TV Review: Riverdale (Season 3, Episode 19)

With only three episodes left to go until the season finale, Riverdale had a lot of work to do to start tying up all its loose ends.

Obviously, not everything is resolved in this episode, but it seems as if we are finally starting to work towards some form of resolution, with big Farm revelations being key in this episode. This does lead to a slightly overstuffed episode though, as the writers have left themselves a lot of work to do.

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We open where we left off last week, with the Jones family. They finally seem to have noticed that Jellybean is missing and after finding a note which tells them they have to play G&G in order to get Jellybean back with Kurtz taking on the role as gamemaster. The game forces Gladys to admit that she is the new Fizzle Rocks dealer in town, which FP is none too happy about, but they don’t have time to dwell on that as they are given their first challenge: to rob Pops and bring the money back.

Apparently, no one remembers that Pops was robbed last season and will probably have protection against it happening again, so they don’t even stop to consider that he might have a gun. Suffice to say, that particular plan does not go very well, & FP ends up getting a bullet for his troubles. Jughead reveals himself in order to stop the shooting, but at that point, it doesn’t really matter, they’re one Jones down.

Gladys and Jughead then take Kurtz to the bunker, not the greatest idea on Jughead’s part, losing the last secret place he has away from his sketchy mother, but you do you. Their next challenge is “Trial With The Cyclops” which naturally means Penny Peabody popping back up. Yep, she’s alive, just one eye down. In a sequence set to Josie singing Amy Winehouse’s “Back To Black” which is either genius or incredibly jarring, you decide, the two fight with ninja swords. Apparently, Gladys is a secretly trained warrior because she seems to know exactly what to do and after a fight that conveniently lasts the length of a song, plunges a dagger into Penny’s leg.

Gladys doesn’t come out of the fight unscathed, however, with a broken arm and a squashed kidney, which apparently happened when no one was looking because she seemed totally fine during the fight. After dropping his mother off at the hospital, Jug goes to finish the game. Kurtz tells him that his final challenge is to climb into a freezer (for reasons?) but Jug insists on calling Jellybean first to check that she is okay. Of course, as soon as he gets into the freezer, Kurtz slams the door and gives the order to kill Jellybean (I mean only Jughead didn’t see that one coming).

Meanwhile, Betty makes good on her promise to get her father transferred to Hiram Lodge’s prison, which apparently has waterfront rooms (is this a prison or a hotel? Who can say?). After Hiram agrees, Betty returns to her usual work of exposing the Farm as a cult. This week she’s digging into Evelyn’s background and discovers that Evelyn has been transferred to multiple different high schools for over a decade. That’s right. Evelyn Evernever is 26 years old (I’m assuming this is a sly nod to the fact that all of Riverdale’s cast are 20 somethings playing teens). Oh but wait, I forgot the best part, Evelyn is Edgar’s WIFE. Yup that’s right, WIFE. This storyline gets weirder and weirder.

Toni is still working as her inside woman and reveals that Edgar plans to adopt Juniper and Dagwood after his wedding to Alice, which is all kinds of creepy given that they’d be his step-grandchildren after the wedding anyway. Betty ropes in Penelope to try and retrieve the twins from the Farm, and she helps….well sort of. She manages to get Dagwood away, but Juniper remains because of course, only the boy is able to escape from the creepy cult. So of course, Betty has to break in, with the help of Toni, to retrieve her niece.

But naturally, this is all a trick, Toni has also been brainwashed by the Farm (they work quick!) and Betty is ambushed by the Farm. Alice is well aware of Evelyn’s marriage to Edgar and they are entering into some kind of polyamorous union. Edgar tries to convince Betty to join the cult, by tempting her with all her favourite people (none of whom are actually in that room) and it nearly works, but then Betty remembers the levitating babies and is straight out of there. The final nail in what is not a great episode for Betty personally is that she finds out her dad died during his prison transfer. All in all, Betty is not having a great time this week.

Archie meanwhile is in a spiral of self-deprecation after his fight last week resulted in Randy Ronson’s death. With everything that’s going on this week, no one really has time for Archie’s nonsense, and honestly, his storyline is once again the least interesting. Basically, it ends with Archie paying the family to ease his conscience and Veronica convinces him to carry on boxing. Also, Josie and Archie break up because she is going to New York to be on the Katy Keene spinoff.

As for the Jones family, the episode ends with Jug breaking his way out of the freezer & discovering that the Gargoyle King killed Kurtz. Of course, Jellybean is fine, FP gets out of jail and Gladys leaves town, with Jellybean staying behind.

Originally published at https://www.thenationalstudent.com.