Riverdale Season 3 Has Pulled Me Back In

Sometimes shows start great and become a crucial part of pop culture history and slowly devolve into a pale imitation of their former selves perhaps unable to keep up momentum, maybe they just burnt too fast and too bright.

This is especially true of teen shows either taking hold of a fair and stories becoming fan service to funnel a million fanfics. Or with your target audience growing up quicker than your perpetual teenagers you have to go to new heights to keep them interested.

We no longer live in the golden age of television, we’re in a period of modified nostalgia, reboots of reboots and revivals no one else asked for. Instead of attempting to recapture some of that magic and some of the audience from these programs.

The first season of Riverdale was a pleasant surprise to me, the updated story of Archie Comics in a noir mystery had an ambiguous, dreamy quality with the murder of Jason Blossom driving the ten episode season. The cast was strong, the writing was funny, and the conclusion to the story was satisfying.

And the first season was pretty much a runaway success, Gossip Girl from Gen Z or Veronica Mars with smartphones as you will, however, the second season just felt different. I think a lot of it had to do with the 22 episode season a lot of the episodes felt frustratingly pointless and then there were the storylines that went nowhere. I think a lot of it was attempting to flesh out the town of Riverdale, make the city feel real, however, the dreamy ambiguity of Riverdale was part of its charm.

Was there anyone who was tuning in every week to learn more about real estate dealings or Archie’s apprenticeship as a consigliere?

I missed more than a few episodes and only just recently caught up on the third season, but I’m pleased to announce I’m here for it the main reason being; it’s so fucking stupid I love every second.

The two main conflicts of the season centre around the ‘Farm’ cult Betty’s sister Polly went off too in season one and a Dungeons and Dragons rip-off game that may or may not have lead to the death of two different people. Oh yeah, Archie’s is now in a prison fight club, but tbh I don’t super care.

They’ve seemingly decided to get rid of any pretence of the actual education system within the confines of the high school, and there’s been no real nod to age-progression, and maybe that’s how it should be. Veronica owns Pop’s diner and looks set to make a speakeasy underneath it, Jughead runs an upstart biker gang, and Betty is his ‘queen.’ Babies are flying. Dungeons and dragons are getting murderery. The cheerleader’s sexy dance outside the prison, the prison is named after two 1920s murderers.

A show that went so far out of its way to establish them as normal kids, in the beginning, this show is now amazingly ridiculous, and I love it.

I have no idea what’s going on, motivations and alliances seemingly change from one moment to the next and right now I’m down for that. Riverdale is a full comic book with no pretence of realism, this is especially evident in the dialogue, but it’s just so silly.

The cult aspect seems the most promising new storyline for the season; the farm has been mentioned since the first season when Polly ran away. I’m ready to see how those dynamics influence the town and the magical realism quality of the floating babies.

The cult aspect seems the most promising new storyline for the season; the farm has been mentioned since the first season when Polly ran away. I’m ready to see how those dynamics influence the town and the magical realism quality of the floating babies.

It’s campy it’s fun and depending on how they take the rest of the season the Gargoyles aspect could also be enjoyable as well.

The only complaint I have is that once again Archie’s storyline feels like it’s divided from the rest of the cast (this time he’s in prison) I’m probably going to do another post on why Riverdale should bite the bullet and kill Archie soonish.

But if you’re like me and found Riverdale season 2 to be lacking then I would advise you to revisit this show, it’s fun, it’s silly and is refusing to take itself too seriously the perfect escape from the cold outside.

 

 

 

Riverdale ‘La Grande Illusion’ Review

Maple Syrup. When you’re entire towns drama hinges on the second best thing to put on waffles (#nutella&strawberries4lyf) you really get the opportunity to build drama from the ground up.

This episode is all drama as the repercussions of Jason Blossom’s death still continue over town, this time in the form of a ‘tree tapping’ ceremony that Cheryl invites Archie to attend with her.

Whether or not the coloring of both Archie and the Blossoms is intentional or not, any romance between Cheryl and Archie just feel positively creepy. But Archie being the sweet puppy he is, attends and discovers everything isn’t so sweet in the maple syrup business.

Meaning intrepid journalist Mrs. Cooper can use the testimony of one shaky eyewitness to conduct a full expose on the Blossoms and how they are being ousted from the board. Again Mächen Amick still feels like a standout performer as she carefully balances Mrs. Cooper’s anger and grief in the same scenes.

Veronica Lodge also gets a chance to shine this episode as befriends Ethel Mugg after she suspects a suicide, Veronica’s guilt over her once bitchy past motivates her to overcompensate with making her feel better. The sins of the parent seem to be a running theme throughout the episode and Veronica is especially tortured when she learns her father’s role in putting Ethel and her family in the position their in.

Mr. Andrews continues his streak of being the best parent out of a bad bunch learning that the Lodges are behind the project he’s working on he wisely breaks things off with Hermoine and gets himself a stake in the business. And he warns his son over the strange world of Blossom’s he’s getting himself into.

Val makes an appearance as the most underserved character in the show so far, seemingly Val feels like a real-life girl who has accidentally got herself caught up in the crazy world of Riverdale so when Cheryl implies she’s coming after her boyfriend she knows she’s better than this mess and walks away. #teamVal

At the banquet, Archie looks more like his comic book counterpart than ever before.Polly confesses the reason she remains at the Blossom mansion is to find out if or what the Blossom’s know about Jason’s death. In the race to find out Jason’s killer, Polly is now suddenly feeling like the dark horse, less unhinged and more focused she could be taking some lessons from her mother.

Veronica gains redemption at the end of the episode as Ethel doesn’t blame her for what either of their fathers did, choosing to look beyond that to the here and now. But the mysterious Hiram Lodge’s presence is still firmly felt in Riverdale as Archie discovers it’s the Blossoms who had him put in jail and concludes he could have taken some Shakespearean level of revenge and murdered their only son…

Next week Molly Ringwald is making an appearance as Archie’s mom, do you think I’ll finally have my answer on any Blossom/Andrews link?

Also maple syrup, yes or no?

Riverdale ‘The Outsiders’ Review

Alternate episode title:

Building sites and baby showers

Riverdale returned to our screens last night and the teen noir examining the intricacies of small town life, some sweet and some disturbing.

The appearance of Polly Cooper changes the dynamics in Riverdale. Now the eldest Cooper is living with the Lodges Veronica decides to fix everything by throwing a baby shower.

Noticeably the family casting for the Coopers is A+ and as a lot of the Cooper family dynamics are explored within the episode I can’t help but feel the show is rolling up to a big reveal where all the small comments and insults thrown around begin to make sense.

Meanwhile, the guys from Fred Andrew’s building site leave as Mr. Blossom offers them a better deal. So the most logical course of action is to hire a bunch of teenagers. I don’t know shit about construction but I’m pretty sure that’s fifty types of illegal.

But Archie is in his fuck-boy redemption arc is helping his dad and when some thugs come to the worksite and beat the shit out of Moose he decides he’s going to get revenge.

The whole thing with the Southside Serpents is just proving to be very confusing at the moment as we don’t really know what is going on with them even as Archie walks into the lion’s den…

In the first half of the episode, we learn that the Southside Serpents were dealing drugs and Jason Blossom was involved in that. In the second half of the episode, we learn that Archie doesn’t know Jughead’s dad is their leader and Jughead didn’t know they were dealing drugs and that Fred might have known Jughead’s dad was the leader… I don’t know.

Andrews and Jones snr. hash it out, it’s a vaguely lovely moment realizing that not all Riverdale parents are trash (for at least a solid five minutes anyway)

Following a particularly dramatic baby shower, the moment between Mr. and Mrs. Cooper is superbly acted and once again leaves us with the impression the Blossoms might be a little more than just kooky.

Mächen Amick is really the standout of the episode as we begin to see the cold visage of type A, Stepford mom that has been crowding the Cooper daughters for the past eight episodes. The scene with just Betty and Mrs Cooper alone in the blue-washed house is especially heartbreaking. Honestly, the way a lot of this episode is shot is really beautiful. it sounds condescending to say ‘for a CW show’ but just the amount of thought put into every shot isn’t typical for this kind of show and is really appreciated.

Polly ends up moving in with the Blossoms in their creepy mansion on the hill. A weird choice for anyone that’s seen any horror movie ever, but you do you girl. If spoilers are to be believed then the cultish aspects surrounding the Blossom family are going to be kicked into high gear next week…

Riverdale ‘Faster, Pussycats! Kill! Kill!’ Review

Riverdale has slowly been ticking off its high school tropes in the past few episodes, we’ve had dances, we’ve had football games, we’ve had the very overused trope of high school music teacher sleeping with a student then turning out to be someone that stole the real Ms. Grundy identity.

Now we’ve got the school talent show and a Josie centric episode to boot. Tonally this episode is worlds away from the gothic horror of the previous episode moreover no one seems to notice that Cheryl Blossom got sent away to a boarding school last episode.

Josie’s has been something of a type-a enigma for most of the season, always there with purfect performance or a biting one-liner. This episode we learn her father is a jazz musician and kind of a massive douche, looking down on his daughter’s pop aspirations. This mixed with her mother’s pushy attitude we begin to see how Josie’s facade is built via mounting pressure no teen should have to worry about.

We see how this pressure leads her to fight with the very lovely Val after she agrees to sing with Archie due to his stage fright.

This leads us to Archie who seems to be the most disconnected main character on television as the main meat of the Riverdale story which is the Jason Blossom murder. The significant disconnect this week is when he asks Veronica to help with his performance before replacing her with Val with little regard for anyone’s feelings.

Thus bringing us once again to my theory that Riverdale might just be the origin story for Archie Andrews, the fuckboy.

In retaliation, Veronica decides to join the Pussycats as they begin to work on a Donna Summer cover in order to impress Josie’s real shitty dad.

Although talent show drama isn’t the only thing going on this week, Jughead and Betty delve deeper into the Jason Blossom case and finally go talk with Polly who has been sent to a convent. Now as we all suspected Betty reunites with her sister who’s pregnant (come on, why else do you send your teenager to a nunnery.) She talks about how she and Jason were going to run away that fourth of July weekend before Mrs Cooper had her taken away. Polly goes on to explain they had a car stashed away and exactly where Betty can find it.

The whole Cooper storyline just seems macabre, in a suburban horror movie-like way. Tossing your kid into a convent when you can’t control them anymore and manipulating your other daughter into submission. A part of me is willing to bet that one or more Coopers killed Jason.

Although the Coopers aren’t the only shifty parents in Riverdale, Hermoine Lodge restarts things with Mr Andrews much to Veronica’s chagrin. With her dad locked up in jail, she’s less than impressed when Hermoine tries to make her sign some developing contract over to Mr Andrews and decides to forge her daughter’s signature anyway.

If Riverdale is planning on doing a murder a season I suspect that the next one is going to be one of the parents in a vigilante justice motif.

After the making up and the breaking up, Val rejoins the Pussycats for a wonderful rendition of Feel Love and then proceeds to leave halfway through.

Seriously, dude you fly out and miss three concerts, give your sixteen-year-old daughter grief for not doing ‘real music’ and then leave halfway through a three-minute song. Asshole.

But this is also the episode where everyone gets coupled up, Val and Archie kiss and Jughead and Betty also kiss. I don’t hate either pairing but I do think that Val probably deserves someone a lil better unless Archie steps his game up.

Towards the end Jughead and Betty find the car Polly was talking about and do the responsible thing of taking pictures of the evidence and going immediately to the authorities (Pretty Little Liars girls take note!) Because when they get back it’s up in smoke which could mean whoever killed Jason followed them to the car and knew it’d be incriminating.

Overall I don’t think this was the best episode of Riverdale, I think we’ve got better to come but it was a great balance of the high school world mixed with the mystery and the parent’s douchebaggery.

And you can check out the trailer for next weeks episode right here: