Welcome back all you Riverdale fans! It’s mid-season finale time and while it didn’t pack quite the same punch as last season’s, it seems that Riverdale wants to take a few pages out of Gotham’s playbook and go the “No Man’s Land” route. This season has twisted and turned so much that I don’t know what’s going to happen at all so let’s get on with the thoughts! As always, spoilers ahead.
1. Crimes to the Future
Welp, the midseason has come and gone and we’ve gotten at least 10 fewer answers than I was expecting. I’m glad they did this, in the way they did it, but would it have killed them to have at least provided some token answers. Let’s run through the threads that remain woefully mysterious, shall we?
First up, The Farm. We know about as much as we did when Gracie, I mean, Evelyn Evernever was first introduced, which is minimal at best. It’s obvious Edgar and his farm commune of brainwashing is tied to, or heading, the G&G craze, the seizures and everything else so why haven’t we gotten more info on them? I hope they start to address this come January.
Next up is the Gargoyle King. Where’d he come from? Why haven’t we heard from him before and if Hiram really has been working for him this whole time, what’s his end goal? Hiram has always sought power but this season sees him constructing a criminal empire not for himself but for some greater plan that’s been in the works since, I presume, he got high at school with the other G&Gers? His whole plan confuses me and did the writers really think we’d believe Hiram was the Gargoyle King after the fake-outs from last season and the way too obvious set-up from last week? I dunno but his end-game seems to have shifted and I really wonder if he’s huffing his own supply.
Finally, we’ve got the biggest question on all of our minds, where is “Red Son” Supergirl?! Wait. Sorry. Wrong show. Honestly, I tried to find a third big plot thread that has been left unresolved but now that Archie’s been cleared of charges, the Warden’s dead and G&G has become the defacto driving plot, there isn’t all that much remaining. Yes, there are giant questions and holes that will be filled as the season continues but most of the ones I thought would still be around have either been furthered enough (Archie on the run, Veronica fighting her dad, Betty in the asylum) or are newly added/plot’s that simply aren’t being developed/plots that have ended (Kevin in ROTC, Archie in prison, Cheryl & Toni vs Cheryl’s mom.)
It’s gonna be a strange back-half of the season to be sure.
2. Fast Company
After two and a half seasons, we finally get to meet Jellybean and Mama Jones. . .at a junkyard in Toledo stealing car radios. I don’t want to knock this choice, because I really like the portrayals, but why the hell would they do that? This choice breaks a lot of what was established before in terms of the relationship between Jughead, FP, and the mom. For what reason did she leave FP and why’d she take Jellybean if she was going to end up in a similar situation anyhow?
However, the more I interrogate that feeling, the more I realize that the show was merely playing on the shared cultural meta-narrative, that shorthand writers use that lets the audience fill-in the blanks with a presumed understanding. I always assumed that Mama Jones left FP because he was a deadbeat and that she wanted to leave to go to a place more akin to Archie’s home. That she wanted to leave the rough & tumble gang life behind. While the first part is true, the second wasn’t, as evidenced by her willingness to, presumably, murder Penny Peabody. It’s a characterization I would not have expected so good for them for subverting it.
It did weaken the conversations she had with Jughead, mostly because there wasn’t enough time to really dissect all the baggage he’s carrying, and I hope this just means they’re leaving it for later, but it was still a disappointment.
Continued below3. A Dangerous Method
I found myself losing focus a lot during this episode and that doesn’t bode well for what was supposed to be a mid-season finale. Granted, it seemed like they were using this more as an episode to do a status quo shift rather than as a resolution to a larger set of plotlines. There was, however, one thread that wrapped up nicely in a way that gave some answers: Betty in the asylum.
We learned where G&G started, giving us more to speculate on. We learned that there wasn’t actually a Gargoyle King in the basement and that the Sisters aren’t buying into the gospel of the Gargoyle King, merely using the image to scare these drugged out girls, which is a sentence that makes me feel gross and uncomfortable. The Sisters of Quiet Mercy are an organization that Riverdale desperately wants to make the epitome of the worst kind of mental health facility/orphanage. It’s succeeded but each new revelation about that place makes me wonder how, even in her brainwashed state, Mrs. Cooper could send her daughter there and make Polly OK with that.
Regardless, these revelations re-frame the game and makes me believe that it was Penelope Blossom that took the game out. There’s no way that she knows nothing, especially not after that display at the school board meeting and her playing with Veronica two weeks ago and whatever the heck was going on when she was coated in syrup. My money is on it being Reggie/Reggie’s dad though. It’s just out there to be possible and with the increased prominence that Reggie has had this season, it would fit. Or it’s someone we haven’t met yet and they’ve just been biding their time.
4. The Fly
Archie’s sojourn through Ohio has only really been going on for two episodes but is such an interesting idea for Arch. Archie’s emotional arc is very different now than what was presented in episode 1 of the season. There it was all about accepting the guilt of the death of the guy from Shadow Lake and his complacency by aligning himself with Hiram for the majority of the season. He spent his time in prison, before he became an underground fighter for the Warden, moving on and becoming the good man he was before the Black Hood.
He was unlearning the poison that Hiram had dripped in his ears. Once out, though, his journey morphed into him trying run away from his past under the pretense of protecting everyone. It’s not unfair considering the circumstances but it’s a real bummer that this is the kind of thing we have to sit through again. In the end, though, Archie’s trek north should help steel his morals and shine light on who he is after searching. Archie has always been the least cynical of the cast, I hope they keep him this way.
5. Shivers; or, They Came from Within
I have the distinct feeling that the episode title is more apropos than it otherwise appears. “Outbreak” refers to the presumption/cover-up that the seizures are caused by some virus and then the quarantine that Hiram & Hermione have put into motion; I still believe that’s caused by Evelyn but the how is the unknown part. It also refers to the spread of G&G, Fizzle Rocks, and whatever magic is causing people to act irrationally against previously established characteristics. Mrs.Cooper, Ethel, even Hiram at the end — all of them have this hint of madness that feel off.
While I don’t think we’ll get a mystical explanation for everything, I do think Fizzle Rocks plays a big part in everything. People are being dosed, somehow, and the ROTC people are going to start doing strange things in the coming weeks, I can feel it. We’ve been shown they’re already getting high off the stuff. Whatever the case is, I’m intrigued by the set-up. Isolating the casts within the town, and also trapping Jug, FP, and Archie out of it, Riverdale has crafted the perfect incubator for high levels of paranoia and the slow descent of a town into madness.The outbreak is here, who is infected and with what still remains to be seen.
Continued belowThat about does it for now! What did you all think of the mid-season finale? Were you as mixed on it as I was? Let me know in the comments and come back on January 16th (17st for this review) for the return of Riverdale from it’s winter slumber. From the previews, it looks like things are only going to get stranger. Until then, remember syrup is very viscous, fight evil, and be careful around Jellybeans.
. . .What WAS up with that syrup scene?
Best Line of the Night:
Jellybean: “It’s JB now, Kid Kerouac.”
