because he’s letting her at least think about and talk about sex as much as she wants, even if it’s for really grotesque reasons. She needs an outlet, but the call of Nabokov turns out to be stronger.
At the showing of the movie, the eyeballs they have as novelty gifts are truly very gruesome. Dilton has somehow been roped into volunteer duty handing out flyers. Cheryl shows up, and Veronica practically leaps over to accost her. Cheryl’s very presence is a victory for Veronica, you see. She shows off for Cheryl’s benefit, telling her oh, she might die of fright and if she merely faints, there’s a nurse on duty! No matter what she says, she just looks so pleased that Cheryl is there that fails to come off as threatening or mean.
The nurse on duty turns out to be Midge in a jokey nurse costume. Cheryl is annoyed that she wasn’t invited to be a part of Veronica’s campaign, so she takes it out on Midge instead (“I am extremely disappointed in you!”) before whipping around to tell Veronica that if this experience sucks, she will use her crowd rousing powers to make sure Veronica loses money this night as well. Veronica is quite nervous.
The 4D experience turns out to be (1) 3d glasses (2) a fog machine and (3) archie and Reggie in really fantastic eyeball with tentacles costumes feeling people up in the audience with those costumes.
Midge is into tentacle porn. Her willingness to fuck Fangs is now fully explained to me. The emergence of these tentacle monsters makes Midge plant one on Fangs.
Cheryl is having a wonderful time. She’s laughing joyfully. The crowd begins to chant, “Go Eyes! Go Eyes!” while Veronica, up in the projection booth, is very pleased by her own success.
Betty goes barging into Werther’s office to toss Lolita on the desk to demand what he’s doing with that book. He is an absolute candidate for a summary execution. He says that by learning about Lolita’s mind, he was hoping to better understand Betty’s.
Which only proves he didn’t read the book, because Humbert Humbert never understands or even thinks that Lolita has a mind. He just wants to (and does) fuck her barely pubescent body, because that’s the kind of thing that gets him off sexually. At the description of Dolores as “a sex crazed young woman” (he really hasn't read the book) Betty goes off. Her rant - all of which is perfectly correct - ends with “I no longer feel comfortable being alone in a room with you.”
This has all the hallmarks of the kind of movie that Aishwarya Rai has made, where she is oppressed and put upon until she erupts in a long interrupted speech of righteous indignation. Then she stomps off.
The thing is, Betty making the leaps that she makes in Werther’s terrible so-called therapy were completely unconnected to what was actually said during them, and that book Lolita suddenly giving Betty all this, uh Betty Friedan type of insight is also ludicrous. This has the feeling of shoving in pseudo-feminist points because what the show makers really wanted to do was accuse all of us of having their personal hot-for-teacher fantasies. (No, we don’t).
The next night ,Veronica is amazed to see the blockbuster crowd at her theater. Unfortunately, it turns out that Reggie and Archie don’t want to service her balls anymore. She thinks they’re angling for a raise, but they genuinely don’t want to do this anymore. Archie because he wants to look at Reggie play with balls and give him balls and things like that, and Reggie because this form of after school Arbeit is too undignified for him, and he doesn’t like being an employee of the girl he has a crush on. As soon as Archie delivers the form of notice that Reggie has clearly made him do, Reggie asks out Veronica a second (or is it third?) time, but Veronica is yet again too busy, this time because her show is a success. They’ll try again tomorrow, she says, after she’s called Variety to let her parents know that they haven’t beaten her yet.
The Lodges communicate via press releases, apparently.
Speaking of communication: Back at the Cooper house, Alice is mad that Werthers ‘giving up’ on Betty. (Werthers realizes that Betty might end his career, so he’s officially ‘fired’ her as a client.) Alice very much wants someone to ‘fix’ Betty but I guess not spend any money on this problem, so she’s about to call Werther’s back when Betty Cooper really does become Betty Friedan. She diagnoses her 1950s picture perfect housewife mother (who moreover has some species of career) with being unhappy with a nameless, unnameable problem. When Betty hits that sore spot, Alice turns around and says immediately that perhaps therapy for Elizabeth is a bad idea after all. “Talk to me,” Betty begs. “I’m right here.” She also asks if Alice is afraid FOR her or afraid OF her. Before the conversation can get anywhere worthwhile, they are interrupted by the patriarchy, in the form of the doughy Hal Cooper, emerging from his deep dark hole to call Alice a wonderful mother and wife who has sacrificed so much, just sooo much, for Betty. He summarily sends Betty to her room when Betty wants to know exactly what was sacrificed on her behalf.
The next morning, Betty wants to try reconciling with Alice, to “try to find a path forward.” The thing is, Alice Cooper in all universes has a hateful relationship with the truth, and since Betty told her not one but two major truths (she is afraid OF Betty, and she is otherwise unhappy) she lashes out by disowning Elizabeth altogether. Alice Cooper, I’ve said before, is someone who should be a very serious free-abortion-on-demand advocate because that’s what she should have done. I wonder if Riverdale knows that this is the character portrayal they are putting out - an illustration of a woman who should’ve had an abortion each time she got pregnant, and didn’t get to, and what happens to her in the aftermath. “Marveolous” is what Alice says at the prospect of a teen daughter who doesn’t need or want the kind of mother (castrating. p.s. Oh hey, Germaine Greer’s “Female Eunoch” reference) Alice wants to be. She also hates the task of being a domestic worker if any kind - “You can make your own damn breakfast” she says.
The smokey eyes on Alice first thing in the morning make her eyes bewitchingly cat-like.
That evening, Reggie is waiting for Veronica with a sweet bouquet of flowers. It’s already been half an hour. Kevin turns out to be an amazing retail worker, diligently wiping down the counters while Veronica is back on the phone with that Roth guy, the one who failed to get her the proper prints of East of Eden. She’s managed to get the Variety reporter to take dictation:
“Boffo B.O. for Babylonium: Riverdale Exhib Draws Eyeballs with Crawling Eye.” That alliteration plus strange word choice is Veronica Lodge through and through. Her gambit to use Variety as the platform to announce her resurgence in the world is turning out very successful.
In a bit of fanservice (rather than show maker masturbation which is the whole Grundy non-apology using Betty), Roth says he’s “always been a fan of Riverdale. Great town. Superb audiences!” to which Veronica says, “It’s like no place else Mr. Roth.” She’s now going to get a proper print of East of Eden. She’s wearing a pinstripe print, to mark her success. Later on, we see that she is wearing a black belt with a rhinestone buckle and a string of pearls with this. It looks amazing.
By the time Veronica has wrapped things up with Peter Roth and come down to meet her date, Reggie has left because he was tired of waiting. He’s left the bouquet for Veronica, because he’s a gentleman. Veronica is pensive over the fact that she has managed her time badly. Because that’s what it means, right? They’re not doing that stupid thing where they are saying a woman who has to try to lift her business of the ground has to choose between having a persona life and success, right?
When Veronica tries to go home after a long tiring day, she finds that her locks have changed. Smithers, who is loyal to no one other than his own paycheck, has changed the locks on her, so as to be able to report her genuine distress to her parents properly I guess, and also informs her that her parents deeply resent her roarin’ success. Veronica never loses her equanimity, so she says “a crawling eye for a crawling eye.” She is going to move into her own theater, to live there homeless while she gets her business fully launched. This has happened to her, of course, in other universes. Even though Veronica is always wealthy, ridiculously so sometimes, she also suffers consistent bouts of being ‘unhoused’ as the show calls it, same as Jughead.
The song the soundtrack plays is about how sometimes you’ve “got to start at the bottom.”
Unsurprisingly, we transition over to Jughead, who has finally gotten to the end of his wake for Rayberry. He’s finished the last word on the last published work by the authors, so he’s ready for the check now. Jughead says that “Time passes. Seasons change. Life moves on, you know?” as well as “I’m ready to move on.” Of course, as a Jughead and Riverdale fan I can’t help but hear something meant for me in the “I’m not done mourning, but I think I’m done wallowing.” I mean. Jughead’s version of wallowing while mourning was to read all of Rayberry’s work. I’m retreading all the episodes, in one form or another. But the show is wrong. I don’t want anyone involved in the show to move on. I want all y’all to be trapped in Riverdale forever and ever and ever.
Pop’s is glad to hear that Jughead is ready to get on with his life.
But of course, Riverdale the town won’t let him move on with anything ever. Keller comes in with sirens blazing (why?) to tell Jughead that he is going to need help ‘solving’ Rayberry’s suicide.
So much for moving on, Jughead says, sardonically.
#Riverdale recap#riverdale episode summary#riverdale s7 e9#riverdale episode 126#lolita mention#riverdale opinion#too many thoughts about riverdale#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#riverdale episode recap#Riverdale s6
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Riverdale S7 E4 Love and Marriage
Jughead and Ethel are in big doodoo. The principal has his own grim looking photo, unduly large, outside his office. The ego on this big ugly white man! Why is it so familiar? Hmmm.
The three hideous old people (well Sheriff Keller is handsome but that doesn’t make him any less hideous) are giving the Ethelhead the third degree, and Ethelhead are defending themselves the best they can:
The picture she drew of making mincemeat of her parents! → That was a joke!
The comic book issue with the murdering milkman! → She really did see one the night of the murder!
Why did Jughead hide all this stuff like a dirty secret? → Not answered because what he was trying to avoid is happening exactly right now!
Jughead sternly tells the agitated Ethel to stop answering questions until they talk to a lawyer. (Why oh Why can’t we have Ethelhead for real? They look really cute together. And his sweater’s red S matches her scarlet turtleneck ‘n’ scarf combo.
The way you know that Dupont (the now child psychiatrist, but my S4 loving self refuses to learn this new name they gave him) is a bad man is because he speaks in hoary cliches with such relish. “A picture is worth a thousand words.” Dude. Do better.
Ethelhead get hauled down to the station. On their way out of the school, Jughead is seen by Veronica, who is wearing her headband of pearls that makes her look like an angel. Jughead grimly tells her he’s being railroaded. Veronica in all universes is the right person to talk to when things are going wrong, so I’m hopeful things will work out for Jughead (though probably not Ethel, because Veronica doesn’t care about her so far this season).
Meanwhile, in the boy’s shower room, Jason confronts Archie. He wants to know how very dare Archie take advantage of Cheryl, going “all the way” with her. The general acceptance that everyone has even in this timeline of the Blossoms being weird people means Archie finds it perfectly normal to talk to Cheryl’s brother about sex while naked boys (well, American TV naked- two boys are showering in the back and one shirtless pantless one walks by in a towel) are all about.
Archie finds Cheryl and takes her to some room (not the music room, because the music room is for sexy times at Riverdale High) to confront her. He’s wearing very excellent white shoes. Cheryl is in the same shade of red all over like Ethel but I don’t suppose that means anything. Archie - for the benefit of the narrative but also because he’s a bit of a dim bulb is making sure that he didn’t just pass out and miss going all the way with Cheryl.
Can I just ask why Cheryl is so much better at faking straightness than Kevin? (This is in direct parallel with Kevin and Betty, of course.). It isn’t just a matter of Betty being smarter than Archie (she is) but also Cheryl knows how to be seductive with boys. The way she places her perfectly manicured hands on Archie’s chest is so perfectly calculated that he gets the heart shaped lighting happening in his irises.
Meanwhile, in fail gaydom with Failgay Kevin who I hate this season~ Betty and Kevin are outside where it is so cold Betty is sitting with gloves on and you can see their breath. Kevin does not want to have sex with Betty until they are married (or ever). Betty dumps him immediately.
Then she goes to go cry about it to the local closeted lesbian, who reacts with “Boys ruin everything.” At first Toni thinks that Betty is crying because Kevin tried to guilt trip her into allowing him to rape her, but Betty forthrightly tells her (through the most adorable scrunched up face of tears) that it was she who wanted to get laid. Toni continues to say the right thing - “More girls should do what you did!” Toni with all the right takes. She even calls Kevin by the right moniker - the ‘Supposed Boyfriend.’ Then she does what all gay girls do when consoling a hot girl upset about her ex boyfriend - ask her to be alone together in a dark room (THE DARK ROOM HAHAHA I see what you did there Riverdale), and maybe touch her leg a ilttle bit (which Toni also does).
Meanwhile - what a jam packed morning - meanwhile while Cheryl is seducing Archie and Toni is trying to seduce Betty after Betty dumped Kevin, Veronica is visiting Jughead in jail. The Stupid Hat Powers prevail so they are allowing him to still keep his crown.
Veronica, because she is wonderful, asks how Ethel is doing, to Jughead. But I don’t know how Jughead would know, since they are unlikely to be kept in the same cell. Jughead sounds very calm as he relays what he’s heard about procedure, but he’s got a double fisted death grip on the bars, poor thing. Jeronica have this two-brainiac-hipsters-vibing-off-each-other chemistry that I find completely enchanting. They literally speak in non stop references at each other which (TMI) is not at all fun to be next to but is DELIGHTFUL form of folie a deux. Anyway, Jughead in this universe is actually capable of advocating for himself instead of offering to die to solve things, and suggests that if he could get exonerated first, THEN he can help Ethel. Veronica is a woman always in search of a project, so she goes off to find the coroner of the town that Jughead naturally doesn’t know, in order to ascertain the time of death for Ethel’s parents.
Archie comes home to find that Mary Andrews, looking wonderful in royal blue with a strand of pearls, is disgusted and upset that her son has fucked Cheryl (allegedly). Archie is so uncomfortable about having to discuss sex with his mom that he crinkles his forehead exactly like Luke Perry used to in that show in the 90s. It’s not at all clear what upsets Mary most - having to receive a call from Penelope Blossom, having to talk about her son’s penis with Penelope Blossom, the thought of Archie having sex, the thought of Archie having sex with Cheryl, or having to talk about all of the above with Archie. I suspect it’s the choice of a BLOSSOM that upsets her the most, but she’s very funny to me. This actress’s slightly spaced-out line readings always bothered me, but she seems perfectly suited to this particular era. As she gloweringly passes Archie, he hunches down all cutely chastized. He has to put on a suit to go have dinner at the Blossoms!
And cut to dinner at the Blossoms! everyone is color coordinated in reds and blacks except for Mary who is wearing cream with a purple collarline. Clifford Blossom is dressed like Gomez Addams but he is nowhere near as fun. He is in fact a McCarthyite. To Archie’s terror (i love 50s Archie - he has such an endearing deer in headlights look), Clifford wants his thoughts on “the Russia problem.” Archie is looking around the room, and pieces together what he thinks the right answer might be like he’s trying to read hidden cue cards tucked into the corners. Russia! it’s a -. A Big! A Massive! Problem. [more pause] CLEARLY.
The way he gets told he’s a smart young man after sounding as dumb as a bag of broken bricks is how white male privilege works. Guys will literally say the most obvious, stupid thing and then older guys will promote them ahead of me and pay them special bonuses. The music director plays a ‘whimsical comedy’ type plinking over it but no, dear, this is how the world actually works. The way Archie goes from scared to smug in a nono second? Too real. Too too real.
The way Mary is just sat there ignored - nobody asks her what SHE thinks about anything - until Clifford summarily tells her they are going to have a talk later (not a question but an order) just is the icing on this shit cake.
Meanwhile, Cheryl and Archie go on a walk. In this universe, Cheryl never met Fred Andrews, which means “You’re looking especially DILFY today, Mr Andrews” or whatever the 50s equivalent is (You’re looking especially gitchy today?) never happened which means if this had been S1 of Riverdale I would never have been hooked! Archie says that his dad was his best friend (ah, but Archie were YOU the best friend to your father? I bet not!). They went to the movies together almost every weekend. Even before he left for the Korean War, apparently Fred’s fantasy was to go out west with Archie (and JUST Archie) and live as cowboys (with JUST Archie). Thinking about running away somewhere makes Cheryl feel romantic (???) towards Archie. It looks genuine, which is very disconcerting.
Toni is all smiles as she leads Betty down the steps to the Dark Room only to see that boys indeed actually do ruin everything - Kevin is there, slowdancing with Clay. I mean, this is exactly what Toni was hoping to do with Betty, I would think, but yes, Kevin does ruin everything. Toni tries to get out of there, but it’s too late and boy Kevin and Clay are physically too big for teeny tiny Toni to hide them effectively from view. Betty is confronted with the terrible evidence that her boyfriend of two years who made her feel so bad about her normal urges is in fact not into girls, and has been lying to her this whole time. She runs out.
Veronica to the rescue! It turns out the extremely incompetent Sheriff Keller, father of the very terrible Kevin Keller, never even checked the coroner’s report to ascertain the time of death. Jughead has an airtight alibi! Sheriff Keller doesn’t want to acknowledge he was wrong, so he still natters on about how this doesn’t account for Ethel. Veronica tells him to hop to it to release Jughead.
Jeronica immediately go to Pop’s, where Jughead gets a chocolate milkshake and a huge burger. In between bites, Jughead drops this bomb: Ethel told him that while her parents were being murdered, Ethel had been doing the “car seat chacha” with Julian Blossom.
Oh but that does make sense, actually. The Blossoms can only fuck redheads!
Ethel was down for some casual necking, but when Julian tried to get “handsy” (which is such a confusing euphemism since it can mean anything from groping a tit to shoving a finger up a butt) she walloped him. Ethel is all my tall strong girl fantasies because the force by which she slaps Julian almost twists his head off its stem. Julian, possibly now nursing a black eye, threatened to make a laughingstock of Ethel by spreading a rumor about her “nymphomania.” This is what Kevin called Betty once already - Kevin is the worst. Julian is terrible, but Kevin is just as bad!
Jughead is still such a wonderful friend to Ethel. The Feminine Mystique was not published until 1963 but Jughead fully understands how gender oppression and politics works, which I think all men do, and is ACTUALLY willing to acknowedge it, which most men still aren’t. He makes it his mission to make Julian do the honorable thing. “God help us.” Yup.
Betty comes sadly home to her mother, who has received a phone call from Kevin’s mother, who we have hardly ever seen. Kevin’s mom has been insisting that her boy is devastated! So upset! Betty tells her that she now knows her ex so called boyfriend was gay THIS WHOLE TIME. Alice Cooper acts like this is totally normal, calmly inviting Betty to take a seat. They play horror music over Alice telling Betty the most insane bullshit - that she owes it to Kevin (Betty owes Kevin??) to see him through a “sexual identity crisis.” Alice Cooper always finds the worst possible way to react, doesn’t she? And she somehow thinks that it’s fine to marry someone who is not only not attracted to your whole sex but also lied about it for two years to your face on a daily basis. Is this saying something about Hal? (Is that why he’s a serial killer?)
Jughead comes home to find that his little trailer is trashed. Again! By Keller! And even his dog is missing!! Poor Jughead.
Back at the Andrews, Mary is dishing the dirt about Clifford. He sold maple syrup to the Army at a premium during the Korean War (I really want them to stop talking about the Korean War on this my escapism show), plus he’s a hypocrite and draft dodger. Then she says a really terrifying thing - that she’s linked together with the Blossoms for “the rest of her ilfe” because (she thinks) Cheryl and Archie fucked once. They have decided the two need to get married - after the compatibility test. Archie makes a sound in his throat like he wants to vomit. “Think of Cheryl’s honor!!’
The thing is, who is threatening Cheryl’s honor? I mean, does anyone even know about this? Who else would spread this around if not Penelope??
Is Cheryl pretending to pregnancy as well??
The next day, Midge and Fangs are pregnant (She’s “never late” and now she is.) Fangs says he loves her, and they are going to figure it out. Fangs is being honorable.
Inside the hallway of the school, however, Jughead and Veronica approach Julian, who is anything but honorable. He refuses to alibi Ethel, because she’s “inappropriate” for a Blossom to schtupp. He calls Ethel “cheap thrills.” For this, Jughead Jones squares up with both fists to punch Julian right in the face, knocking him to the ground.
HOORAY.
Violence plus public shaming - Jughead shouts at him about being entitled and taking advantage of “my friend Ethel!” - actually works on Julian, who gives a statement that finally renders Ethel from ‘active suspect’ status. Sheriff Keller uses police words but I have not forgotten that he didn’t even look up time of death on the coroner’s report. Jeronica SUCCEEDED!
Plus, once again, what a wonderful friend Jughead Jones is.
According to the creepy Dupont/ Wertheim? Werthers? there are only three things that need to be checked for marital compatibility:
1. Similarity of background
2. Close friendship
3. Understanding the concept of marriage
They definitely don’t have 1) and in answer to the close friendship question Cheryl just laughs, because she is friends with nobody and Archie says he gets along with everyone (which kind of is the same thing). Then Dupont says that Archie is going to be burdened with fidelity, “which goes against our nature as men” but then apparently the way to make a cheater not cheat is to use a combination of saying only nice things, listening and making him food. Cheryl is wearing a very funereal black scarf around her neck, which looks like a noose.
Werther calls Penelope to tell her the children are compatible. Mary is there with her, looking like she wants to vomit. Penelope lays it out for her - Archie is the only other redhead child in town, so that makes them perfect.
At the Dark Room, Fangs makes his inability to practice proper birth control Toni’s problem. She says she’s going to do something at the lab, so he’s to bring Midge.
Betty comes to find Kevin in the music room. When she says she saw him and Clay, Kevin’s first act is to be misogynist, snorting with contemptuous dismissal. I hate Kevin so much. This reminds me of American OG feminist tracts about the hideous misogyny and sexism of homosexual men before lesbians turned out in force for AIDS sufferers - they were the worst kinds of men, apparently, and Kevin is one of them! He’s still lying to her, by the way. Because what must’ve happened was Kevin went to the locker room to look at naked boys to soothe his ego being bruised about Betty refusing to be his unacknowledged beard anymore, then ran into Clay there and sucked his dick. WE KNOW WHAT YOU DID KEVIN.
Kevin says that if he had known what he was, he wouldn’t have wasted Betty’s time.
This is scene almost took me out of Riverdale fandom wholesale by the way.
The way they play tender music over this.
The way Betty has to further lower herself to say she “doesn’t understand most of this” when she actually does, perfectly.
The way that KEVIN - FUCKING MISOGYNIST KEVIN, CONDESCENDING LYING PIECE OF SHIT KEVIN - is told by Betty that he DIDN’T WASTE HER TIME “at least not to me.”
I WANT KEVIN TO DIE
I HATE THIS SHOW FOR PRIVILEGING KEVIN THIS WAY.
KEVIN DOES NOT DESERVE IT.
CLAY DESERVES BETTER.
BETTY SHOULD KILL KEVIN.
I am so mad.
Because the net effect of this is to make Kevin’s homosexuality (rather than his being a dishonest, condescending piece of shit MAN) the problem, for which Betty must subsume herself.
The narrative appears to validate Kevin’s sexuality but actually what this does is reinforced homophobia. I hate this. I hate Kevin. I hate Riverdale for doing this.
[Taking a break to calm the fuck down]
Ok I’m back.
So at the diner, Cheryl and Archie are trying to make the best of a bad situation. The way Cheryl is so sad but takes the time to be tender and kind to Archie (who is her beard and being forced to marry her under false pretenses) is - oh no putting me right back into my Hating Kevin feelings! Because Cheryl’s been so nice that Archie is actually kind of excited about the idea of being married to her. See, Kevin, if you’re going to trick some person into being your beard, you could be at minimum NICE TO THEM.
The sad, bruised tenderness of Cheryl in this universe is actually what I think Cheryl is really like underneath her HBIC persona, and she hurts me in the best way to consider.
At the other table, Jeronica are celebrating springing Ethel from jail and injustice. (Hey!! Jughead is being this much of a good friend to Ethel because he’s trying to follow the Bend Towards Justice edict laid down by Tabitha!) This Jeronica friendship is basically functions as in-canon fix-it fanfic. Without the pressure to live up to being ‘good enough’ for Betty Cooper, Jughead feels safe just telling someone what’s happened to his home. And Veronica, without having to struggle against Archie’s pride (which he only exercises against her, and not against he Blossoms) can seek the company she craves in her lonesome huge apartment AND engage in the generosity that is her trademark. In short, Veronica invites Jughead to stay with her.
At the high school, Toni is going to use a very interesting pregnancy test - inject a frog with pee to see if the frog lays eggs. Midge is pregnant! For some reason Toni suggest that Fangs get Midge’s parents for her hand but NOT tell them she’s pregnant. Given how the Blossoms are reacting to Cheryl allegedly having had sex with Archie, this seems ill judged.
Jughead has made a huge breakfast spread for Veronica at the Pembroke! Jughead as Little Orphan Annie and Veronica as Daddy Warbucks! This works for me! Jughead is going to go get Hot Dog from the pound, so Veronica offers to ‘spruce up’ his home. They are both going to skip school. The old married couple vibe of this is just so fun.
At school, Archie has finally told Betty that he and Cheryl have never had sex, but will still get married. Archie, poor lamb, thinks that ‘savig Cheryl’ will give him some purpose in life. Betty finds this very sweet, but tells him he shouldn’t go through with it, because she’s learned from experience that love doesn’t just ‘grow.’ Dupont/Werther’s theory about human love is really weird - you start gaining the capacity for sexual love at 17 (?) and then it peaks at 21 (??) after which there is a precipitous drop off I guess?
Cheryl, because she is feeling a bit better about marrying Archie, wears a black-and-white polka dot scarf instead of black noose one. She says Clifford wants to talk to Archie. She intuitively knows that Betty is about to get in her way, so gives her a chilly greeting.
At the meeting with Clifford, we get a hint of why it is Cheryl was willing to go through with this. She had (wrongly) thought that being married to the one acceptable redhead boy in town meant that she would be a) free from Thornhill b) free from her parents and c) be in a family with someone who is kind and decent. Archie is seeking sex with a beautiful woman and purpose in life. Cheryl is seeking a secure living arrangement with a not-monster and a place to hide from her homosexuality.
This could’ve actually worked until it suddenly wouldn’t have.
But of course, Clifford Blossom makes it clear that none of this can come to be. Neither will be sent to college. They will both live at Thornhill. Archie is to spend his life working for his future father in law, always second best to Julian probably, and never get to go to California like he dreamed about with his dad.
The hard cold reality of marriage - WHERE will you live and HOW will you pay for it- being the major wake up call to the betrothed is so real.
Sigh and now we’re back to Fangs, who tells Toni that it didn’t go well when he tried to ask for Midge’s hand in marriage. Toni, even though this was her idea, reads his inappropriateness as a potential mate for Midge in the cruelest way: “you’re a greaser wannabe-rock star.” She hatches a dingbat plan to make Fangs a rockstar in 4 months (when Midge will show).
Is - Is Riverdale playing coy about abortion with this? What is the fear here, that Midge’s parents will use their rich whiteness to force Midge to get an abortion? But since Midge was scared, not elated, to fall pregnant, and Fangs treated it as an emergency rather than good news, abortion is the answer. Tell her parents, get the abortion, and you can keep ‘loving’ each other.
Is Toni Topaz anti choice????
She mentions Romeo & Juliet which we then cut to the extraordinary “Orient Express” style sprucing up of the train car a la Jughead. Jughead is overwhelmed, but I want them to kiss. KISS HER, Jughead. GIVE ME MORE JERONICA. Jugead looks overwhelmed by his surroundings. They play pretty music, but they need to kiSSSSS.
We cut to Betty being confronted by her mother about the sex book. Betty looks amazing in those wide fabric belts. She had a wide green belt for her insane initial talk about Kevin with Alice, and now she’s in a pink one cinched over a flowery dress. Betty stands up for herself, telling Alice that she’s backwards, that she is going to continue to educate herself about sex and sexuality. Ethel comes down from upstairs to bravely fess up that it’s her book (this is the only extant copy of this book in Riverdale I guess?).
Archie is sadly re-reading the one post card he has received from Fred, about “Finaly making it to California.” The sound track warbles, “Who do you suppose I really love?” as Archie thinks about his dad. The only person Archie really cares about in all universes (sorry Jughead) is Fred Andrews.
Cheryl is looking at a post card of Niagara Falls, looking just as sad. Who is this from?? Some girlfriend of hers who got into her own comphet marriage??
Archie finally tells Cheryl he can’t go through with it. When cheryl says that marrying into the Blossoms is too much to ask, that the Blossom (unspoken Curse) is her burden & cross to bear, Archie doesn’t let her mope. He suggests they elope! He understands exactly what they both want - “You could get away from your family. I could get a job on a ranch. Or be a folk singer.” In short, “be free! out west!”
Cheryl says ok, let’s try! And they hold hands as Toni listens.
Oh no, we are back to motherfucking Kevin and his stupid fucking problems and I am HATING RIVERDALE AGAIN OMG RIVERDALE YOU FOUND A WAY TO BREAK ME AT LAST???
Betty says - BETTY ACTUALLY SAYS - “I think you’re so brave.”
Betty you stupid appeasing bitch no he is not. Oh my fucking god is this a Whyte Womyn delusion what the fuck is happening? NO HE ISN’T. KEVIN IS THE LEAST BRAVE PERSON IN THIS ENTIRE SEASON. “Swell to the last,” is the approval that she gets?
FUCK THAT.
SHOOT THE FUCKER IN THE HEAD BETTY.
ANYWAY.
This is how Betty learns that the pin that she got pinned with is all about Alice wanting to fuck Betty and therefore approving her relationship with a gay boyfriend who is a liar who will never fuck her.
Toni confronts Cheryl in the changing room, atelling her not to run away with Archie, because she’s running away from herself. “Archie is a great person with the best heart, and he’s nothing like my family.” People - especially Jughead - have said the ‘great person’ and ‘best heart’ etc about Archie before in all previous seasons, but this is the first and only season when this has actually been shown to be true. Toni the anti-choice meddler tells Cheryl that running from herself is only a short term solution.
Betty is at home, ready to confront Alice about several things. Ethel has been sent away to the Sisters of Quiet Mercy which Betty knows is not a good solution at all. When confronted by the furious Betty about her incestuous feelings, Alice retaliates by telling her she burned the sex book.
Archie is waiting for Cheryl at the bus depot with tickets to California. Weeping, Cheryl drives up to tell him she can’t go with him after all. (Curse of Thornhill). “Archie some day you’re goingn to make some girl very happy - Unfortunately that girl isn’t me,” is what Cheryl says before redirecting him to try to woo Betty. “Write her one of those sweet poems of yours.”
Unchained Melody (Wooo my love) plays as Cheyl approaches Toni. The music isn’t even a little bit subtle. ‘I hunger for your touch’ as Cheryl tells Toni that she decided not to go with Archie. Toni gives her the Price of Salt (sorry, not salt, Pepper hahaha) as a lesbian manual.
Archie is writing a love poem for Betty. he’s about to rush over to give it to her when the secondd worst possible thing happens:
UNCLE FUCKING FRANK IS HERE.
He came to beat the shit out of Archie for wanting to fuck someone other than his own dad, or something.
I HATE UNCLE FUCKING FRANK.
Omg Riverdale you are really testing my limits here.
At the Pembroke, Jughead sadly tells Veronica that he can’t track Ethel down, because all he’s been told is that she’s “at some home for wayward children.” He’s so sad about it. He’s not OK. Veronica consoles him, telling him that he fought hard for Ethel and saved her.
YAAAAAYYY AND THEN THEY KISS!!!
Jughead continues to have pitch perfect reactions. “Wowiee” is exactly how you should feel after kissing Veronica Lodge. Oh I’m so happy.
#anti kevin keller rant#no really like i fucking hate him#dni if you're into kevin keller#riverdale opinion#riverdale episode 121#riverdale episode 7.4#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#Riverdale s6#riverdale recap#riverdale episode recap
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I feel like some of these Riverdale final season episodes have that sort of Very Special Episode type of vibe, except seasoned with the usual Riverdale mayhem then buried in pot in the ground to ferment into kimchi (which is to say, a food that retains some of the aspects of the original cabbage but smells, tastes, and has an altogether different nutritional value and gastronomical impact on the palate). Episode 119 (Skip Hop And Thump) was the The Closet is Bad episode which ended up making me hate Kevin, which reached a nadir from which he will never recover with the Prostitution Episode (Episode 124). Episode 120 (Sex Ed) was the Repression is Bad episode which started 1950s Betty on her Sex on the Brain character arc to the obliteration of all other interests which sort of reached an apotheosis in Episode 124 (Dirty Dancing) where flashing her panties to the entire town on live television was presented as some sort of ‘liberation’ by a bunch of male writers who really don’t want to think about things like equal pay for equal work and the fact that maternity leave should be no less than 2 years, fully paid, and mandated by federal law, but definitely want more pretty women to get more naked in public (fuck them all). Episode 121 (Love and Marriage) was literally about those things - lavender marriages (Cheryl and Archie), relationships across various barriers + fan service (Jughead and Veronica). Episode 122 (Tales in a Jugular Vein) was about The Power of Narrative - about how narrative can be salvation and joy for the writer but also cost him goodwill of those who are important to him.
#riverdale discourse#this is an outtake from my currently in draft 7x8 episode recap#which is getting way too long#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#riverdale episode recap#Riverdale s6
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Riverdale S7 E5 Tales in a Jugular Vein
We open with the three unwise men of Riverdale who fancy themselves the key authorities of the “situation” - Clifford Blossom, the high school principal, and Dupont from S4 that they keep giving more names to that won't stick in my memory: His first name is apparently Friedrich. It’s not even Freddy, it’s Friedrich like he’s some sort of kaiser. In any case, the Blossom patriarch as the source of all evil in this town asks if Ethel has been silenced.
Yes, she has, quite literally - the nuns at the Sisters of Quiet Mercy have imposed a ‘vow of silence’ which seems like a euphemism for literal physical muzzle (Poor Ethel). The parents are all very concerned about the murder of the Muggs but the three wise men are not. They are also confused about why it is that Sheriff Keller is continuing to chase down this ‘milkman’ that Ethel saw as well as the murder weapon. The HS principal seems not to know that this is Sheriff Keller’s actual job, but Dupont (Werther? Whatever) says that the real problem is COMIC BOOKS.
I don’t think these old farts understand how very incompetent Sheriff Keller is. He’s the man who forgot to check the time of death on the coroner’s report. Ain’t no way he’s finding the murder weapon.
And he has a whole batch of them to toss on the table, the topmost of which is The Pit Of Tyranny. Which is what these three men are, sitting together all close in dim lighting. (Are they going to have a threesome after??)
Dupont/ Werther hates comic books, because they are the source of all violence and iniquity in the world, so he is going to make everyone in Riverdale focus on them.
Jughead meanwhile strolls into the offices at the publishing house looking for work. He is just so happy to be working as a writer, across all universes! So adorable. His asshole publisher who always puts out the most terrible terms - a full issue, 21 pages worth of stories, no errors, by tomorrow morning! - and Jug is just bright eyed and bushy tailed about it. “Plenty More Where That Came From!!” Super eager Jughead is so cute - “I wont let you down!” with the finger POINT.
The publisher hands him a stack of potential stories, advising Jughead to talk to Bernie about them. The extremely paper wasting way of listing these little A03 tags, 3 at a time, in single index cards is very luxurious to me.
Boxer, Vigilante, Organ Harvesting
Man, Woman, Cult, Rocket
“Gosh Bernie, all these stories have been done to death!” Jughead says. Aw Riverdale, you’re so silly when you get meta. Is this actually the writers’ process at Riverdale, the Show? Because this was actually a fan theory I saw go around - that they literally just throw darts at the wall and then weave the stories together from keywords. Is Roberto trying to tell us something about his “process”?
Just in time, his girlfriend (Because Veronica is his girlfriend now, right? She certainly enters the room like she’s the girlfriend) Veronica comes over, calling him her “Little Tortured Genius” as Jughead is typing away. She wants to go see Diabolique, but Jughead is being very intense about his deadline and says maybe they can go tomorrow.
The idea that Jughead thinks is GENIUS is “stories about teenagers in high school.” And his ideas grow to things like Witchy Lunch Lady, Creepy Janitor, “Homeroom of Horrors.” Jughead is completely enamored by his own ideas.
I really need to take on Jughead’s attitude about work, maybe. The way he phrases it - “Al has asked me to take on an entire issue!” makes it so sound like he is adored and beloved and trusted, rather than being exploited.
On second thought, no.
Jughead needs to be more like me.
In any case, Veronica takes what he says at face value. She wants to help him, so Jughead tells her with enthusiasm about his first story, which is about gym class (“What’s scarier than gym class?”). The narrator in Jughead’s special edition is a very unhinged looking unkempt old man, a ‘creepy janitor’ with a bunch of keys. Jughead even got one of the artists to draw a mockup for him. He’s really good at this, worming his way into this publishing house!
The first story is called Keep Your Head in the Game.
And this is when I got attacked for a second time by this, my favorite television show, because they came for my throat. Poor bespectacled Asian Dilton is called “the runt, the klutz, the pipsqueak, half pint, short, near sighted and uncoordinated.”
STOP TALKING ABOUT ME!
He is the last among a row of boys who are being forced to uselessly throw a projectile so it lands in a specific arbitrarily designated location. (I hate you, all sports. I hate you, all games that involve throwing things at me.)
Nobody can leave until everyone makes a basket which Dilton can’t. OMG. My PE grade depended on making a certain minimum number of baskets in gym class in Germany, and I almost failed it, but I kept at it with such bloody minded Korean dweeb determination that even though I definitely failed it, my teacher wanted so to go home that she gave me a C. This is so personal.
The Coach makes the other players run laps while Dilton desperately tries to make one lousy basket. Of course, the one most immediately pissed off about this is Julian. He threatens Dilton as soon as the lap running starts, then slams him against the lockers at the first opportunity. Actually though, I decided during the course of this confrontation that Dilton would deserve what he got, because Julian asks him a very important question: Why are you even here if you can’t make one stinking basket? Dilton idiotically wants to be part of ‘the team.’
Dude.
Dilton.
Dude.
Don’t be stupid.
Julian pushes Dilton into a locker, while all the other boys let it happen. Including Archie. Archie is like this in every universe - he doesn’t think this is correct, but other than voicing a sort of weak objection, he doesn’t actually do anything to solve the problem (Flashing back to the infamous birthday episode with Jughead. Does Jughead the writer of this tale really not remember the OG universe?? HMM??). Dilton is desperately screaming inside the locker after Julian threatens for a second time to kill him.
Dilton it turns out is morbidly claustrophobic, which somehow leads Dilton to suffering a psychotic break. The day shift cleaner lets him out, but he steals the fire-rescue ax to hide in the same locker until he can pop out and get rid of them all. Covered in blood, Dilton is next seen in the basketball space, easily making a basket. The coach is all atta-boy until Julian’s decapitated head rolls to his feet. The coach turns his head to see six decapitated heads, all wearing Chuck Taylors, sitting impossibly upright in a row on the benches, their hands demurely in their laps.
Hahaha! OK so this was funny.
The heads are all neatly stacked in between basketballs in a roller container. The next head that he picks up is Archie.
Veronica is all about murdering jocks. She especially likes that Julian Blossom got his head chopped off. Jughead wriggles a bit on his round butt which he does when he’s being excited and smug. He explains that Dupont/Werthers (et al) don’t understand that comics are actually very *moral* forms of entertainment. Rule breakers get punished in these horror stories, as do people who are cruel to others, as well as people who have lustful sex.
Veronica calls him Juggiekins (SQUEE) when she asks him to elaborate on what he means by lustful sex.
Jughead says that it starts on a ‘dark and stormy night’ exactly as the night outside in Riverdale starts to get stormy. The next story is called “Love You to Pieces.” The “young strapping man” Archie Andrews knocks on the Blossom mansion door to explain that he has a flat tire to Nana Rose. He asks to stay the night, to which Nana Rose generously says he can keep himself warm by the fire.
There’s a very wholesome looking portrait of Cheryl that Nana Rose and Archie share their tea front of. Nana Rose gives Archie a warning - he must stay in his room with the door locked all night, because Cheryl is an aggressive compulsive boy-molester. Archie is immensely excited about this. He leaves his door not just unlocked - he leaves it OPEN, then sluttily lies there with his shirt off. What we have is a Rocky Horror Show type of sequence when Cheryl comes in to kiss him. She won’t let him light a candle, then they flop down to the bed together. (This is apparently what Jughead thinks sex is).
What the heck is Jughead’s problem with Cheryl? The cruelty of this story about Cheryl (as the audience knows her) is a bit shocking. She’s definitely trapped in the house. Her family members definitely sexualize teenage Cheryl. She is definitely cursed. And he’s using all this against her? JUGHEAD.
Next morning, Archie is very pleased with himself as he bounces out of the guest room. He sees a very ominous looking veiled young woman looking out the window, but he doesn’t say anything to her. As he scarfs down a generous looking breakfast with Nana Rose, he proves himself to be a real asshole. Having been told not to fuck Cheryl and then having done it, he wants NOW to know what’s wrong with her. Apparently it’s fine if he just took advantage of a crazy girl (“What exactly is wrong with her, a mental illness?” he says as he cheerfully chows down.)
Veronica does not like this story whatsoever. Jughead says it might be a “curiosity killed the cat” story or maybe even a safe sex story (even though that phrase wouldn’t be coined for another three decades). Ever the smartie, Veronica sniffs out the Jarchie angle to all this, directly pricking at Jughead with “I’m hearing that Archie and Cheryl broke up” and that they didn’t actually have sex. Jughead pretends to not be shooketh by this news and the realization that his resentment of Cheryl getting to fuck Archie before him was what was motivating this story. He says, “Well, who can keep up with all the horny teens at Riverdale High?”
It’s only when he is told that what Cheryl has is a physical illness which is contagious - LEPROSY - is when he is upset. Nana Rose is immune because she was ‘exposed’ to it as a child but of course, Archie wasn’t! Then Nana Rose gleefully tells him that it “was no accident that brought you here.” The nail in the road was Nana Rose making sure that Cheryl would ‘relish’ her last days on earth (because she is soon to die). “We’re going to be together forever and ever!” Cheryl says as she comes from behind to grasp the terrified Archie by the shoulder.
Jughead Jones is pro-food and anti-sex but he’s also pro-making out with Veronica.
Anyway Veronica tells him the point of high school is for straights to chase each other. Jughead is just too far up his own ass to catch the hint, so he moves directly to, “Girls will do anything to get boys’ attention” to which Veronica, now thoroughly bored because the lustful sex story turned out to be an anti-sex debacle, glumly retorts, “Including feigning an interest in comic books, apparently.” Jughead is not listening to her, at all.
Jughead the writer next turns his poison pen upon the blameless Betty Cooper. Or is he? Because honestly his descriptions of her are so completely wrong as to be comical: “Plain Jane with the ponytail mane. Sweater set waiting for better yet. Whom none of the boys seem to sic their sights on.” I mean, in the real world of the 1950s AU, Betty was targeted by the lying asshole Kevin as the perfect unwitting beard because she’s the prettiest girl in school, and no guy who can ‘get’ and keep the prettiest girl in school can be gay, right?
Anyway, in Jughead’s story, even though he calls her Betty, this girl is not Betty in the real world. She goes to the hair salon in tears because nobody wants to take her out. The drag queen (is it the same actor who is playing Janitor Key Keeper?) hairstylist suggests that Betty gets the beehive. She suggests that ‘girls in Europe’ are doing it which is immensely enticing to Betty. The thing is, according to the hairstylist you can’t ever wash your hair again once it’s in a beehive. It can only ever be hairsprayed (Aqua Set). Betty objects on hygiene reasons - hair should be washed every other day or at least once a week! - but decides to give all that up for the joy of being beautiful.
Jughead the writer has a thing for Dad joke level puns - he describes the girls of Riverdale as being “gangrene with envy” at how fabulous Betty looks with her new hairdo. Cheryl is upset, and so is Veronica, so when they run into her spraying the hell out of her beehive in the girls’ bathroom, Cheryl attacks first. She calls Betty “ponytail princess” and the haircut “ridiculous” and Cheronica laugh meanly about it. This turns out to be the very first time either girl had paid any attention to Betty, so Betty figures all attention is good attention. She “started needing it, feeding off it.” Veronica is in blue-white polka dots, Cheryl is in red check, but Betty is in the same blues-and-yellows of the bathroom!
The hairspraying is out of control, but the heavier and more shellacked her hair becomes, the more boys are attracted to her. Julian wants to carry her books to class. Archie wants to go out with her on Friday. Two nameless extra boys just wanna stand close by and stare! Betty doesn’t even accept Archie on his first pass either.
She does develop a bit of an obsession with the hairspray. Sitting very Wes Anderson-like in her yellow-green living room, dead center frame, in her yellow-greenish outfit, she is spraying and spraying. Betty never washes or undoes her hair, instead spraying it further before going to bed. The narration says something VERY BAD HAPPENED as Betty’s window throws a huge spiderweb shaped shadow over her sleeping face.
A week later, she and Archie are finally on a date! Pops says that Betty has always been a peach when Archie implies she’s suddenly become good enough with the hairdo change. Go Pop’s. Can I just say I hate the word GINCHY. Is this an actual word from the 50s or did they make this up for Riverdale? I refuse to look it up. Archie insists on using it TWICE in one sentence - he calls Betty and her hair both Ginchy. Ugh.
The song called “I got Stung” comes on so they go out to the dance floor. Archie is the dorkiest dancer of all time but Betty seems to be having a good time, until she suddenly isn’t. She is coughing up foam! She’s having a fit! Archie looks so horrified. The narration comes in to say Betty is now DEAD.
Veronica is super not amused by this conclusion, which I think Jughead put in there for her benefit because he just got done talking about how these stories in this horror comic are actually all morality tales. She takes issue with it, in the beautifully spruced up space she created for Jughead to live in. “What’s wanting to look good?” asks Veronica, looking absolutely perfect beyond all reason. She also says that men do the same thing, turning themselves into he-men.
Heyyy Doctor Curdle Jr. is the coroner! He finds Betty very beautiful with a fascinating hairstyle. He cuts the top of the hairdo off, which unleashes a torrent of spiders down Betty’s beautiful dead face. Black widow spiders ate their way through Betty’s skull. Well.. okay. The Key Keeper bursts in to tell us that “beauty is only skin deep and vanity kills.”
The thing is, even though she doesn’t appear to like these stories, Veronica is still annoyed that she hasn’t had a starring role, unlike Dilton, Cheryl, Archie and Betty. The fact that Dilton is included in this list is interesting, isn’t it, given the relationship, both shown and implied between the other universe Dilton and the Rivervale Dilton and Jughead? She specifically asks a tale romantic in flavor, which is not at all the flavor of what Jughead has been writing all evening NOR who he writes for, but then because Veronica is actually gay her thoughts skip directly from romantic → focus on female friendship.
Asking a man who has written about spiders eating into a girl’s brain because she got a fussy hairdo one time to write about “female friendship” is a recipe for disaster. I will say, Jughead does sort of start off on the right foot - he suggests a story where the girls in a love triangle do NOT go after each other’s throats. This brings Veronica’s hopes up too much though (“Now you’re singing my tune!”).
This last story is called, “My Better Half.”
Jughead really dislikes Archie in this universe. Like, a lot. He sees Archie as a really dumb slut (both terms derogatory). Are we absolutely sure that Tabitha did a complete mind wipe? Where does all this hostility come from? The story starts out with the Key Keeper (who has a wicked case of sunburn or rosacea or whatever) coming in too close, way too close, to call Archie “a half wit when it comes to decision making.”
I object to this. This is unfair. Highly suggestive is what Archie is and has always been. When Julian tells him to ask Cheryl out, he does. When Cheryl tells him to write Betty a poem and start wooing her, he starts out to do exactly that. And so on.
The multiple choice question Archie is struggling with is the choice between A. the girl next door, or B. the rich starlet-socialite. Betty in a pale blue headband and white neckerchief looks like Disney’s Cinderella, whereas Veronica looks like a Betty Page type seductress with her severe haircut and dark red lipstick. Archie chooses C, both of the above.
MWF are Betty, and TThrSat are Veronica days.
In a super modern innovation, Archie tells both girls that he’s dating the other one, and both girls allow this to happen. Veronica thinks Betty is a smelly tomboy and Betty thinks Veronica is a vapid airhead. This is exactly not at all what either of these girls are so this choice is interesting. (Is Jughead pulling his punches because Veronica is right there looking at him type?) Archie just doesn’t have the brains to explain the concept of polyamory I suppose, so his way of coping with the objection from both ladies is to tell each that she is his favorite.
Julian wants to know how Archie gets away with it, and Archie calmly offers it up. This is in matter of fact Archie’s actual philosophy of life a lot of the time: You tell them what they wanna hear.
He even gives them his best line - You’re my favorite. (Doiley gets yelled at because he tells Archie this is not three words, but four.)
The three girls at Riverdale are in the bathroom, fixing their make up. Veronica in black polka dots, close fitting, with a black handbag. Cheryl in a flared skirt red-and-white dress. Betty in pinkish dark check with a black belt. Of course, Cheryl is the one to start shit, while standing between these two girls, by asking Veronica who will be her date for Valentine’s Day. She calmly continues to do her make up while Veronica and Betty have at it.
Veronica calls Betty “dumb for such a smart girl” and a “charity case.” Betty calls Veronica “fragile,” “desperate” or “crazy.” Veronica is furious at being called Fragile, so she fights back with “high strung” and then they're lobbing intimate things they’ve learned about the other from Archie. Betty takes Alice’s sleeping pills because she can’t sleep. Cheryl turns around to call both of them fools. Betty carries a white handbag, by the way.
Archie says that he ‘s taking his MOM to Valentine’s day because it’s her first Valentine’s day without her husband. Both girls are completely moved, but also get their punches in. Archie asks them what they’ll be up to, to which both say they will be at home. They go on a girl’s night out on Valentine’s Day.
And guess what? Cheryl!!! It’s Cheryl that’s Archie’s date for Valentine’s day!! They see them in the Diner! Veronica is immediately about to go do some confronting, but Betty stops her, saying she has a much better idea. Immediately the next day, both girls approach him at once (I love Betty’s outfit with the contrast belt and the white hairpin) to offer a threesome. This is something that Archie must have been working himself up to get them to do, because as soon as it’s offered he says he knows the perfect spot. But they’re setting him up so they get to choose the location. They invite him to the shop room because it’s soundproof.
Because Jughead is the one writing this story, the girls set up the shop room with TONS of candles. (Has there ever been a good fandom post about Jughead Jones’ candle fetish? Because it’s a really persistent theme. Please share). They’ve even set up what looks like a bed on the floor of the shop room, as well as a record player. Veronica and Betty are speaking in unison using identical dulcet tones. They give him a thermos of coffee which is apparently delicious, even though Archie says he doesn’t “need the boost.”
I have been living a very sheltered life because I didn’t know that caffeine caused priapism but then Archie is an unusual bird. Archie does feel strange immediately - there’s a funny Looney Toons type of doi-oi-oi-ing! sound effect as he tries to ‘shake off’ the effects of whatever they’ve drugged him with. He collapses.
When Archie regains consciousness he’s strapped to a table. It turns out the sleeping pills were what knocked him out. “A problem shared is a problem solved” the girl tell him, calling each other B and V. They turn on a huge saw to “double their fun” as Archie screams and screams as they slice him in half. The camera is completely doused with blood.
Veronica wants Archie’s top half and Betty wants his bottom half. I wonder why this choice? Veronica is a breast girl, and Betty is a leg woman?
Jughead wants to know what Veronica thought of the ‘tag team twist’ at the end. Veronica is not pleased. She says that the sexual politics of his stories are troubling. She interrogates Jughead for demonizing women, to which Jughead says she is overthinking it. These stories are meant to be a gas etc. She just doesn’t like these stories.
The thing is, I don’t think these stories are misogynist so much as anti-sex. Jughead is very puritanical and judgmental at the same time - he finds all these people’s aspirations (retaining the desire to be part of a team even if that team isn’t nice to you and there’s no team that calls for your specific strengths, wanting to have easy sex that doesn’t mean anything, wanting threesomes, wanting approval and admiration for shallow things from others) all really dumb. He wants to punish people for being vulnerable. He’s like a lot of solitary, self conscious overthinkers - he finds other people nakedly going after things they want painful to contemplate, and so he is mean spirited about them.
The main mistake Jughead made here though was that the story he wrote with Veronica as his lead wasn’t flattering to Veronica. And Veronica’s mistake was hoping for something like that from a man writing in the horror genre.
I snorted when Jughead mentioned Arthur Miller and Marilyn Monroe as somehow aspirational because I know what happened with Miller after Monroe died (he wrote a whole play where he called his ex wife a great piece of ass, which, great. Super classy. Yup.) Anyway they’re broken up now, over Veronica not liking Jughead’s writing. He is sad about the break up between them. Jughead is also worried about accusations about ‘corrupting the youth of America’ via comic books.
Friedrich Werther (Dupont!) has made good on what he said to the two other Unwise Men at the start of the episode. He’s written a whole editorial on the front page of the Riverdale Register about the dangers of Comic Books: Slaughter of the Innocent! It actually appears to be a fully written article that’s being used as a prop. It ends with “I am asking for a call of arms. We must attack our attackers. No one likes a fight, but the fate of our children hangs in the balance.”
Werther absolutely does not have children, so it’s the usual huge red flag when childless men go on about ‘our’ children. The other major thing that has happened is that Four Horses Have Escaped From Farm (this is also a fully written article. Apparently, nobody was injured, but the children did neigh at the horses , which confused the farm animals. What?)
We cut to the principal reading his boyfriend’s article out loud to their leader Clifford Blossom with great absorption. “Our children are being seduced by sex, by violence, by depravity.” Blah blah. Clifford - who is mayor by the way - says this crusade against comic books is going to be a nice distraction from the still unsolved Muggs murders.
Back at the comic book business, Jughead is told by the publisher that his work is “incredible stuff.” When Jughead says he needed a win, Fieldstone guesses that it’s girl trouble. Jughead tells him he had a “sweet thing going with this one gal” and she didn’t like what Jughead was saying. The publisher does not care what that means, and instead offers a byline (not a bonus, not a cover) so Jughead’s name is going to be in print! The publisher names him Jughead JUGULAR Jones. Featherstone promises that girls come and go but one’s name in print makes people sit up and take notice. Apparently this is going to set Jughead on a collision course with Dupont (Werther! Whatever!).
I am sad that Jeronica is over, though I do like the way it just sort of fizzled out because they ran into an incompatibility that they could not find a way to overcome rather than Archie or Betty causing them problems, which I appreciate. And you know what - the fact that Jughead just can not stop thinking about Archie fucking other people makes me think the Jarchies have it right after all.
#riverdale opinion#riverdale episode 122#riverdale ep 7.05#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#Riverdale s6#riverdale recap#riverdale episode recap
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Riverdale S7 E 10 (Chapter 127) American Graffiti
Jughead Jones has no time to open this episode with pithy narration because he’s too busy being helpful to the very incompetent Sheriff Keller. The diner’s external neons are very red, the redness refracted through the windows adorned with red writing (very non-ominous “Home Made Fries”) and the red of the police lights. (The idea of Sheriff Keller going, I need to talk to that Jughead kid! and then flashing the lights on his cop car to rush the 3 miles or whatever of an abandoned road in this tiny town to get to the diner as fast as possible, and then ran in so very fast he forgot to turn them off is very funny to me.)
The hyperurgent question that must be answered with such haste is - Did the dead Rayberry have next of kin? Is he SERIOUS? Aren’t there ways to check PUBLIC RECORDS?
Jughead Jones is at first flustered because they didn’t really talk about what Rayberry’s life was before Jughead. They had a pseudo parent-adopted-child situation going on, and children are generally not interested in the youth of their parents. Then Jughead recalls that Rayberry did mention a wife, but “only in passing” and was otherwise very tight lipped about it. Sheriff Keller, the one that should still be looking for the killer who murdered a husband and wife IN THEIR HOME and left Ethel Muggs an incarcerated orphan, acts like talking to Jughead is the only thing he could’ve done, and now that he’s done it without getting a copy of the marriage certificate and the name and present address of Rayberry’s next of kin from the high school student,s he has no idea what to do next.
As per usual, Jughead Jones is the one with any sort of investigative acumen, policework or journalism or otherwise - he wants to take a look at whatever records might be at Pep Comics, a known source of Rayberry’s income.
Keller initially started out saying he wanted to “solve” the Rayberry suicide, which was an odd choice of words, but now he says what he really wants to do which is to “put this sorry mess behind” him “as soon as possible.” So Keller is really terrible as a crime solver or bringer of justice - he doesn’t give a shit about any of it, wants to be ‘finished’ with his homework (i.e. stamp all the files CASE CLOSED) and try to get as many people to do the work FOR him while he drives around in his car with the shiny lights.
Jughead also finds Keller’s stated goals questionable. His face goes from earnest concern to a full on ‘What the fuck did I just hear?’ scowl.
The next morning, at the Andrews house, the amount of youthful and aging testosterone has rendered the air in the kitchen too toxic for Mary to enter in her own house. Uncle Fucking Frank walks in on the bisexual boyfriends having a lover’s quarrel about their favorite dream threesome partner. Archie thinks Marilyn Monroe is sexier than Elizabeth Taylor, and seeks Frank’s support. Frank appears to dodge by naming three additional supersexy women - Sophia Loren, Brigitte Bardot, Eartha Kitt - and then says his vote goes to Elizabeth Taylor.
Why.
WHY ARE THEY GIVING FRANK GOOD TASTE IN MOVIE ICONS.
Archie finds this unacceptable (‘what the frig??’) and then threatens to spank them (that’s what that means right? Itchin’ for a switchin’?). He woke up very horny this morning.
It turns out Archie’s grades are up to a B+ GPA! It … it is?? I’m -. Really? Wow Archie, I really didn’t expect you to be capable of that. Good on you.
As a result, Archie gets his “cruisin’ street machine” back.
Archie catches the keys. As soon as he looks back at Reggie, the two are off running towards the garage. Reggie leaves behind his cornflakes and everything!
The soundtrack tells her this car’s “front is slagging.” Slag = British slang for slut = Archie’s car has a slutty front. Reggie agrees with the song - this car is “the most beautiful thing” he’s ever seen. Archie runs his hand alongside the edges of his car, This is the only thing in the world that he finds more irresistible to look at than Reggie. Reggie says he’s always loved cars but could never afford one.
As the music abruptly switches to what I named The Fred Sonata for Piano (which on further listen turns out to be a variation on the main theme tune for the show that plays over the credits), Archie tells the tale of how he and Saint Fred found the car in the dump, adopted her and brought her up right, to this present state of glory. A labor of love that took years and completed just before Fred went off to die in Korea. Interestingly, though Archie Andrews has said the word KOREA more times than I ever thought he would, he doesn’t say it when talking to Reggie. The two engage in car-lingo related foreplay which I have no basis of comprehension (Is this a straight six? - V8 with headers), which thankfully develops into innuendo that I CAN follow (“Can she lay rubber?” - “why don’t we play hooky and and I’ll show you?”). I mean. If this was on HBO they’d immediately perform sex acts in this car, right? Archie has literally heart lights in his eyes as he sits legs spread and crotch presented to Reggie.
At Pep Comics, Fieldstone has a genuine reaction to the death of Rabyerry - chuckling. I like him for this, for being very honest about how much he doesn’t care. (“It’s a shame. Talented guy” is his summary, delivered with a smile.) Jughead takes the body blow of being told “you writers” are inevitably headed for this sort of “kick in the teeth” death via “secret demon” because he wants to know if Rayberry had a wife. Turns out, Fieldstone doesn’t know (Why would he?) but he does know where the MONEY was going: Half of it sent to a P.O. box in a small town in S. Carolina.
We cut to the activity board at Riverdale High. There’s the cross country team, the life guards, the tryout notice for baseball, the track and field team, the Bulldogs, and some place with new classes to which all students are welcome. Black Athena, the literary club, has a really fabulous, well designed poster, except it’s really kind of obnoxious. It’s a club that you can attend “By Invite Only” except they also tell you when they hold meetings. Who’s idea was it to be so meangirl about this? If it’s invite only why put up a sign?
Clay is talking about Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man which I have not read. Clay, Tabitha and Toni are there, as are two other black students. Tabitha is wearing a wonderful cardigan - navy blue with golden butterflies set off by embroidered shiny things all round. Toni says something about how the writing feels jazzy and improvisational, to which Clay, who is revealing a sort of annoying know-it-all-and-monologue-in-a-discussion aspect of his personality, agrees with by providing factoid about the author (he played jazz trumpet). Tabitha is not a fangirl of Ellison because he reveals a sexist attitude in his critique of Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God (which is a book I *have* read and found amazing so 1 for me on the Tabitha side of things.) The show gives a new-to-me black male character the final word on Hurston - that she wrote in a caricatured way for a white audience. (Being Korean and not an American I have no way to participate in this sort of debate.) The other woman there, whose name I also don’t know, says that she dislikes Ellison for being dark and angry all the time with no reprieve. This time it’s Clay that phrases a disagreement about a work of art with a woman in the form of a CORRECTION. Clay and the other guy will brook no criticism about Eliison, apparently.
When Clay says “our skin” a white teacher (female) issues a warning - a sort of harrumphing.
Toni says she’s really “digging this conversation” but I really am not. This feels like someone went and cribbed a term paper available for free on the 2022 internet, plus Clay and this other guy are just being sexist clods who won’t hear any woman criticize their hero. Toni of course has to try to salvage this situation because this club was her idea, but that is disappointing. She does turn the conversation over to seek everyone’s thoughts on Their Eyes Were Watching God.
Cheryl was walking by in her cheerleader uniform, so of course she takes a creepy peek into the room before leaving.
Meanwhile, Reggie and Archie are out driving, top down to take in the pristine air, having a blast. Reggie is whooping it up.
In the hallway at school, Fangs tells Midge (who still looks very not pregnant but also somehow everyone knows?) that he has a gig in Centerville, where the headliner is Richie Valens. There will be producers scouting for talent.
OH MY GOD I MISS JOSIE.
I can’t begin to express my horror at what I thought was the inevitable prospect of Fangs performing a whole number. He wants a very excited Midge NOT to come because it’s the boonies in a rough part of town. His whole plan for marriage and fatherhood is to be a rich and famous musician. Is this the Romeo and Juliet storyline, where they are given a really stupid plan by a really stupid priest (Toni) and go about executing it in the stupidest way possible?
In the student lounge, Jughead is telling Tabitha all about his recent findings - about the PO Box, about the money. Tabitha immediately catches on - this sort of behavior does not seem like suicidal ideation to her. (Is it not? I have no idea). When Jughead brings up his plan to a) break into a dead man’s apartment that is b) being investigated by the police, such as it is and c) snoop into a near-stranger’s personal life when the possibility of consent is nonexistent, Tabitha says the thing that marks her as a true-blue denizen of Riverdale: “Would you maybe want some company for that?”
This 50s Tabitha just like the OG one - she who was up for cosplaying a truck stop prostitute to bait a serial killer, the one who went on a mushroom trip with Betty who had always been sketchy to her, sold to them by the sketchiest person possible (Jughead’s NY girlfriend Jess) in the weirdest location ever (the underground bunker where Jughead once ran away from in his underpants, leaving only bloody handcuffs behind), his desire to commit arson etc. Same energy, really. Plus being a black girl in the company of a white boy in a dead white man’s apartment - isn’t the peril for her possibly quadruple whatever might befall Jughead if things go sideways??
Meanwhile, Betty and Veronica are choosing THEIR dream threesome partners, trying to make the choice between Marlon Brando and Paul Newman. Well, Veronica is asking about dream threesome partner, but Betty answers a question that isn’t asked. She answers the fuck/marry/kill question, with kill omitted. So she’d fuck Marlon Brando and marry Paul Newman. Which I think is literally everyone’s answer.
Veronica lays another heavy handed compliment on Betty Cooper (“Your skin is glowing”) to which Betty says that having Alice no longer try to ‘mother’ her has been the thing that’s been great for her skin. Of course, being banished from your mom’s home altogether to be drop kicked into Riverdale like Veronica is different from Alice Cooper pitching a hissy fit to ‘stay out of ‘ her daughter’s life are categorically different, but as I’ve said, Veronica Lodge of the 1950s AU is deeply lonely, so she will take whatever common ground she can find with literally anyone. She tells Betty that their mutual (but very different) motherless situations means they are “independent’ and “unconstrained.”
Just then, Reggie and Archie finally roll into school together. They’re both wearing their letter jackets but that also means they color coordinate together as a set with the car. Someone whistles at the three of them - the car, Reggie and Archie. Betty’s eyes light up. Veronica suggests that they have their “very own Marlon and Paul to play with” at the school, so all that about tossing boys’ expectations to the wind is hereby canceled. Veronica and Betty are giving the two the most heated, knowing looks, but neither Reggie nor Archie even notice, because they are so sated by the car.
Which I don’t understand. I commute via long distance drive every weekday, but I just don’t have this sort of relationship with cars.
Determined to make good on her word, Veronica approaches Reggie at his locker. His locker has what looks like a schedule, a pinup of a dark haired bathing beauty standing against a surf board, photo of cars, and something else I can’t make out. Veronica apologizes standing Reggie up the other day, seeking another chance. Reggie turns out to be very very smooth. He says, “I’m not scared of the chase, but in my experience, some people don’t really wanna be caught. Is that you?”
Sir. SIR?
Wow.
Veronica invites him to give chase, so Reggie asks to borrow Archie’s car to take Veronica on that date. It’s not the borrowing of the car that bothers Archie about this proposal - it’s that he wants Veronica to keep her silky manicured mitts off of Reggie. When Reggie insists, Archie gives in, applying what they recently learned in school (Mi casa es tu casa!). They shake hands at a very low level that made me initially think that Reggie was slapping Archie’s ass. Reggie is so happy. It was both entertaining and a bit odd to see these two act like bouncy teenagers in s7 when in all previous seasons they’ve been very intense and not particularly playful with each other.
Toni is explaining how much she loves Black Athena to Cheryl, who isn’t invited. She calls it “finally something worthwhile and worthy.” Which is a deeply insensitive thing to say to Cheryl, who is the head cheerleader, dance captain of the local danceathon tv show, and president of the James Dean fan club. Further, she’s the one who bankrolled this endeavor by either embezzling the funds or out of pocket (at some unstated personal sacrifice to herself). Is this justice for Cheryl, that she funds a club to which she is not invited, only to be told how amazing it is by the person she expressly enable to create it?
Cheryl is wearing a wonderful cardigan, scarlet let with lots of embroidered jewel details.
Cheryl confesses that she took a peek inside the room that one time when the Black Athena meeting was happening. Toni agrees that this meeting was indeed ‘tremendous’ which I have doubts about because it looked like the typical thing where men monopolize the conversation unless they’re ‘correcting’ the opinion of a woman who disagreed with them. Because Cheryl will not be allowed into the room as far as Toni is concerned, Toni feels safe talking about Clay’s tendency to ‘take the floor’ too much behind his back, though she didn’t do anything to back up either of the other women when the discussion was actually happening.
Seriously, what is happening with Toni?
Cheryl is being a very sweet girlfriend. Where Toni has been prattling off about how her bookclub is the most awesome, only-worthwhile-thing-ever, blah blah, Cheryl when asked about how she’s doing only says that she really misses Toni and desires her and wants to be intimate with her.
Toni does not feel the same.
She’d rather read and prepare for the next meeting of her “tremendous” book club where Clay drones on nonstop than spend time with Cheryl. Because Cheryl thought that Toni accepting the money meant something about her emotional re-engagement, not realizing that Toni is vain and self-centered enough to think that hearing about how very pleased with herself she is should be sufficient for Cheryl.
Cheryl really has it so bad for Toni, because this is one of the lowliest forms of date rejection ever (I have to read for my bookclub?!??!), yet she doesn’t give up. She tries to finagle an invitation to this club that WOULD NOT EXIST but for her providing the funds for it. Toni refuses even that. What Toni says is that she wants to make sure ‘everyone’ is comfortable, but of course she means SHE is uncomfortable. Then she sets a date - towards the END of the semester - with additional qualitative conditions - “when Black Athena is more established.” And I can’t help but add, when Finals are around the corner and clubs tend to slowly cease their activities. I think Toni is betting that by the end of the semester, she will find alternative sources of funding for this project so that she won’t even have to do this showing-off-but-calling-it-conversation that she’s doing with Cheryl.
Why is this happening with Toni? She’s being actively made an asshole, but she wasn’t really that kind or nice a character to begin with, so it’s not like this shows some shocking new aspect. Toni was always the kind of person who bought a bar so she could force people to watch her sing karaoke while writhing her heavily pregnant body around with a snake on her shoulders. Egotism was a feature of this character. So why the added emphasis?
The two of them hold hands (very nervously, on Cheryl’s part). They both have very long, very pointed nails, which I would normally object to in the context of Choni but since they’re not fucking at all, I guess I have to let that go. By the by- Cheryl seems NOT AT ALL out. Does she know or will she ever find out that Toni outed her to Clay and Tabitha, whom she has not been shown to ever be talking to, and that they had no reaction to that outing?
Elsewhere in school, the heterosexuals are being wholesome and nontoxic. (Toni, LOOK AT WHAT YOU’VE DONE). Betty asks out Archie and they both smile adorably with their huge, perfect American teeth. Betty wants to go out on the date TONIGHT, except of course, they can’t use the car because Reggie and Veronica have it. Archie doesn’t want to do anything sexual with anyone without that damn car - the prospect of bus and walk are just horrific to him, but for Betty the point is to be on a date with Archie, so she doesn’t mind.
Jughead has made good on his word, broke into the Rayberry apartment and is sifting through his stuff. This is the same apartment that Jabitha live in together, both in Rivervale and Riverdale. Rayberry has the same sort of ship-tossed-by-the-sea artwork that Jughead and Fred Andrews also favored. Tabitha is of course with him. It’s Tabitha who finds the motherload of letters, including a photo of June, taken in 1948. June Simpson, a black woman, wrote a whole brick’s worth of love letters to Rayberry from South Carolina. June has her name, address and phone number in Rayberry’s little black book.
Jughead braves the phone call. He addresses June as “Mrs. Simpson” but she doesn’t react to that designation. Instead she wants to know who it is. His voice very gentle and with as much courtesy as he can muster, Jughead tells the lady that Rayberry is dead. As she begins with weep, he answers her questions - he isn’t sure how Rayberry died, he hopes he didn’t suffer, they were coworkers, and his apartment is in Seaside, on Magnolia Street. She’s also extremely polite and composed through her tears, thanking Jughead for his offer to ‘tidy up’ Rayberry’s apartment.
At school, where the ground is very wet outside, Kevin is staring off into the distance on the steps. When asked about it by Cheryl, he says that he was “floating on a cloud” because he just heard Clay recite his “Ode to Sidney” (Poitier??) at a meeting of Black Athena. I’m grateful to the show for not making me hear this. From the way Kevin is reacting, I assume this was an erotic poem to the magnificence of Sidney Poitier, and of course Kevin would get off on something like that. More importantly, Cheryl is shocked that Kevin got the invitation.
At her date with Archie, Betty is talking about how much she is enjoying being liberated from Alice’s attention. Archie is (understandably) bored by this conversation, as anyone would be, because this is not good date talk, but more than that, of course, he’s thinking about his car. He’s not listening to her AT ALL. The conversation goes from bad to worse. “I’m wondering were Reggie and Veronica are on their date!” Archie says. Why aren’t they at the diner (with his car!)? Archie would like to know. Betty is extremely annoyed.
At the coffee house, Cheryl confronts Toni in the most passive aggressive way (“Kevin says it was amazing, life changing even!”) about the inconsistency in Toni being extremely cautious about inviting Cheryl when Clay could just call another clueless white person into a Black Athena meeting. Toni says something very pointed - that Clay could “invited his boyfriend” when he is going to recite a poem, which means Cheryl is not her girlfriend. I mean, Kevin and Clay aren’t out, are they, about their relationship? Or is that why Keller is so distracted in his police duties? Does he want to suicide because his son came out??
In the most begrudging, unsmiling way possible, Toni hands Cheryl the book that will be discussed, sighing, and says she can come. Which means that the whole bit about making sure everyone else was comfortable and all that was just a lie.
That night, Reggie comes home to the Andrews house very late. Archie is waiting like a disapproving father (of the car, which is gendered female), yelling at Reggie like he’s a guy who took advantage of his ‘little girl.’ He calls Reggie “Mantle” and is mean for the first time - “That is your last time in my car.”
I’m with Archie on this one. When someone lends you their car, you should bring it home in a reasonable amount of time. Reggie being obnoxiously not-sorry about the late hour did not help his case at all. Instead of just explaining himself, he says that he DID take advantage of Archie’s daughter - I mean, car. Took her out on the highway, ‘opened her up’ etc.
The next morning, Uncle Fucking Frank is trying to take care of his bag, which is intimately tied to Reggie Mantle being willing to be a free boarder at Mary Andrews’ house (WHERE DID SHE GO?) so he can be the only competent basketball player at RIverdale (thereby allowing Uncle Fucking Frank to keep his job as coach). He urges Archie to give Reggie a break, because he’s far from home, far from family, and grew up scraping by without the Andrews’ boys’ advantages.
Betty is sucking on her lollipop of sexual frustration because of her terrible date with Archie yesterday. Veronica wants the full skinny, but then both girls end up confessing that both of their dates were not fun. Both boys were distracted. Betty seems almost to be over Archie - she suggests switching dance partners to try again. I’m not sure if she meant switch partners with Veronica or find a new set of boys, but Veronica is still very hot to trot for Reggie, so she doesn’t like that idea. She suggests a double date, telling the lollipop wielding Betty that they need to give their beaus a chance to “redeem themselves for being such unlicked cubs.” She wants everyone to go to the concert that Fangs mentioned earlier - where “hipsters and hepcats” will be.
Hepcat was actually a word back in the day, it’s not a Riverdaleism. Why did it fall out of favor while hipster went on to have a modern life?
This is an interesting bit of self censorship that Veronica keeps engaging in. She never corrects or says no to Betty. She just suggests something different, in order to distract her from the Betty idea she doesn’t like.
In the student lounge, Tabitha gives Jughead a summary of what she’s learned about the Rayberry’s marriage. They got married in New York, then moved to S. Carolina where their relationship became the target of the KKK (brick through the window, burning cross on the lawn, no help from the police). Tabitha finds their love story beautiful. The Rayberry’s plan was to get June’s family somewhere safe before leaving for Paris. Because this plan seems so future oriented, Jabitha find it ever more unlikely that Rayberry suicided. I find this all rather unsupported by how Rayberry was living his life. Why not try to sell his novel, for example? Plus the thought that a black woman and a white man would marry in NYC and then go to South Carolina to start their mixed race family makes me think they were really, really silly people, tragic as their story is. Tabitha says that she saw racist attacks and incidents all the time when she was on tour for the Emmett Till remembrance campaign. Tabitha’s sartorial theme is butterflies - she’s wearing a butterfly belt.
Archie catches up with Reggie to apologize, to which Reggie also finally apologizes. He says he’s “car crazy” to a literal disease level. They make up, and just in time - Veronica and Betty want to be taken on a double date to Centerviille.
At the Native Son discussion at Black Athena, both Cheryl and Kevin are there. Why does Clay get to be the master of ceremonies? Is it because Toni, though she’s black, needed to have blackness explained to her by Tabitha? (Oh, I haven’t read this book either.) Clay is insufferable, as well as very incompetent as a book discussion reader. He insists that the correct opinion is to find the book “harrowing and thought provoking” but honestly, and this is true for any book, anyone can find any volume opaque or irrelevant, just as much. He also controls who gets to speak when. Why is Toni, THE FOUNDER, and a weak ass piece of shit, allowing this to happen?
Tabitha turns out to be much better at this than Clay: “The book asks, where does the responsibility lie.”
According to Riverdale, the plot of Native Son involves a man killing a woman, but even though a girl is murdered, the main message (in service of which a woman character was femicided) is about white ignorance. The reader is supposed to hold hands with a woman killer because he was oppressed by the “box that white society built around him” (according to Tabitha).
Pause and sidebar to ask some questions. Is this a fair summary of Native Son? Further, why is Riverdale taking it upon itself to tell this story? And for non-American women (uh, me) a man killing a woman in the story is not going to make me want to read it if the ‘correct’ reading is to brush her killing aside to talk about the very specific, America-only problem of coping with the legacy of racialized chattel slavery. Clay having read this book three times almost makes me determined not to read it, because he’s OBNOXIOUS. The unnamed(?) black woman in the group says what she evidently thinks might be a ‘hot take’ - “All right I’ll say it” before she gives her thought, but Clay can’t help himself. He shoots down her thought AND shuts down her ability or opportunity to say anything more because he obnoxiously tells her someone else, someone better, a MAN no less, already had her exact thought already (“And James Baldwin would agree with you.”)
Because I don’t know this book, I’m only reacting to the gender dynamics of this discussion group and the way it’s unfolding, and now I think that Clay is as much a woman hating piece of shit as Kevin, which is why they are so happy together. Clay just WILL NOT LET women speak, ever. He also puts Cheryl on the spot.
In a panic, Cheryl initially says that she has nothing to add. This vow to keep quiet was something that she offered Toni when she forced this invitation out of her, to which TONI DID NOT DISAGREE, but at this moment, Toni abandons her wholesale, shooting her a look of disapproval.
Other than the fact that Toni is the only out girl she knows, what the hell is Cheryl’s attraction to this shitty person?
Anyway, when pushed, Cheryl does come up with some cogent things to say. That the novel is powerful, and that the “family in the book, the Daltons” seemed familiar to her in “unpleasant ways.” Apparently, the other black male student’s name is “Jeremy” according to the closed captioning I just turned on. He’s exactly the one that is made uncomfortable by Cheryl’s presence. Or maybe he’s actually more sensitive than Toni and Clay - that is, this book has as its main plot point the murder of a young white girl, after all. Anyway, Jeremy takes Cheryl to task asking “Is Native Son the only novel by a Black author that you’ve ever read?”
For some reason, Cheryl is supposed to feel bad about this even though none of this has been in her formal education. Clay steps in to offer Cheryl his syllabus of must-read books. This isn’t really for Cheryl’s benefit though. It’s because Kevin apparently started from the same place of unfamiliarity, so Clay is defending himself for having brought the first clueless white newbie to this book club more than he’s trying to be of service to Cheryl. Did Jeremy ask this same question in that same way to Kevin when he came to his first Black Athena meeting? Why was THAT awkward initial encounter never referred to or shown?
WHY ARE WE TAKING CARE OF KEVIN FUCKING KELLER IN THE STORY AND PUTTING CHERYL BLOSSOM ON THE SPOT?
And why allow white people into this space at all? Simply because Clay’s vanity needed Kevin simping for him live as he simped for Sidney? I thought the point of this group was to showcase black writers, while providing the black students a safe place to say what they needed to say (which was already hampered by a disapproving white teacher). Did they change their minds? Because this seems to have lost its way a bit, in Clay wanting to evangelize (and show off) about black literature to white people, which is a categorically different conversation.
Jughead, whenever he finds something out, has to go directly to the authorities, so he’s done that here. He is giving Sheriff Keller some very unwanted additional homework. Jughead says “disguising murder as suicide has been a gimmick in detective fiction since” forever. Keller doesn’t want to do the homework, so he asks how well Jughead knew Rayberry. Then he lays out some unflattering facts about Rayberry - communist, draft dodger, war protester, dope fiend, mental illness sufferer. The file compiled on Rayberry is quite thick. Keller, whose son is living (I think?) a secret gay life, which is the same Keller, who cultivates a consultant-client relationship with prostitutes while a cop, says that someone with a lot of secrets is inevitably going to commit suicide. That is to say - he really, really doesn’t want to do any real detective work. Jughead glares at him.
Clay doesn’t do any of the clean up after the Black Athena meeting. That sort of housework he leaves to the women. And Cheryl has volunteered for maid duty. (I did not expect that this is the episode where I hate Clay, but I hate Clay now). Cheryl stayed to hear Toni’s thoughts. Toni says she was relieved, that she was worried about everyone’s discomfort (Cheryl’s and her other friends, in turn) but that’s a lie. She was worried about being called out for having a clueless white (ex?) girlfriend, i.e. she was worried for herself. Cheryl is very honest - she says that she WAS uncomfortable, and that Toni’s other friends were also uncomfortable (especially Jeremy) but Toni glides over that with “everyone settled in nicely” because above all else, she can’t have this thing she started, The Black Athena Club, not be a success. Even though it’s called ATHENA and a man completely takes over every conversation.
Cheryl comes out as actually heroic. From this conversation, even though Toni didn’t say a single word to or for her, even though Clay put her on the spot and then condescended to her, even though Jeremy made her the representative to be low key told off for not including black writers in Riverdale’s curriculum - even though all this happening, Cheryl still came to the correct conclusion, that her unaware white self should not be changing the nature of what Black Athena was founded for. She’s alert enough to figure out, unprompted, that her very presence alters things in a profound way.
There are so many things weird about this. Cheryl coming to this astonishing level of self awareness that there are spaces necessary in which the majority members of a diverse society should not seek a seat and that her very presence might be a detraction, is actually out of character for Cheryl. This is too advanced for where and who she is, for one. For another, Riverdale the show gathered its sparse number of black characters with names and speaking roles into one room to have their own space to discuss black literature, but constructed a plot so that CHERYL, a BLOSSOM, a rich white girl descended directly from land snatching (implied) genociders, is the one with the hero’s journey. Granted, she paid for it, so that interpersonal weirdness between Cheryl and Toni is just making things murkier.
Toni seems relieved (I think she was worried Cheryl might pull funding OR not be her back up funding next semester). And Cheryl is giving me whiplash because I said all that I said above about her having the heroic arc with Black Athena, but I also spoke too soon (even though this is my second time through).
Because what Cheryl is really after is more time with Toni. To be close to Toni, to understand Toni, to have things to talk about with Toni, and get into Toni’s pants. She’s willing to plough through whatever homework Toni wants to set her to feel OK dating Cheryl Blossom. Cheryl is rewarded for her good behavior by Toni asking her out on the date to the concert in Centerville. I am very sick of this.
Meanwhile, Mrs. Rayberry is talking about her dead husband with Tabitha and Jughead. She reads it to them. Rayberry was going to try to get his novel published, which he hoped would get them enough money “to buy your parents a place in the city and move to Paris.” Thanks to his relationship with Jughead (which he seems to have never mentioned to her), Rayberry was “filled with such optimism about” the future. They all agree that thai doesn’t seem suicidal in the least.
Jughead feels the need to check in with the widow about the ‘negative’ things Keller told him about Rayberry. She is very patient and kind, providing an explanation for each item. He did protest the Korean War but he fought in the uh, good one, I guess (Full disclosure: My whole life, which I’ve enjoyed very much so far, would be impossible without the American men who fought and died in the Korean War.) His injury in WW2 got him addicted to opium, his stay at mental hospital was a voluntary self-check in, and he went to Communist gathering in the Great Depression (because capitalism had a big hiccough then).
Mrs. Rayberry says that her husband was “an optimist despite everything that life threw at him.” I mean, he had to have been. It also explains the extreme attracting Jughead Jones felt for him too. Jughead Jones is attracted to hope. “Always believing something better is around the corner” has the same ring to it as “I’ll figure something out, I always do.”
Jughead makes a face that lets us know he is going to get really feral about this new fixation. He wants to know who may have wanted to harm Brad Rayberry, and why. Mrs. Rayberry is too heartsick and sad, only able to say that the world is a tough place (to which Tabitha has a very emotional reaction), but she won’t stop or forbid Jughead from investigating what really may have happened.
In an abrupt change of pace we check in with Reggie, Archie, Veronica, Betty and the two boys’ obsession with cars, all out on a joint date at Pop’s. The boys are poring over some car magazine, which Veronica belatedly recognizes was a bad idea to permit them to get. They try to get the boys’ attention (but why though?). Veronica says she used to be driven around by Steve McQueen, to which Betty one ups her and says she’s a V8 fixing expert. This does make Archie lift his head from his car porn to actually look at her face for just a second. But then it’s right back to car porn, so the girls get them out of there and on to the road.
Except Reggie and Archie confront each other about who gets to drive. Reggie drove to the diner, so Archie wants to drive to Centerville. They biker while the two fed up hotties step out ahead of them.
Mrs. Rayberry takes her leave of the two young people. She is going to give Rayberry a proper burial, then get his novel published. She also, as I guess the executor of his estate, gives Jughead Jones express permission to adapt his stories into comic books. Jughead says that he’ll get Pep Comics to do some sort of tribute issue (with proceeds going to the estate.)
Then, Mrs. Rayberry asks Jabitha if they’re going steady. These two have the single cutest romantic moment in the whole episode. They’re both startled by the question, though not at all displeased. Jughead understands the question first, saying, Oh no, no, while Tabitha takes a moment to comprehend it (“Who, Us??”). After saying No No, while grinning in a pleased way, Jughead says, “I mean…” and stops talking while he stares at Tabitha like the sun is rising from her forehead. When Tabitha says, We’re classmates, he turns quickly to look at Mrs. Rayberry wondering if she caught him saying “I mean..” Then Tabitha adds that they are “friends, I would say,” which makes Jughead so disappointed for a second that he can’t look at anybody. He does recover though, enough to say “Good friends, good friends, yeah. Pals.” When he says PALS though, it’s Tabitha’s turn to be disappointed - she gives him a quick sideways look, which he feels like a touch on his cheek, causing him to look back at her.
Mrs. Rayberry tells them to take care of each other, before leaving. I love that her gloves, belt, and hat are all the same color. It looks so stylish.
On the Riverdale faildate, the car has broken down. Apparently, it’s just empty of gas, not broken. So the two girls send the boys off to get the gas. While she and Betty “stay here and huddle for warmth.”
The long walk back along the road would be shortened quite a bit by being able to hitch a ride, but the boys are out of luck. Archie is tired of Reggie continuing to paw at his vehicle, so he suggests that he ask his sponsor for a car instead. Ask for it as a star player’s perk. “Is that how you see me? As a germ who’s looking for handouts?” I mean, Archie being unable to refuse fancy gifts from the Blossoms is canon, so I don’t think that he thinks that’s at all a bad thing. Reggie gets all defensive, using words like “uppity” and “waxing your car” and “forgetting my place” and so on, but Archie, when it comes to his car, will not let his focus get derailed and won't get drawn into a battle of words. So, they fight physically about it, on the dark side of the dark road. Reggie gets the upper hand, telling Archie to “submit.”
Meanwhile, it’s the lesbians to the rescue! Cheryl pulls up with Toni and Midge in tow, asking if Veronica and Betty are having car trouble. Betty explains their situation, so Toni invites them to hop in. Betty worries about the boys, but Veronica has it right. “Who cares about the boys,” she says, grinning from ear to ear as she skips out of the stalled car.
At the Diner, Jughead is discussing their evening with Tabitha. The meeting with June and reading her letters served as a reminder that she needs to go “back on the road with my folks.” She’d originally wanted to rest, but not anymore. Jughead says he supports her (“There’s nothing more meaningful than that.”) He says he wants to court her (“Maybe I’ll send you some letters too.”)
Archie and Reggie are all disheveled and out of sorts, so Pops, giving them a container of gas, tells them that he has a junker he wants to unload on Reggie. Reggie gives him a big hug. Then, on the walk back to the car, Reggie confesses that he took the car all the way home when he had it that night. He confesses to being homesick, and Archie, who hasn’t really gotten a big grief-related monologue like Jughead gave about Rayberry, says that his grief has settled into a feeling of homesickness for his best friend. (Not surprising, because in Fred’s place has come the terrible Uncle Fucking Frank, who also somehow managed to make Mary Andrews completely disappear.)
Archie says that he hasn’t had a best friend since his father died. Reggie suggests Betty might be a best friend candidate, but Archie just looks back at him. What’s that mean? I’m not sure but apparently she’s not a candidate for best friendship anymore, now that they have sexual feelings for each other.
The whole Beggie / Retty (whatever that ship name is) undercurrents are interesting.
Reminding me that I can’t recall the last time Jughead and Archie actually had a conversation, Reggie asks why it is that “Beef Soup? Soup Can?”” can’t be the best friend. I think in the comics, Jughead had a brother Souphead? Is that where the Soup references come from? Archie laughs as he asks,”Do you mean Jughead?” but he doesn’t confirm or deny anything about him either. Reggie sums it up as “I guess you can’t really talk V8s with him.” Archie does call Jughead a “good egg” and Betty? He seems like he has so much to say about her he can’t get any of the words out. Reggie looks disappointed.
More Beggie/Retty undercurrent.
Also, if OG Jughead knew that Archie in this universe was this tepid about him, he would be so completely crushed.
Reggie’s mystery parents, who they can never show us because of the mishandled race relations episode, are happy Reggie landed with good people. I mean, we’ll see if Reggie gets that scholarship that he needs so badly or if Julian like, takes a bat to Reggie’s knee in a fit of jealousy or something, but for now, they’re not wrong. He’s roommates with Archie, has adjusted more or less OK to the new school, and he’s doing great at his basketball.
Both of them finally remember that they left behind the two girls in the open top car a while back. They giggle about the prospect of being told off by Betty and Veronica. Of course, the girls aren’t there!
Riverdale did a wonderful thing in sparing me from Fangs’ concert. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Fangs was apparently a big hit. Everyone wants his autograph. We have to listen to his very karaoke version of Tutti Frutti but still, it could’ve been a lot worse. He’s carried his guitar to school in the most douchey way possible. Midge being at the concert was “his lucky charm” which netted him a contact with a producer at Phantom Rock Records. I hope it’s a scam.
The school is indeed allowing Reggie to keep Pop’s old vehicle in the shop class lab. Reggie is already working very hard on it. He’s named the car Bella. Archie says it’s in even worse shape than his own car had been. He’s come to offer his help, but it turns out that Betty was the one Reggie called on to help. This might be the first time in his life that Archie is facing some sort of rejection. He not unreasonably must have thought that all the inquiry about best friendships from Reggie was an application to occupy the spot himself, which is why he didn’t cop to his childhood best friendships with either Betty or Jughead. Alas, it turns out Betty is the preferred partner in this instance. (More Beggie/Retty undercurrent!)
Betty says the concert yesterday was excellent. Archie is awkwardly the third wheel as Reggie and Betty work fluidly together on Bella.
At the Rayberry apartment, Jughead is cleaning up when there’s a knock at the door . It’s a lady with a cat held in her arms like a baby. I am so jealous. I’ve never had nor met a cat that allowed any person to do that. She wants milk, which she is sure is going to be in Rayberry’s fridge. She heard the milkman make a delivery to this apartment, because the cat had a strong reaction to the milkman’s bottles clinking. Jughead has his first clue!
#Riverdale recap#riverdale opinions#riverdale episode 127#riverdale episode 7.10#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#riverdale episode recap#Riverdale s6
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Riverdale S7 E2 Skip, Hop and Thump!
Mind-wiped 1950s Jughead Jones who doesn’t remember the true universe reads things like Pit of Tyranny and Things of Darkness while in bed with a very happy looking Hotdog (he’s so shaggy!) wearing long johns with gray socks.
“Superheroes were out! Horror and crime comics were in!” Jughead says. This I guess is Riverdale’s parting statement about the State of The Culture as of the airtime of this episode (April 5, 2023 in the US). We are not with the MCU! We’re doing something else!
Jughead is still wearing the felt crown on his head, in bed, in his long johns. Does he never take it off? Is it on his head in the shower too? Does it function like glasses? As in sometimes when I change clothes I have to take the whole thing off but other times I don’t. How does it stay on his head? He’s either been reading all night, or he reaches for one among a pile of comic books as soon as he wakes up every morning the way I reach for my smartphone (a tech he completely failed to explain properly last episode) to see what’s happened on tumblr? Many thoughts about the first 25 seconds of Ep 2.
Jughead says he and his friends are obsessed, before he sees something he doesn’t like. Jughead marches into school with a crown pinned to his head (it has to be pinned), a side slung book-bag and Charlie Brown’s mustard yellow sweater with the black stripe across the chest. They are not fooling around in the costume department at Riverdale the Show.
Mind-wiped Jughead speaks with the same weird cadence now as 50s Archie who may or may not be aware that he is in an Alternate Universe: much more singsong, elongated vowels, generally slower speech. He tells his group of comic book loving friends - Ethel (Hi Ethel!), Ben Button, and the AU Dilton Doiley. (Why couldn’t they get the OG Dilton back? Did he refuse to cute his beautiful long hair for this time skip switcheroo?)
Jughead is in a high dudgeon. He says the comic publisher “stole his story!” and that he should “sue ‘em!” One of Jughead’s minor themes is that of plagiarism and accusations thereof. He was first accused of plagiarism (wrongly) while at Stonewall Prep which then led to his being, in essence if not in the legality, expelled from that school for the said charge. As an adult he then had an entire novel stolen out from under him by Jess, an ex, with one ex, Betty, and one future girlfriend, Tabitha, helping Jess steal it, after which he tried to steal the novel handed to him by the one night stand that blackmailed him into reading it. He fessed up to that one at the last minute, but it cost him his writing contract and his relationship with his editor, a gruff-but-loving father figure in a life woefully deprived of a reliable fatherly presence. And now, in this timewarp 1950s, he is certain that a publisher stole from him.
Can I just say - I love maniacal Jughead. Whenever he gets like this, his eyes get really weird and bright. He just loves to be vibrating in outrage, with or without his core memories. Dilton thinks he’s being illogical, Ben is too sick of these forays into mania to even continue to look at Jughead, but Ethel is fully turned on. Ethel has a really really beautiful pair of eyes on her, and she’s getting very bedroomy at Jughead about his insane sounding plan to go “pay a visit” to the publisher. Nobody agrees to go with him though.
Toni, followed by Fangs, followed by some white kid who is NOT SWEET PEA swagger into the class room just as Cheryl is making her candied-sweetness announcement about the upcoming Annual Sock Hop. I have heard of a “sock hop” but being a not terribly curious person it did not occur to me to look up what the heck that was. I knew they wore white ankle socks and had like ‘bobby soxers” and stuff so I assumed it was about wearing those socks. But no. You’re supposed to dance in your socks (no shoes).
An aside: I am furious not just at the loss of Sweet Pea (Yes, I know he left in S5 but I am not over it and you can’t make me) but the fact that they gave Fangs Sweet Pea’s middle of forehead curl hairdo. That does not work for me!
Cheryl in this universe is a specific kind of naggy person that I feel very called out by. She doesn’t just invite people to the Sock Hop. She reminds them (well, tells me, so I’m thankful for this but I think everyone in the universe knows that you don’t wear shoes to dance at the Sock Hop) that Sock Hop = shoeless dancing but then has to go on to tell boys to make sure their socks match AND that they have no holes. The reason you do this kind of nagging is because you assume whoever you’re nagging is dumber than a pile of rocks. Notice that Cheryl, whose lesbianism often comes with a side of straight on hatred of men (her Jason-love being the only exception), only lectures the BOYS about this.
She looks extremely adorable with her red headband that perfectly matches her bright lipstick.
We get a cute montage of sorts of everyone looking at their heart’s desire.
Fangs is making eyes at Midge, who pretends she wasn’t the one that turned around in her seat wholesale stare at him for no reason when he just was walking to his assigned seat. She is shooketh. Archie turns around in his seat to stare longingly at Veronica, who has eyes only for herself - she is fixing her make up in a little handheld mirror. (Foreshadowing??) Aha but it turns out Veronica knew that she was going to be looked at by someone, and has put up the mirror as a ploy to hide her sightline. We are treated to her point of view- It turns out Julian is also looking directly at Veronica. As Cheryl keeps talking, Veronica’s view goes from Julian all the way to Archie, who is fully staring bug eyed and open mouthed at her pulchritude. I have to say once more I love 1950s Archie. He is so guileless. In this age of being stuck being penpals of people on what’s supposed to be dating/ hookup apps, this level of direct physical statements of intent, of clearly twisting your spine to give someone A LOOK feels very refreshing. And (More Foreshadowing??) Veronica’s gaze does not stop at the agog-Archie. It continues on to Betty, who looks very annoyed at the way Archie is gawking at Veronica. She gives Veronica a disapproving look before turning her sights on to Kevin. Or rather, the back of Kevin’s head, because once more, Kevin is not looking at Betty Cooper.
Which basically tells you everything you need to know about Kevin, because HAVE YOU SEEN 1950S BETTY COOPER?? Why would you look at anyone else ever? But of course, Kevin is looking at the new student who I have assumed is Chuck Clayton but absolutely isn’t, because even in an alternate universe Chuck Clayton would not be not straight. (Lucky me, I guess? Ugh.)
Cheryl, who has been going on and on this whole time about how the Sock Hop is going to be “Both the Bee’s Knees and the Cat’s Pajamas” (very interesting that so far, 1950s Cheryl doesn’t use 19th Century syntax) positively squeaks as she announces that Kevin and the Crooners will be performing at the dance! Betty, who is very good at certain kinds of support, reaches over to squeeze Kevin’s arm at the mention of his name, which finally gets him to take his eyes off the boy of his dreams.
The bell rings, and Archie chases her down. Veronica’s headband matches her dress and I have bangs and shoulder length hair and am seized with an irrational desire to wear a headband. Archie wants to know if Veronica wants to go to the Sock Hop with him. Veronica is pleased, but she doesn’t say yes. Instead she asks Archie if he knows how to cut a rug.
Archie looks down, then away, making an uncomfortable face. Veronica assumes that Archie doesn’t know what Cut a Rug means. She thinks Archie is really, very, extremely dumb. Interesting. She asks “Are you a good dancer?” by way of explanation. Archie’s response is still delayed. He dredges up a “Oh! Yeah. Of course I am!” and - the performance is really hilarious to me because I’ve watched it three times in a row, just this exchange and honestly I CAN’T DECIDE if Veronica is right that Archie does not know this extremely commonly used idiom in his one and only language OR if it’s because Archie does have fluency in his mother tongue but is simply bad at lying to the girl he likes a whole lot (He can’t dance, it’s later revealed). Veronica says that she believes him yet will “still need a demonstration.” Then she calls him “Daddy O” which turns him all so hard that all the blood from his brain goes somewhere else in a hurry and he just is mutely nodding. Oh Archie.
Toni Topaz, looking excellent in her ponytail-with-bangs, oozes up to Cheryl who eagerly asks if she’s going to buy tickets to the Sock Hop. “Are you asking me out?” is what she says, which then rings about the cutest meltdown. Cheryl entirely fails at sounding outraged because she’s elated, but is aware that Midge is there, so she stutters (to Midge, by turning her head away from Toni) that she OF COURSE ISN’T asking Toni out because - because she’s the *host!* And and and (Cheryl never stutters, but here she is, stuttering) also she’s a … [unspeakable word: GIRL] and Toni is also [unspeakable word: Girl]!! And girls don’t!!
Toni makes fun of Cheryl - smirkily asking what she means to say: “Girls don’t what? Dance with other girls?” and then says “Calm down, Peggy Sue.” To add insult to injury she then talks about how Fangs is a singer who deserves to be in the lineup for the music for the dance. The dirty look that Cheryl gives Fangs is a balm to my heart. I stan Cheryl Blossom for many reasons, but her persistent hatred of Fangs makes her my avatar. Cheryl suddenly remembers that she does not like anything associated with the Southside, and so is rude about the Serpents. She doesn’t want them at her Sock Hop because they will “Start a Rumble.” Toni tells her nobody will buy tickets to this thing with Kevin’s “B-grade barbershop quartet.” BURN. Fangs follows Toni around like he always used to in the proper universe, but this time he says bye to only Midge, who pretends rather incompetently that she is not all about that attention. Cheryl smacks her.
At PEP comics, which is in the building that used to house the Charles Smith FBI Field Office in the future, Jughead Jones is waiting impatiently for his turn to speak to the editor in chief. There’s a secretary lady and a young male assistant to the EIC. Jughead is determined to have his say, and his trying to stay true to that purpose while being obviously a bit intimidated by Al Fieldstone is very cute. He can’t even face him head on, instead angling his body towards the door in case he needs to skedaddle for his life in a hurry.
Mind-Wiped 50s Jughead speaks in the same OG Disney Channel (like, when Walt was on shows on it) Ozzy-and-Harriet, the OG Mickey Mouse Club candances as Archie. It’s very funny when placed against the more natural delivery of Al Fieldstone. Jughead is very scared but he says what he came to say. “I submitted a story that you - rejected it. And then- surprise surprise! - you ran a story that was exactly like it! Now, you might call that a coincidence, but I call it theft!” Even the way he puts his little hands on his little hips has no conviction, because Jughead is so intimidated by Mr. Fieldstone. He looks a little astonished at his own moxie at having said all this to this man.
Fieldstone growls that there are “no original ideas” and that he has hundreds of submissions every week which are all “slop” - and Jughead stutteringly insisting that the “timing” and “details” are too much to be a coincidence? Fieldstone rolls right over him. Filing cabinets, he says, are filled with every germ of a story idea he’s ever had. Fieldstone boasts about a backlog he’s “waiting to farm out” to potential writers. Jughead is very gifted at making the most of opportunities, I guess, because he immediately volunteers his own services as a writer.
“You’re looking for writers??”
“Always!”
“Well I’m! A - WRITER.”
Again, Jug looks so amazed at himself, for calling himself a writer in front of an actual publisher His eyes hold more than a small amount of fear that he won’t be believed, and won’t be allowed to claim this title. But he doesn’t blow it! Jughead wants to know how he can be ‘considered’ for a writing job, to which the editor in chief hands him a slip of paper with the aforementioned story kernel on it, and tells him to come up with “seven pages” that won’t “make him want to puke.”
Jughead leaves elated, entirely having forgotten about why he came to begin with. Obviously, Fieldstone has been through this spiel thousands of times before. What writers want, according to Riverdale, is not actually justice in the event of a plagiarism event. What they want is a paying writing gig, and the offer of one will make them forget everything else.
Meanwhile, in Betty’s bedroom, Archie confirms that he indeed knows the phrase “cut a rug” but he has a panic response to the word “dance” because he once broke Midge’s toe attempting to dance once. Betty is going to teach him the twist. She tells him to move his hips from side to side. Archie’s hips stay stock still but he moves his shoulders in rhythm which is a start. Betty tells him less shoulders, more hips, but then he just has a body disregulation event. It makes Betty give up right then and there, switching them over to slow dancing. The song says “Be miiiiine/ For the Rest of my Life” while Betty and Archie in a peachy glow look lovingly at each other. Oh they are so cute.
Of course, this is when Alice Cooper has to come barging in. She is scandalized. While she shuts off the music, Betty and Archie try to explain that they weren’t doing anything bad, that Archie was gearing up to ask out “The new girl” (according to Betty) who is “a celebrity from Hollywood!” (according to Archie). She summarily kicks Archie out. I LOVE Alice’s outfit - the floral print, the wide skirt, the green cardigan, the skinny pink belt, the super high heels. This looks like the more uncomfortable thing you could choose to wear at home, but it look undeniably excellent.
Meanwhile, in the extremely big traincar in which Jughead lives, we have AN ETHELEHEAD MOMENT. Jughead has shown his draft to Ethel, who says she is so jealous of the opportunity he has to submit something to Pep Comics. Jughead says she’s as good as anybody, then goes on to offer that if his story passes muster, he will recommend her as an artist to the publisher. This is so cute. I love this. I also like it in general when Jughead Jones has a nice looking place to live.
Cheryl is obsessed with selling tickets to this Sock Hop thing! She drives solo to a lakefront piece of land where clearly people go to fuck in their cars, then does an INSANE thing. She knocks on windows to ask if they’ve bought a ticket. Of course, the first car she picks is the one Fangs is in. He rolls down the window for some reason to reveal Midge who looks scared and is in a pose that looks like she either just got done or was about to give head.
WHY DOES FANGS LOWER THE WINDOW???
Cheryl has a very Penelope Blossom freakout. “One of my precious Vixens with a common greaser! SACRILEGE! GET OUT OF THE CAR RIGHT THIS MINUTE!” Ah there is the Victorian syntax, back in full force! Further, the sheer power that Cheryl has is amazing. Midge, whinging, does exactly as she’s told. Cheryl’s coitus-interruptor outfit is excellent - red skirt with white polka dots, a white coat, red barrel handbag.
In one of the cars is Kevin and Betty. I hate Kevin. To quote Nathan Lane talking to the gays of Brokeback Mountain - “Leave those poor women alone!” He looks unhappy while he is in the car with the beautiful Betty Cooper, who wants to know why she and her so called boyfriend are sitting in a car at the make out spot not touching. He can’t even come up with some sort of answer for why he’s being such a withholding jackass. She points out that he hasn’t even asked her to the Sock Hop, to be his date. The way Kevin’s closeted self hatred manifests apparently is to be a misogynist. He doesn’t apologize for not asking Betty to the dance. He says he’d assumed she’d be there, while he performs, as his fan.
Betty can’t take it anymore and plants a passionate kiss on him. The revulsion he exhibits with his hands before he pushes her off! Kevin! Then he has the GALL to call her a sex maniac because she wants to be ‘pinned.’ (Just like I didn’t really know what at Sock Hop was, I am not sure anymore that I know what the whole ‘pinning’ business is actually, even though it’s mentioned a lot in things set in the 50s and in pulp novels.) I think it’s related to ‘going steady’ and I suppose promising to dry-hump only each other (because sex wasn’t allowed at this time officially between teens, right?). Betty rightfully leaves the car so she can walk home.
“Pretentious, clunky, too much dialogue, but it’ll do” is the assessment that Jughead’s writing gets. His hands are in an anxious prayer position, his foot is tapping from terrified nervous energy, and the hideous squares of his vest do not go with the hideous squares of his red checked shirt, but Jughead gets a job! Sort of! He gets paid for his writing, in any case.
Aside: In the same way that perhaps Archie was never very talented at music (the only person who thought he had a gift was his groomer - the university professor rejected him outright, for one) are we supposed to think Jughead is a hack? He got into a prestigious writing program for college, sure, but he didn’t place at the writing competition he submitted things to that got him Chippings’ attention, his classmates at Stonewall rated Donna’s fic to be the best, Betty as an adult called his writing cringe and now this.
Is a dollar a page a lot in 1950? It sounds dirt cheap pay, to me. Oh and see - the care with which Riverdale is made! The publisher is totally gypping Jughead, who is too naive to know it, and he doesn’t give a shit who the artist is that Jughead claims to know until he says that magic word - CHEAP- in which case the publisher wants the illustrations for the 7 page zombie story TOMORROW. The way Jughead frantically throw out the word “cheap” because the editor isn’t interested at “incredible artist, young, hungry” and the way the editor immediately wants to know about the CHEAP part!
Jughead’s wholesome offer of a handshake thanking a man who (a) definitely DID steal his story after rejecting it and (b) is going to pay him slave wages for a story he churned out based on a kernel probably stolen from yet another writer and (c) is now going to exploit Ethel’s work being met with suspicion was a great touch.
The next day at school, Kevin is drawn to the music room by the siren song of melodious piano playing. It turns out to be the black student who isn’t Chuck. We finally get told what his name is - it’s Clay Walker. He says he was “horsing around” even though he sounded extremely accomplished on the piano. Clay Walker gives Betty Cooper her dues - Kevin is ‘dating the prettiest girl at Riverdale High.” Once more, Kevin, STOP TORTURING HER. Clay says he has transferred in from ‘all over’ though that’s an evasion, not an answer. His father was military and he may now be dead (or perhaps somehow dishonorably discharged?) - Clay says his father WAS in the army. When Clay asks Kevin to recommend someone he should take to the dance because he doesn’t have a date yet, Kevin says the most damning thing. That “lots of people go stag.” Which means that his level of failing at comp het is not actually necessary at Riverdale. He’s ruining Betty’s teen years and subjecting her to constant sexual rejection on purpose when it isn’t necessary for his survival. I hate Kevin.
Aside: And actually, Kevin has a lot of weird toxicity doesn’t he? I’m not just talking about the strange way he yanked Fangs around, ultimately yeeting out on the relationship that he insisted they have with Toni and so on. That and his using white privilege to steal Toni’s baby away from her. And the fact that in his soul-selling to get Broadway success, Fangs is his servant and his sexual servicer, not an equal partner. When Jughead-Narrator of RIvervale sold his soul for comic book success, he just had the comic book success and a permanent resident booth inside Pop’s. He didn’t sexually or emotionally dominate a significant other.
Archie tries officially asking out Veronica again. She still doesn’t say yes. While reading Peyton Place, Veronica invites Archie to her place later that day, with the express purpose of auditioning to be her beau for the evening. Even though this proposition is actually quite insulting, the way Veronica looks - so alluring and perfect and knowing - is inducement enough. And really, Veronica does know how to lure them in. She tells Archie as he cutely skips out, “I’m rooting for you, Stud,” in the most sultry voice. He can’t control his happiness at being singled out (when he’s by himself, no less).
Once more, I adore 50s Archie. He’s so bouncy and cute and sweet and wholesome. This is how I think Jughead thinks Archie is, even though he isn’t, and I wonder also if that’s why this is why he’s like this in the universe that is Tabitha’s creation. (Even though she didn’t take the narrating duties away from Jughead, this is, in essence, a universe fueled by Tabitha’s power, so this is in some way her version of these people, right? In which case, Betty being insanely horny as fuck all the time is actually very funny to me.)
Speaking of which, Betty wants to know how Veronica makes this happen - how she gets boys to just do whatever she wants. “So they just do whatever you say!” she remarks. Can we just take a moment to discuss how absolutely spectacular Betty looks in this green sweater and cinched-waist skirt combo? Just SO sensual and sexy. Veronica totally finds her hot. I mean, generally, my central thesis about Veronica is that she’s gay. This is why her relationships with men never quite work out. She may be bisexual sexually but she is homosexual emotionally. She loves beautiful women, and wants to love on them and dance with them and boost their confidence. So Veronica does what she does with pretty ladies to Betty here, telling her she’s “a total Marilyn” and tells her how to break up with her boyfriend - ask some other boy out and make Kevin “all hot and bothered.”
Cheryl is still shilling tickets to her sock hop dance thing, but not very successfully. She accosts Dilton Doiley.
I am sad about what they’ve done with Dilton Doiley for this scene. He’s such a stereotypical Asian nerd, of the type that Riverdale has hitherto successfully avoided. OG Dilton was a feral little weirdo, who did things like encourage Archie to get a gun. Rivervale Dilton had long excellent hair and was a different kind of feral weirdo. Reggie 1.0 and 2.0 were also not the note-for-note rote racist Asian boy nerd stereotype that 50s Dilton is. He’s bespectacled, stuttering, scared of Toni Topaz (Minnie Mouse Serpent, be gone!) and bullied by Cheryl who seems literally half his size. A gormless Asian nerd afraid of women - feeds right into the Is he gay or is he Asian hatefulness which manages to be homophobic and racist at the same time. Great.
Back at the Andrews residence, Archie has tried on Fred’s jacket so he can have something to wear to Veronica’s shindig in the evening. The jacket does not fit at all whatsoever, so he presents himself awkwardly like a pretty scarecrow to ask for assistance for his mother. Mary Andrews giggles like a Flintstones wife which she’s never ever done before. She fixes the jacket. I wish I knew how to do things like ‘let out a hem a little bit. One more normal life skill I have neglected to acquire all this time. The faces that Archie makes in the mirror are, just to keep going on about it, SO VERY CUTE. He looks so handsome, so fresh faced, so excited, so sweet spirited.
He’s so in love with Veronica’s ‘celebrity’ or maybe ‘celebrity adjacent’ status. He keeps saying that about her to the mothers, even though Veronica actually shared how miserable her present existence is. She’s abandoned by her parents, has been always neglected by them, and lied about it all only to have it humiliatingly thrown in her face. And yet, Archie is just so taken with her Los Angeles, Big City, Glamorous It-Girl persona. Poor Veronica.
Mary cries about seeing Archie in Fred’s suit because she and Fred went to their Sock Hop together. Fred apparently wrote Mary love poetry in this universe. Archie has very cute pale blue wall paper with different sports implements. Archie seems very charmed by his parents’ high school courtship.
Inspired by this story, Archie writes Veronica a poem, then gets Betty to take a read through in case in sucks.
Okay so.
So.
I object to this sort of ‘friendship’ between boys and girls. I just feel like they aren’t really friendships but some sort of (at best) unconscious emotional cruelty by one party to the more sexually interested party or (at worst) taking advantage of someone who you know is into you and you’re not sure or you think you can do better so you’re backburnering them. And having them ‘coach’ you on how best to date someone else is a pretty shitty backburner-stoking method. So in principle I dislike this, but the fact that Archie is doing it to THE PRETTIEST GIRL IN RIVERDALE (that both gay boys agree on - that is Clay and Kevin) is a bit too much.
In any case, Betty likes the poem. I was supremely relieved that they didn’t make me listen to the poem, ngl. Because I really didn’t like any of Archie’s songs either (Sorry, Arch).
Cheryl has some courage. She goes to the site of the Speak-Easy that existed in the infinite space underneath Pop’s which looks like a trailer but somehow isn’t, which then hosted the second Whyte Wyrm, and in this era is a “coffee house” which actually looks like an amazing place I’d like to go to. Toni must have incredible vision because that space does not look like it has anywhere near enough light but yet she is reading. It’s literally called THE DARK ROOM. Bikers, beatniks and badasses are who Toni thinks she’s a part of but I ask you this - why would such cool people give a shit about playing music at the goddamn Riverdale Sock Hop?? Why is Toni so goddamn invested in Fangs taking the stage at what sounds like THE preppiest event of all time??
I do very much enjoy all the weird 50s hipster lingo that Toni uses. “Take a load off” etc.
Archie has brought wholesome flowers Veronica’s thing. She is wearing the most RIDICULOUS dress. An absolutely enormous flat black bow topping cancerous looking black buttons on a painted-on purple tightness. I both love it and hate it. She is holding an alcoholic drink when she enters, telling Archie that they were all discussing Eisenhower and presidential politics. Archie and I are both alarmed that there are “others.” There are no fewer than THREE others - one of which is the cursed Julian.
Meanwhile, the Cooper ladies are doing dishes together wearing really, really high heels at night. Do - did? - white people actually live like this in the 1950s? Like, outdoor shoes in the house is gross enough to me, but to wear 5 inch heeled shoes while doing the dishes at night? That is some extreme kink dominatrix shit to me. I’m very square and preppy, it’s true, but come on! Anyway, Betty tells her mom in the most winsomely adorable way that she is having ‘fluttering’ feelings about Archie. Alice, because she’s a piece of shit in any universe, tries to kibosh that by asking if the attraction is purely because Kevin makes Betty feel ‘underappreciated.’ This bitchy comment kills Betty’s glow immediately.
We skip to Jughead looking through Ethel’s illustration work. “Holy Hell, Ethel!” he exclaims. He thinks she’s produced something great. Ethel looks so happy. I know from previews something terrible is going to happen to her, but why can’t Ethel just have some nice things! Why?? And because Jughead doesn’t seem to think her being a girl is going to be an obstacle to getting paid for her art, Ethel takes courage and asked Jughead to be her date at the Sock Hop.
Except 1) Jughead was not at all keeping track of the date of the Sock Hop and 2) when he asks “For Kicks?” as a response she caves and agrees, even though she clearly meant it to be a date invitation.
I hate this. I hate this so much. They always do this in so much media, that a girl asking a guy to go to a thing like this can never lead anywhere good and often starts out with her being rejected outright in an offhand manner. Riverdale! I was rooting for you! We were all rooting for you!!
Anyways, as though this wasn’t bad enough, Ethel’s very terrifying mother opens the door without knocking, bringing scary music in with her, and gives Jughead such an evil look of hateful silence that he goes from wanting to politely greet the woman (and possibly tell her how talented he thinks Ethel is) to being confused and a bit offended. Mrs. Muggs implicitly threatens her daughter and her guest with Mr. Mugg’s violence like this is a normal thing to do, which Jughead takes as his cue to leave.
At the Pembroke, which omg has a baby grand in the living room - I am so jealous when anyone has a huge musical instrument just in their living room - Archie cannot keep up with the competition. Veronica is telling an anecdote about Frank Sinatra. This might be a lie, right? Veronica is established as a liar. But in any case, I miscounted. There are FOUR, not three, other suitors in the room. The most annoying one is of course Julian Blossom, who insults Archie gratuitously.
Veronica has a fricking actual Monet in her living room. Julian recognizes it, preening that the Blossoms go art buying every summer. Bored perhaps, or maybe egotistically annoyed that instead of just being impressed Julian keeps trying to compete with her stories, Veronica solicits Archie’s opinion. The thing is, Veronica knows Archie is a know nothing. She even thinks he doesn’t know what Cut A Rug means. So she has to know she’s setting him up for humiliation, asking him for an opinion on Monet.
I do like Archie’s forthrightness. He says he prefers Norman Rockwell. Not letting it go, Julian attacks him about his clothing, which then touches the sore point that sets Archie off in every iteration - besmirching the honor of the sainted Fred Andrews. Veronica, recognizing a strategic blunder, tries to redirect everyone to a game of charades.
The Archie I know and kind of loathe finally emerges in this alternate timeline. Stiff with rage, he threatens violence on Julian before excusing himself to go. The concerned disappointment on Veronica’s face, as well as Julian being a jackass right behind her got to me.
Julian is what Bret Weston Wallis would be if Bret had been straight. But Bret wanted to bottom for Jughead Jones, so he came off somehow less repellent even though a lot of the things he did and said were just as terrible. Julian is Riverdale’s anti-heterosexual statement, I guess?
Archie tosses his poem for Veronica in the trash as he leaves.
The next morning, Veronica pays the Andrews home a visit, trying to put on her best nice girl front to Mary Andrews, who isn’t having it at all, whatsoever. Mary Andrews says about her son that he is “simple, so simple” which - OK so everyone including his mom thinks 50s Archie is as dumb as a sack of rocks. So Mary rightly tells Veronica off - “What kind of person auditions boys to go to a Sock Hop?!” and calls her “Little Miss Femme Fatale” before slamming the door in her face.
This is the most I’ve ever liked Mary Andrews in seven years.
That same morning, Alice Cooper has summoned Kevin to talk about Betty. Kevin basically tells Alice that he’s gay. “Betty wants THESE THINGS from me, but I’m not sure I can give them to her.” Like really. Any straight boy saying this to his girlfriend’s mom is almost as clear a statement of his homosexuality as saying “Mrs Cooper I want to suck cock.” But because Alice is a POS she thinks that this is normal. Or at least, she says so. I’m inclined to think she’s cockblocking Betty. If Alice in the 50s has the same sorts of things happen to her as the main universe - teen pregnancy from FP or Hal or whatever throwing her entire life off course - then she has an understandable motivation to make sure her totally gorgeous, sensual daughter is dating a gay boy who can’t stand to touch her even to keep up a straight front. Out of her bra, Alice produces a pin, and tells Kevin that what girls really want is a “fella who carries her books home for her from school or takes her to the movies or call them on the telephone.” She says the pin (which Hal gave her) will solve all sexual tension and make things be ‘pure.’
Whatever Alice and Hal have going on in this universe is just as sick as the thing they had together in the real universe.
Kevin looks like he wants to throw up, but takes Alice’s explanation that pinning Betty with her mom’s pin is going to take care of everything with a smile.
Suddenly, Toni is all about selling tickets to the Sock Hop because Fangs will be performing. Oh. Is this supposed to be an echo of like, their eventual marriage with baby stupidity in the main universe? And to top it off, Toni bullies the new Dilton Doiley into buying 5 tickets to the Sock Hop because this is supposed to be funny. It’s not and I hate it. Toni asks Cheryl if she’s told Kevin that he’s been replaced by Fangs, to which Cheryl says she hasn’t but also takes the chance to use a new hipster phrase she’s learned: “Can you dig it?”
Poor Ethel. Two hideous old white men are bearing down on her in the Principal’s office. She was doodling in Mr Doiley’s class (so Dilton is the science teacher’s kid - I feel too tired to point out this is a stereotype). It’s the illustration suitable for that comics magazine she wants to work for. Ethel’s work has a really cool R. Crumb kind of energy. So she tells the truth - she says she’s trying to meet a deadline for the Pep Comics project. The world is against Ethel, so she now has detention.
Archie approaches Veronica. He says he’s sorry he left in a huff but then scarily says, “I sincerely was going to rip Julian’s head off.” When Veronica responds with a suitably chastened apology, which she tops off with a sweet affirmation that she really liked getting to know him, Archie asks her out yet another time. Very interestingly, Veronica seems pleased that he’s still interested in her like that but rejects him for what looks like might be once too many times. She won’t be going with anyone. Archie gets rightly very annoyed, asking why she’d made him jump through hoops and participate in a dog and pony show. Veronica says it was a game, because to her way of thinking the queen bee is supposed to rile up the worker bees then fly off. Archie has finally had enough to stalk off.
Right before gym class (? I guess? I don’t understand the yellow button downs + belted blue shorts outfit they’re all changing into) Betty wants to know if Veronica has made her choice. Veronica says she’s going stag. I wish the gay girls flirting storyline was given to Veronica and not Toni or Cheryl. Anyway when Betty asks why, Veronica says without saying so that she is going alone as a form of penance for having been so thoughtless and careless with Archie’s feelings, making him do her bidding to compete for her against other boys. Betty asks if she didn’t like his poem, which Veronica doesn’t know anything about. Veronica tells Betty she doesn’t know who if anyone Archie is going with, but whoever she is “She is one lucky girl.” Betty looks at her beautiful self for reassurance, happy to hear her flutterings about Archie can maybe be explored, before skipping off adorably behind Veronica.
Immediately after, looking like 50s barbie in one of her sexy sweater-and-cinched-waist outfits of this season, Betty walks in slowmo to the beat of 80s synth music to ask Archie to the dance. I was so excited for her, but then Kevin FUCKING KELLER makes the record scratch happen by demanding that he must talk to Betty right this particular minute.
He takes her to the music room where all the sexual things happen at Riverdale High. He says he’s very sorry, mentions that he was cut from the program at the Sock Hop, and then tells Betty that she’s the “most wonderful, the ginchiest girl” which apparently means - sexy and cool and excellent - after which he asks Betty to go steady with him. Betty has doubts but the motherfucker (I hate Kevin so much right now) bulldozes over her very justified objections by promising that “things will be really different this time.” He says what I think is a true thing - “I love you” - followed by a lie - “You make my heart feel full.” Dude. He’s pulling out all the stops, manipulating the fuck out of this girl who he knows is so horny which horniness he hates because Kevin Keller in this timeline isn’t just gay because he likes men- he’s gay because he hates women. He can’t even bring himself to touch a piece of clothing over a tit. Betty has to put the pin on herself.
Ethel didn’t show up to detention because she was selling her artwork to the publisher. Mr Fieldstone turns out to not hate women like Kevin Keller. He finds it difficult to believe that Ethel, whose skin looks so clear and milky, whose collar is so lacey and sweet, could draw art to his liking, but once assured that it’s real, gives her the standing-greeting and handshake respect gestures that he did not give Jughead Jones. He nicknames her Freckles, saying, “You have some real talent” and calling her work “putrid (admiring).” And Jughead Jones, bless him, seems surprised but not at all jealous. He’s just beaming at her.
The publisher, all smiles, calls Jughead Boy Wonder, to go with her Freckles nickname, and wants to know if they’re boyfriend and girlfriend. Jug says they are “creative partners” to which she adds, “We are going to the Sock Hop together.”
Smithers has found Archie’s poem in the trash bin he was emptying and duly brought it up to her. Uhhh. So Smithers is going through Veronica’s trash every day!?! And I guess reporting on the contents to her parents?? Like, why is he examining the contents of the trashcans instead of just throwing them away?? In any case, I am unhappy because I think they’re going to read me Archie’s poem at some point.
Ethel is excited as she comes home to her terrifying parents. Her dad calls her a delinquent and they’re both immediately screaming at her. Ethel calls her mom a drunk and her dad ‘miserable all the time.’ She says she’s going to the Sock Hop, to which her mother hollers, OVER MY DEAD BODY. Oh, I’m so sorry for Ethel. Why can’t she have nice things? (I mean, because the actress is gifted and can shoulder big heavy burdens in the story, but still, it’s hell for the character.)
At the Sock Hop, which looks even weirder as a cultural activity now because it’s canon that the Cooper women wear super high heeled out door shoes to wash dishes, Clay approaches Kevin. He tells a terrified Kevin that he thinks Fangs is handsome, then adds that he thinks Kevin is handsome too. You know what Clay - Run! Run away! Kevin is a piece of shit! He asks for a private concert, and Kevin just looks like a deer in headlights.
Fangs, whom I hate since he undeservedly became Serpent King in S6, sings Tutti Fruitti. Everyone likes this song, because it’s a good song, but I genuinely hate this performance. I’m usually forgiving about the singing performances on Riverdale but this is unbearable. Toni asks Cheryl for a dance (Cheryl is absolutely correct that Fangs is most definitely not the next Chuck Berry. Midge is an utter airhead, given that she swoons at Fang’s horrible singing. Anyway, Toni takes to the dance-floor with Cheryl which for some reason their principal who is clearly fucking Dupont, I mean, Werther, is mad about.
They overburden the very limited vocal range of the Fangs actor by giving him Only You to sing. Overlaid over this horrendous singing is Archie’s poem which Veronica has memorized. She does a Sylvia Plath meets Ted Hughes thing of reciting a poem back at its poet. Except Archie (and uh, the Riverdale writers) are no Ted Hughes. The only thing that is getting me through it is the extremely wonderful pearls-of-many-sizes headband Veronica has on. It sets off her black hair perfectly. She asks him for a dance, but Archie after looking so thrilled, says no. And that’s because Veronica has been cockblocked by Archie’s mom.
When Archie leaves her behind, Veronica is rendered vulnerable to Julian Blossom oozing up to her. But she’s not the one with the shittiest end of the stick, actually because that honor goes to Betty, who looks so adoringly up at Kevin, who can’t bear to look at her, and seeks reassuring eye contact from Alice Cooper of all people. The evil principal - who has to be another woman hating gay man in this universe - comes to remind Cheryl that they live in a comp-het world. This breaks Cheryl’s heart, and I’m sure the sting is made even worse because Fangs is tunelessly crooning the beautiful song, Only You, in his horrendous butchered version.
In comes Ethel, blood smeared over her pretty pink outfit, blood competing with her sweet pale blue eyeshadow on her terrified face. Jughead runs to her as she collapses, and she tells him that something terrible has happened. I mean, Fangs is butchering a ballad, but yes, something even worse has apparently happened to my poor girl Ethel. Uh, also I didn’t know Jughead was packing that much cake behind so that’s another thing that’s been denied her. Ethel better not have the worst plot line after Betty this season! I swear to GOD.
#riverdale opinion#riverdale episode 119#anti kevin keller#too many thoughts about riverdale#riverdale positivity#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#Riverdale s6#riverdale recap#riverdale episode recap
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Riverdale S7 E6 Peep Show.
The episode opens with Jughead in bed reading comic books with the editorial condemning those same comic books. This is the second or third time they’ve shown Jughead Jones in his tight-fitting long johns in bed, reading. Is this- is this supposed to be fanservice for the Jughead girlies? (Of which I admit I am one). But I mean, Is it? The only other character I can recall who was regularly shown in this sort of underwear is Goofy from Disney. This is an odd choice, because so much of this episode revolves around showing bodies and how best to showcase them in underwear.
Anyway, as Jughead reads a Pep Comic issue which seems to be titled “Things [of?] Darkness,” he is suddenly reminded of something written by his “favorite pulp writer of all time, Brad Rayberry.” He picks up a volume of November County and Other stories by the same author, looking very concerned.
Immediately, he runs over to the publishing house to yell at his publisher about being a plagiarist. Jughead always does this in every universe - oh I’m suddenly sad I won’t be able to say this anymore after this season! Sob! - when he has a suspicion: He goes straight to the suspected perpetrator of whatever the crime or misdeed is and confronts then forthwith, but without any sort of plan as to what he’ll do if they deny it, which they invariably do, or how he will cope with the consequences of launching such a frontal attack. Betty and Archie are physically reckless, but Jughead is existentially reckless.
His publisher says that plagiarism is a word they don’t use at the publishing house (which is such a great side step. Did Mr. Publisher have a former career as a lawyer?) Then he makes up a story about how he tried to reach out to the proper author but then conveniently presumed said author was dead based on the lack of response. Which doesn’t justify plagiarism but he seems to think it does.
We are with Archie as he, along with me, tries to endure the unwelcome imposition that Uncle Frank is in his house. I’ve always despised Uncle Frank, and honestly, them showing me that he would have been even worse in the 1950s does not make me hate any iteration of him less by one iota. Archie is trying to fix his car, but Frank says he is “concerned.” He lays out all of Archie’s flaws, which are that he is a middling student, lying, not pulling his weight around the house, and the “business with the Blossom girl.”
Sir? Sir! I object. The lying & business with the Blossom girl was the exact opposite of a concerning lie, is it not? It turns out both are still technically virgins, which is what you all probably care most about, and he did it to save her and he went along with you all trying to force him to get married at 17! Anyway, Frank is a right piece of shit, because he pokes at Archie’s grief with “How do you think your dad would feel?”
Well sir, Archie may not know this but since I watched all previous seasons of Riverdale with close attention several times over, I know exactly how Fred would feel, and he indeed would feel proud of Archie. That was kind of Fred’s problem - even when he was annoyed at Archie, he was never less than proud.
Apparently, Frank was present when Fred took his leave of Archie to go “off to war” because he knows what the instructions were - “Take care of Mom and be the man of the house.”
I would have been much happier if Frank had died in the Korean War, and I’m sure Archie agrees. I’m also pretty sure that Fred DID NOT MEAN to burden his actual child with this sort of thing. He was trying to give his child something else to focus on rather than worry daily about his father 8,000 miles away. Frank as far as I can tell has no family of his own, so again, this business of childless men lecturing about or at other people’s children? Bah humbug, honestly. Maybe this is my being raised intensely Catholic while female, but honestly, this type of man should simply never ever say anything at all about children, child bearing, reproduction and so on.
So Archie, looking like he has a gun pointed to the back of his head (which is Frank staring into it like a psycho) apologizes to his mother about not being a ‘better son.’ I’m also back to very much disliking Mary Andrews. She is a bad mom. Why would you farm out actually raising your kid to FRANK of all people? Ugh. WHAT KIND OF MOTHER HAVE YOU BEEN MARY ANDREWS? Have you thought about that?? She’s been weak as shit against people like the Blossoms, arbitrary & unpredictable in her rule enforcement and generally a shitty parent.
Next door, Betty is sadly getting ready for school. I want to look inside Betty’s closet this season. She alway has a perfectly color coordinated belt or scarf (sometimes the same color, sometimes a wonderful contrast color) to go with her outfit. She looks across the way and is completely verklempt at the view of Archie’s moist abs, fresh from the shower. The music can’t possibly be 1950s- there’s synths and stuff. The song says “I feel so…. GOOOD.’ I can’t relate, but her vision is so good that she is capable of focusing on his happy trail from a whole house away. If only we all looked as pretty as she does (I LOVE the Grace kelly type hairdo she has happening) while agog with lust.
At school, in the locker room, the girls are putting on their gym outfits. What sort of sports can you play in outfits like these, by the way? Stiff yellow button down shirts with puffy sleeves tucked into high waisted bermuda shorts that barely cover your butt cheeks? These shorts are even belted tight at the waist.
In the sweetest, most kittenish way possible, Betty asks Veronica, “What’s sex like?”
…. I mean. OK. Lemme breathe. Because that was so like, the perfect delivery for a very by-the-books porno, no? Gorgeous blonde horny girl goes “What’s sex like?” while leaning forward, blinking winsomely with huge eyes. And she’s not even aware of the effect she has. What is GOING ON.
So Veronica is understandably shocked (hc: turned on and not out to herself) (Why is TONI not picking up on these vibes to invite Veronica for a cuppa at the Dark Room already? Is this because they are both tops??) but only gently says that it’s a bit early in the morning for this sort of talk (“I’ve barely just had my morning java!”). What happens next is a huge part of why I adore Veronica Lodge above all girls but especially Betty (who, even if not this season, is for plot reasons not all that big on truth telling): She meets truth and candor with truth and candor. When Betty says she doesn’t know what sex is like and would like to hear, which is a pretty brave thing to ask someone, Veronica responds with the same attitude to confess that she herself is still a virgin. Betty has the absolute perfect come-back: I just assumed because you’re just so sexy! Betty really knows how to talk to a girl!
I suppose the idea is that the 1950s were a super repressed time in America (which I don’t think it actually was in actuality but OK) such that even the sensual Veronica Lodge is - gasp! - still a virgin but actually since this is reflective of my own high school experience I found it very comforting to have it represented on the screen. “You don’t have to have sex to be sexy,” is what Veronica says.
Betty would like advice on how to carry herself more like Veronica. Veronica suggests perfume and heels, then brings out the idea of sexy lingerie. “Soft fabric against my skin” is what she says as some horny trumpeteer goes “Wah wah Waaaaah” in the background. OK so I guess I’ve tried out the wrong kinds of lingerie because that shit was itchy as fuck. Veronica walks her fingers flirtatiously up Betty’s arm as she says, “Say, why don’t you give lingerie a twirl?” Betty looks very turned on, first just by the purring way Veronica is talking about being sexy, second about the idea of Veronica in lingerie that makes her already perfect body “look fantastic” and about doing something sexual with Veronica. I mean possibly also I guess she is excited about having a guide to learn about lingerie but that’s like below tertiary. Betty is going to go over to Veronica’s later to try on her used underwear (which I find a strange idea but ok).
At the student lounge, Cheryl approaches Toni to give her the lesbian pulp novel back. Cheryl insists on calling her “Antoinette.” I am insane for all these fabulous belts these girls are all wearing this season. I love the gloss on the red patent leather one that Cheryl is sporting. When asked what she thinks about the lesbian pulp classic (the real world version of which was one of the rare ones where neither woman died for being gay at the end), she responds to the cover art using very distant artsy language as in, Cheryl finds “two voluptuous, feminine forms in close proximity to each other” quite pleasant. Toni pulls out her go-to pick up line for Riverdale girls: She asks the girl to go to the Dark Room for a coffee. See, I knew Toni was trying to put the moves on Betty when she was consoling her after the dumping of Kevin!
Cheryl refuses - “Oh I couldn’t *possibly!” - and that’s because she’s too busy “relaunching the Vixens.” She needles Toni about finding cheerleading “far too square,” essentially daring her to try out for the squad.
The hostage situation with Archie and Uncle Fucking Frank continues, this time at the Principal’s office. Uncle Fucking Frank is still standing executioner distance behind Archie. Archie is trying to do everything with his face to signal that he is not ok, please help, while saying what his abductor wants him to say: “I wanna be at least a B student.” His principal is too dim to catch these hints, and anyway he’s probably turned on by the weird dominance thing that he’s witnessing right this minute. It turns out Uncle Fucking Frank is in cahoots with this asshole, the principal, enough to have private conversations with him!
At the tryouts for the cheerleading squad, Cheryl is holding court. Evelyn Evernever is there! She’s already a cheerleader. Welcome back Evelyn! I hope you’re unhinged and evil in this world too!
Toni bursts in like Aragorn, pushing the double doors wide open. The song playing in the soundtrack (probably in Cheryl’s head) states: It’s Too Darn Hot as Toni smugly makes her slo-mo entrance looking, actually, Too Darn Hot. Cheryl is so happy to see Toni, and is extra happy because she put on her blazing red lipstick just in case Toni showed up (she had more of a nude lip earlier in the day for their initial encounter). She’s also forbidden Evenlyn from wearing her reddish hair down, lol. Evelyn condescendingly tells Toni that she’s not “on the list” so she can’t try out, but Cheryl overrules her (because it’s never a cheerocracy!).
The two lesbians smile adoring at each other. Something about just breathing the air with Toni on her home ground (as a cheerleader) makes Cheryl glow like a Renaissance angel. Toni actually has a routine prepared, and we go to it. Cheryl watches all of Toni’s tryout routine in a totally horny haze, slowing it down in her mind as she almost drools. The song is also egging her on - something something “Refill the cup with my baby tonight” and “I’d like to sup with my baby tonight” etc which are all statements about cunnilingus. The room gets all dark for her. She doesn’t have the orgasm (of the mind) that she did the first time she watched Toni do a dance routine, but it’s close. Cheryl says this whole performance “razzed her berries.” This means looking at Toni made her nips tingle. Then she adds that “I haven’t seen pompom technique like that in years” which means she can tell Toni is (like all dykes) great with her hands.
Evelyn is making a very sour face behind her. Somehow Cheryl knows this, so she says since she “alone” speaks for the Vixens, she immediately offers Toni a spot on the team. Evelyn tries to make a case for procedural fairness only to get screamed at. The other girls all welcome Toni to the team.
At the dinner table, Uncle Fucking Frank makes a terrible announcement. “It looks like I’m going to be sticking around for a while.” Oh no. OH NO. Why? Because Principal Featherhead asked him “to be the basketball team’s head coach.” I’m horrified. Also Frank is short and stocky. I know zip about sports but isn’t basketball for tall lean people?
So Uncle Fucking Frank has no family - not even a lady - and no kids and he just moved into his brother’s widow’s house to bully his nephew, and because all this is not enough, he begged his way into getting a job at this nephew’s school. “Asked me” my ass What the fuck is his fixation on Archie?
Archie understandably says he doesn’t want to play basketball while Frank is gonna be coach. Not playing is not a way out of the Uncle Fucking Frank close contact - if Archie won’t play, then he can be waterboy. What is happening? I hate Mary so much. See, I knew, I KNEW that my being OK with Mary Andrews was not going to last. Why the fuck did she even have this child? Ugh.
At Veronica’s, Betty is feeling shy about showing how she looks in Veronica’s underwear, though she wasn’t shy about wearing Veronica’s underwear to begin with. Did they go shopping? Is this NEW underwear? Be that as it may, Veronica looks very eager on the bed, quaffing mimosas, and eating chocolates. When Betty finally emerges, Veronica’s eyes light up. “I knew it would look perfect on you!” The problem is, Betty feels embarrassed, which Veronica doesn’t understand. Looking like Bettie Page exactly, Veronica says, “Bettie Page herself would go ape for you.” Bettie Page’s personal orientation was not, uh, lesbian so that is a weird thing to say, Veronica. Just say you want to fuck Betty. Even though Betty looks close to tears, Veronica wants to keep looking at her, so makes her come in front of the mirror so she can keep looking at her under the guise of giving her some sort of sexual koan: “I am a gorgeous, powerful, sexy siren, at the height of my womanly powers.” I mean, this is very sweet, but I did have a flashback to Hannah Gadsby going - *I* am in my prime!! *I* am in my prime!! - meaning her 40-something self. The koan does work on Betty though, who is actually persuaded by the end.
Jughead has straight up gone to see the author Rayberry. He introduces himself as a writer at Pep Comics, then bluntly says “they’re ripping you off.” Rayberry wants to know why Jughead wants him to sue his own employer. Jughead is full on fangirling - “I think you’re the tops.” Even though Rayberry just wants to get rid of him, Jughead won’t take no for an answer, and even though the author looks slovenly while he keeps slamming the door in his face, he doesn’t give up.
Evelyn has given Cheryl a visit, to say that she is “uncomfortable” with Toni being on the squad not because she’s black (sure?) but because she’s “a lezzie.” I mean, it’s probably a bit of both right? Cheryl shuts down both objections - Riverdale has been fully integrated, and Toni Topaz is not… that, so Evelyn needs to “put an egg in your shoe and beat it.” That is the weirdest way to say that I’ve ever heard. I kinda like it. Cheryl wants to watch her show which is Oh Mija!
At the Dark Room, Toni is taunted for becoming a “paper shaker” by the Lezzie Lizzo, who is sporting a beret with a studded Serpents jacket. Lizzo mocks her for “still birddogging that redheaded closet case.” Toni tries to cover it up with some sort of sanctimonious bullshit - she is now the first ever black cheerleader at Riverdale. I’m with Lizzo - I don’t believe her one bit. “Oh so it’s *political* for you! [Much scoffing, then completely insincerely] Yeah I got it. That makes sense.” But Lizzo says she understands Toni Topaz for knuckling under the white patriarchy’s demeaning demands for women in the interests of getting access to Cheryl’s pussy. She says it nicer than me AND she acknowledges that Cheryl is very hot. “That’s one cherry lollipop I’d happily lick.”
I knew Lizzo was a good egg the first time I saw her. Why o why won’t Toni give her a chance? And what does Lizzo do all day? How old is she? Is she a high school drop out?? Can I have more Lizzo and much less Evelyn???
The next morning, Archie discovers that Uncle Fucking Frank has confiscated his car, to be returned to him when his “grades are where they should be.” This is because Uncle Fucking Frank is obsessed with Archie, leading to his wanting to spend every possible moment with him, including the ride to school.
Veronica is super excited to approach Betty the same morning to ask her exactly what kind of underwear she is wearing. This is extremely heterosexual behavior among women, right? Oh, and Veronica acknowledges that the ‘lingerie’ type underwear is neither silky nor comfortable (I mean granted, I haven’t ever tried the like, thousand-dollars a pop La Perla stuff so maybe those are??) - “How will ever get used to lace panties if you don’t wear them every day?” she chastises when it turns out Betty hasn’t put them on today for fear of being seen in them and being thought a “nymphomaniac.”
THIS FEAR IS SPECIFICALLY KEVIN FUCKING KELLER’S FAULT. I HATE YOU SO MUCH KEVIN.
Veronica thinks this whole “nympho” talk was invented by misogynist (gay) men to hurt women. I agree. She also diagnoses Betty with “needing a man.” Usually, this sort of comment is not true about the woman about whom it is said, but Betty actually does need a man. She is SO horny.
Betty tells Veronica that she has her eye on Archie. Veronica doesn’t like it, but she prioritizes Betty’s well being over her own, so rushes her to speak to Archie before Betty can “talk yourself out of it” by which Veronica means “myself.”
Archie is bent over a book in the student lounge. While Veronica listens from her hidden vantage point (with Betty’s awareness), Betty, her big bambi eyes brimming with adoration, asks Archie out on a movie date. Archie actually tells her the truth - he’d love to, but he can’t because of Uncle Fucking Frank. Veronica’s face falls when he says he’d love to, then brightens when he says he can’t. Betty doesn’t believe Archie though, at all. She thinks she’s being rejected.
She cries about it on Veronica’s shoulder, who continues to say the right and decent thing - that what Archie said might be the truth. Cheerful now that they have both been apparently rejected by Archie, Veronica suggests that they both find some airheads down at Stonewall Prep to play with. Betty cheerfully agrees to this plan.
At basketball practice, Julian is being a piece of shit to Archie who is trying to appease Uncle Frank because his mother is blind to the abuse he’s being subjected to. Why would you leave a child in the care of a childless middle aged uncle? Mary Andrews makes me so mad.
Evelyn Evernever, looking very ginchy in the ginchiest outfit (I love the 50s cheerleader uniform - cream sweater, navy skirt), breaks into Toni’s locker, immediately finding the lesbian book. She gets caught red-handed, but is brazen enough to try to confront Toni about her lesbianism. Cheryl denied it, she tells her. Toni threatens her with violence, then insists that Evelyn tell her exactly what Cheryl said.
At the comic publisher’s, Jughead is getting to see his name in print. He is so pleased - “It’s so boss, Boss!” - and being really adorable about it. (By the way, is this a throwback to the comics? Was Jughead in the comics just always off in his own world like this?). With perfect timing, Rayberry, all dressed up in his confrontation suit, bursts in, demanding to know who Fieldstone is. He launches into an angry speech about suing Pep Comics for plagiarism. Jughead jumps in to mediate, and this middle aged man and old man let him do this. The author and publisher shake hands on compensating Rayberry for the plagiarized stories. For his troubles, Jughead gets to have a dinner date with his favorite pulp writer at his favorite diner. Right off the bat, Rayberry even hints that he might ask for Jughead to be the one to adapt his stories going forward for the comics. Jughead just gushes to the man about how he loves his stories in “all the different pulp magazines” then proceeds to list all of them: Weird Tales, Startling Stories, Fantastic Adventures. He looks so happy - he can’t stop smiling. It’s so cute.
Then Rayberry asks whether his father approves of these literary aspirations. Across all universes, terrible Faifather FP is a fail, because the light immediately dims in Jughead’s face. Rayberry causally says his own father didn’t approve of his “literary aspirations” but Jughead simply doesn’t know. And in addition to inflicting me with Uncle Fucking Frank again, Riverdale fails me additionally but not killing off FP. Riverdale, girl, why? So even in this universe created by his angelic girlfriend, Jughead is abandoned by his father yet again. Rayberry tells him to write about his trauma from paternal abandonment. When Jughead asks if Rayberry would be willing to read his more literary attempt, Rayberry sighs and says “Oh, and we were having such a swell time.” Jughead fully looks like he is going to break apart into sad, salty-tear soaked little pieces at this apparent rejection until Rayberry says he was joking, that of course he’d be happy to read Jughead’s efforts, and they laugh about it.
OK so this is why Jughead is so disinterested in girls and Veronica and so on. He is in too much pain from his father. He is in desperate need of a father figure, but Fred Andrews who served that function in the other universe is gone (and possibly didn’t even meet Jughead in this world, since he never met Cheryl either), other male authority figures are all non-starters (Dupont hates him, the principal hates him, Sheriff Keller is a moron, Clifford Blossom is evil, Uncle Fucking Frank is himself), and his publisher/editor who served this role for him in the other universe acts just as exploitative towards Jughead as FP does so he’s no appropriate either. And Riverdale’s main narrative arc - the Jugular Vein, if you will - is that Jughead Jones Cannot Get What He Wants, so we should know by now that this business with Rayberry will never work out.
The song that plays in the transition to the next scene is “Lead Me Father.” This show and its song choices! We cut to Archie doing child labor for Uncle Fucking Frank in the gym. he takes a break to handle a basketball. I don’t know this song, but it says things like “Pick Me Up When I Stumble, So the World Won’t Know.” I guess basketball is tied to his father’s death for Archie somehow, which is why he doesn’t want to play it anymore, especially not with Uncle Fucking Frank as the goddamn coach. Also I don’t know whose daddy is like this but if your daddy is like this, let me just say, Wow you are lucky.
This is intercut with Jughead trying to write about his father, as the lyrics gravely intone about “Give me the strength for a song.” He picks up a photo of a man who is not the FP we know, sitting scowling on a bike. The singer croons that he wants to help some “poor troubled weary worker along.” Jughead’s face goes through complicated set of emotions - he misses his dad, he’s bitter about his abandonment, and above all, he’s very very sad. Jughead Jones’s tears of heartbreak are always just under the surface, which is why he keeps not wanting to be here in his reality and (doubling down on my thesis) he resents it when people are emotionally secure enough to try to take a risk to make their lives even better (like, you know, get laid with a sexy person to share a good time).
The next morning, Uncle Fucking Frank unilaterally tells Archie that he now has a job at the Diner, pumping gas. This seems like a really specifically american thing, to overload one’s kids - Archie, who is not bright and also not that interested in school and not given very good brains by his very stupid mother, is supposed to get his grades up but also perform slave labor for the basketball team and further perform child labor at the gas pump all at the same time. This is not how that works. (Listen to your bespectacled East Asian -I know what I”m talking about.)
Meanwhile, Jughead is showing off his Homeroom of Horrors Pep Comics issue, written by JUGHEAD JUGULAR JONES. His friends want to celebrate with burgers. Jughead tells them he has a meeting with Rayberry at his house. He’s so happy.
Toni confronts Cheryl about telling Evelyn that Toni isn’t gay. She completely glosses over Cheryl saying they have a “big problem” about MIDGE. Toni says she’s not ashamed of who she is or who she likes and should not be considered someone to be rescued. Cheryl backs down immediately, answering in a soft voice that she doesn’t know what Toni wants Cheryl to say. Cheryl apologizes, so Toni says that she’s had enough of pursuing Cheryl. And that turns out to be the key thing, because the prospect of losing Toni’s attention altogether is what makes Cheryl gin up the courage to say, out loud, using her voice, to another person that she is attracted to girls.
Atta girl Cheryl!
“And I think maybe I’m attracted to you!” Cheryl says, starting to cry. Toni is merciless, and wants her to actually confess - that Cheryl KNOWS she is attracted to Toni.
Jughead is at the Rayberry apartment, which looks really familiar to me. Is it the Toni/Fangs Throuple Cursed Apartment with Fucking Kevin?? Or is it Jughead and Tabitha’s apartment?? (The windows are too different.) Rayberry says he’s willing to read Jughead’s writing, then offers him tea, which Jughead accepts. Jughead is a bad guest because opens a closed box and steals a manuscript with a working title that I don’t catch the reference to because I never do. Jughead straight up steals the manuscript. Plagiarism and manuscript theft are apparently big themes for Jughead (sometimes the manuscript is a computer file), but I am not clear on what the theme is supposed to say, yet... this was very ill judged of him.
Meanwhile, Cheryl and Toni are on their first date, kind of, during which Toni takes it upon herself to out both Kevin and Clay, even though she says Cheryl isn’t supposed to talk about it with other people. This does not seem like a very good beginning. Cheryl in this universe has an aunt Carol, who moved to Greenwich Village to be a lesbian and a writer. “A sapphic sexual deviant” according to Penelope. Carol apparently gets to live loving women. Toni is bisexual in this world too, but it was only a problem when she made out with girls. Her grandmother is for some reason absolutely accepting of Toni being queer. Cheryl says that her family will only accept her if she plays her role correctly. She’s now ready for something else, so Toni holds her hand.
Archie is working at night, and of course Julian oozes up to get his tank filled. Inside the Diner, Bee and Vee are on a date with one dark haired and one light haired WASP boy each from the private school. Betty is bored as fuck by her date. Pop brings a thermos of coffee to Archie. Archie says that Fred used to play basketball with him all the time, when Pops says Fred was a legendary basketball player. Pops says Fred was a true American hero. Archie agrees, looking genuinely happy for the first time
Jughead has stayed up all night reading Rayberry’s “Jupiter Journals” manuscript that he stole when he was personally invited to that man's house AND imposed on him to read his vomit draft. Jughead! Why are you like this! For some reason, he is not in his skin tight Goofy long-johns. Instead he is in the patented slutty Jughead Jones tank top over striped pajamas. Does this mean something? Or is this the underwear and loungewear that Veronica got for him when she redid his traincar? Jughead says the book is “like Flash Gordon if Fitzgerald had written it.” I have no idea what Flash Gordon is. Jughead in his inappropriate way, because he is so love-starved, immediately decides to confront Rayberry about shoving his light under a bushel or something, not cognizant of the fact that having stolen the manuscript is going to have bad consequences.
At school, Veronica wants to know what happened with the preppy that walked Betty home, which was a big nothing. There was no spark because Betty wants to sleep with Archie and nobody else. She says this means she’s doomed since he turned her down flat. Veronica says Romeo & Juliet had “logistical problems but they figured it out.”
And for the first time in seven years, at the THIRD Romeo & Juliet mention (Jughead calling Betty Juliet, Toni calling Fangs and Midge Romeo & Juliet and now Veronica) someone finally says the correct thing: “Veronica, they both DIED.”
Bless Veronica though because she knows something about Romeo & Juliet, so she retorts: “Not until Act 5 and only after they lost their cherries.”
Is this foreshadowing? Is this how this sojourn to 1955 is going to end??
Veronica has an idea. She says that Barchie should have long meaningful late night conversations to get close to Archie.
She also uses the word “gatekeeping.” Earlier on she used the term “gaslighting” about the purpose of the word “nymphomaniac.” Is the slow breaking down of the world of 1955 as created by Tabitha Tate? Why is Veronica using 2020s lingo like this in her 50s universe?
Betty said she’d love to, but she knows Archie doesn’t have a phone in his room. Veronica is so smart - she immediately gets to the heart of the matter. “You can look into ARchie’s bedroom window through yours?” she asks. She wants to know immediately if Betty has seen Archie [dot dot dot] and I’m choosing to understand this as “naked” to which Betty says, sounding very much like she really needs a vibrator, “Yes. Many, MANY times!” Veronica wants in on the peep show.
Inside the school, Julian Blossom is really asking for it, calling Archie a grease monkey to complain about the car service, then calls him waterboy and to get him to fetch a soda. Julian then takes the name of God, I mean Fred, in vain, saying he’s going to obliterate Fred’s record since Archie’s not going to be the one. Archie pushes him, Julian pushes back, then Archie punches him right in the face.
What was the casting requirement for Julian Blossom? Have a punchable face? Because he’s now been socked in the face by no less than Ethel, then Jughead, and now Archie.
It is Archie’s explosion into violence that makes Mary spring into action. I don’t have kids but this is bad parenting, right? Like, she’s doing all the things wrong. Mary only reacts meaningfully when Archie is violent, like today. She finally womans up enough to tell Uncle Fucking Frank to back off, declares that since she is Archie’s mother, she will take the lead on this issue.
While that’s going on, violence of a different, distinctly more feminine character is happening among the cheerleaders. Cheryl has assigned being the flyer to Toni, which Evelyn very much resents because that was her role. Cheryl comes very close to saying this is a Cheerocracy but what she actually says is that if Evelyn doesn’t like it she can quit immediately. Evelyn looks at the others for support, but none is to be had. OK so we know from the earlier seasons what Evelyn is like, and she is shown to be openly homophobic here, but also given that Kevin got to do all that HE did and still got called BRAVE by Betty as sweet music played over the horrible scene, I think Evelyn deserved better. So Evelyn capitulates as Toni smirks at Cheryl approvingly.
Finally, finally, Mary is asking Archie what is going on. She wants to know if Archie is avoiding basketball because of Frank. Archie says it’s not because of Frank, it’s because of Fred’s absence. There is an anvil in his heart whenever he plays basketball because he misses his father. He’s also afraid of not being as good as Fred. Mary says a truthful thing -that Fred would be proud of Archie. She’s also going to make Frank ease up on him. We’ll see about that.
Jughead has gone charging ahead to go to Rayberry, to tell him outright that he stole a manuscript from him and then read it. Jughead thinks that his telling an already published and well known author that he has “got to get [something] published” is somehow going to get him forgiveness for the breach of trust. When Rayberry tries to get his bearings, Jughead smiles as he says that it was “only for a night.” Rayberry gets angry, and kicks Jughead out. Jughead's heart breaks right there, but he did it to himself. He wanted to speed run to intimacy with this potential father figure (who also confessed to having a difficult relationship with his own parent) but made a colossal mistake by being too hungry & desperate. Rayberry also breaks his own coffee cup by throwing it, which makes Jughead go running, which probably means he grew up in a violent home.
In the girls’ locker room, Choni get their first kiss. Toni was turned on by Cheryl’s show of dominance, even though Cheryl is apparently sexually a total bottom.
And finally, Veronica and Betty are blatantly peeping at Archie undressing. Veronica starts narrating in the most cheesy way: “Stand back Ringling Brothers because THIS is the greatest show on earth!”
OK so I agree that Archie’s abs are pretty fantastic but why does this keep happening to him? In place of Kevin now here’s Veronica egging Betty on to do this voyeurism. Veronica even wants binoculars. Archie sees them though before Veronica can get a gander at his junk. Both girls collapse to the floor. Veronica finds the whole situation pretty funny, but Betty is so embarrassed, saying the two of them are being Peeping Patties. Also? Betty understands a lot of Veronica’s film references, though I suppose Rear Window is very much a mainstream blockbuster.
The next morning, Betty tells Veronica she couldn’t sleep a wink. Veronica was also embarrassed but like many perpetrators of sexual wrong acts she has come around to thinking that Archie was asking for it with his strutting while having abs. She also hopes Archie will be too embarrassed to confront them.
She is utterly wrong about this, because Archie has come directly to them. He doesn’t seem mad however. Archie wants to talk to ONLY Betty. Veronica makes like a MILF, tells Archie to “keep up the good work” before walking away. Archie says he saw B and V peeping on him. Betty does here what Betty always does and she lies, until Archie assures her that he isn’t mad, and actually wants to do a mutual peep show.
This next part is very very cute though. The lust makes the two of them completely braindead so they assure each other that they will both be in their own bedrooms at midnight (so they can do this mutual peep show). Archie is so really, truly, very excited, and Betty is BEYOND excited.
Suddenly, Archie wants to play basketball. Apparently 50s Jughead is not wrong about this part - Archie is entirely fueled by sex. Because he has sex related prospects tonight, suddenly he is “here to play.” He also stands up to Frank, telling him how irrelevant he is -”I’m not doing this for you.” Frank seems to think that his ‘tough love’ worked. I wish I could punch him in the nuts.
A teacher has ratted out Jughead’s author status to Werther (Dupont!). Why are these people at work so very, very late??
Betty and Archie are so ready to do their long distance strip tease/ peep show. Belts, then shirts (and Betty has on the sexy lingerie underneath!), then come Archie’s abs! Betty starts to remove her skirt (though with her unbuttoned blouse still on. And now they are down to just their underwear!
OH NO. RECORD SCRATCH.
I am cockblocked by BOTH Uncle Fucking Frank AND Hal Cooper! Oh Riverdale, that was really cruel. “What in the hell is going on here??” indeed! You title the episode Peep Show and then do THIS?
#i am finally caught up! Next ep drops June 1 here!#riverdale opinon#riverdale ep 7.6#riverdale episode 122#riverdale s7 recap#riverdale s7#Riverdale s6#riverdale recap#riverdale episode recap
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