Riverdale Episode 1.10 Recap “The Lost Weekend”
0
0
Read Time:11 Minute, 6 Second
Previously on Riverdale: We get a reminder of the team when the Riverdale football team decided to keep tangible record of their sexual assault, and we see Betty Cooper (Lili Reinhart) making Chuck Clayton (Jordan Calloway) release his truth while she has a literal mental breakdown. We re-learn that the Blossoms might have something to do with Hiram Lodge being in jail and round it out with Valerie dumping Archie’s trifling butt like a bad habit. Atta girl.
Jughead (Cole Sprouse) opens with his usual vintage movie style narration this time bringing themes of chaos and control intermixed with scenes from a wild house party at Archie’s place. The foreshadowing is a bit misleading which I think could have been an interesting tactic, but falls kind of short with no delivery. More on that a little later.
Of course the main focus is the birthday party that will be held for Jughead and we get a reminder of such as Fred (Luke Perry) wishes Juggy a happy birthday and laments that he won’t be there, instead he’s meeting up with Archie’s mom. Since an entire five minutes have gone by without mentioning Archie (KJ Apa), he decides to let us know how he feels about Fred’s trip to finalize his divorce and how he wants his mommy back. We find out that Mary left two years ago and made Fred be the one to break the bad news. In this reveal we see where Archie got his terribleness from, and are also given the setup for the party of the night.
We switch over to Veronica (Camila Mendes) and Hermione (Marisol Nichols) speaking with Hiram’s lawyer about the character testimonies. Veronica is less than enthused and ready to bow out completely. This idea only becomes even more cemented when Betty and Archie tell Veronica about what Archie overheard at the Blossoms. Later, in a ridiculous scene in which she’s analyzing numbers and wearing ridiculous glasses, we find out that the Blossoms have been paying a “fee” to the Lodge family for literal decades. When relaying this information to her mother, Hermione advises Veronica to drop it since their involvement might implicate Hiram in Jason Blossom’s murder. Later, Veronica receives a letter from her father that in turn implicated Hermione. This revelation leads Veronica to testify on her father’s behalf to protect her mother (for which she receives another string of pearls from her dad). It also leads her into the arms of one Archibald Andrews.
This town is full of crazy little interconnected secrets.
The worst kept one seems to be about Jughead’s birthday. Archie tells Betty about it and about their tradition of taking in a double feature at The Bijou. He then foists the duty off on Betty who insists he comes with. Because the attention wouldn’t be focused on him, Archie bows out complaining of being a third wheel. A funny thing happens where Archie says a quote about being the three musketeers and Betty tells him there are four, clearly with an idea in mind. There’s literally a moment on Archie’s face where we see him not understand the reference, and then simply not care as he walks away.
Does this show know that Archie is terrible? I’ve had a lot of discussions about this and while some disagree with me, I’m of the mindset that the problem isn’t KJ Apa. I think he does a capable job so the real question is whether or not the terribleness of Archie is purposeful? Are the writers complicit in making him a beacon of overindulgent (albeit middle class) privilege or do they think it’s a good thing? Giving him character, but over extending his flaws without enough relatability to actually make you care past the abs and that glorious red hair? Even Archie’s problems have an issue of polarity where on one side he’s dealing with the separation of his parents and on the other end he’s gets outed as a teacher “lover” with mommy issues. And both seem to be handled with the same teenage reckless abandon. When dealing with teen shows on the CW there’s always an air of adulthood and Riverdale is no exception, but the stakes seem to try to both be shocking and milquetoast? Chaos, control, chaos, control.
A good example of this is Cheryl’s actions. At the bottom of the b-story we have Cheryl (Madelaine Petsch) who is angry because Veronica won when they danced for their lives and Cheryl was made to sashay away. Cheryl decides then to team up with Chuck, who we mostly know as predator, to crash the party Betty has put together for Jughead at Archie’s house. Why does Cheryl still talk to Chuck? Is being lazily beaten at a cheer off enough to align with the future president of the date rapists of America? I get the logistics of why you need Chuck and Cheryl to team up, but the moral implications are so fleeting. At one point Betty calls Chuck out for actually having to deal with the consequences of his actions and he just shoos it off his shoulder like she’s a nagging bird and not someone that should possibly act as his MIA conscious. It’s a bit disconcerting, but still pretty entertaining.Because in all of the good Betty is, Chuck brings out the bad in her.
Let’s talk a little more about the metamorphosis of dark!Betty. I find that while Archie is just strangely all over the place, Betty seems to be grounded in her chaos. Although the title irks her, she really is the quintessential “girl next door”, the issue just has more to do with the definition. Betty is certainly not typical, and I like that the show doesn’t do a lot to tarnish her morality, but also gives her a frankly terrifying edge. There’s a problem when she’s losing control to the point of piercing her own skin and drawing blood to the surface (and even more of a problem when she won’t get some darned Neosporin), but it’s so in character that we’re willing to wait it out. This seems to be the main difference between Betty and Archie. Even when Betty does something crazy or even in a way that could be read as selfish, it’s usually to help others. Archie’s selfishness makes it difficult to really empathize, even when his actions have good outcomes.
A lot of Betty’s journey for this ep has to do with her wanting to throw a birthday party for the ever resistant Jughead. We get their first fight, but of course Jughead is pretty perfect and they make up, but not before we see Jughead deal with his own insecurities and Betty finally acknowledge the inherent darkness that plagues her. It’s a pretty heady set of scenes with particular resonance from Cole Sprouse with some solid delivery. Again, they’ve managed to make Jughead a much more nuanced character which again begs the question what happened to Archie?! But I digress.
Betty does end up having a heart to heart with Mama Cooper (Madchen Amick) about boys and keeping secrets from them. Mama is in full support of keeping your business to yourself as she’d gotten burned by Betty’s father. We learn later in the ep that Mama Cooper is from the southside (along with certain serpent FP Jones (Skeet Ulrich)) originally and had her own sort of Polly/Jason like come-up with Hal. It really puts that situation into perspective, and I like the pacing of that storyline so far. I will note that although Madchen looks amazing, she also just signed on to be a “Professional Advisor” for the Blue and Gold. Which, is utter nonsense, but I guess we’ll need that information later.
Of course the episode rounds out at Archie’s house where Jughead and Betty arrive for the surprise party. Even though Betty originally just wanted inner circle only, it turns out that Jughead’s circle is much smaller only including an already drunk Archie still feeling the sting from his parents impending divorce, but not including such people as everyone else who is not Archie or Betty. Even Barb (Shannon Purser, who I now just realized I called Barb when she’s in fact Ethel, but let’s be real, she’s Barb) is there which, okay, I get it, but she deserves so much better. Joaquin on the other hand really has no business being there. Learn to separate your buddies and your bussy, Kevin (CaseyCott), this is not going to end well for you.
Betty clearly knows something is wrong which of course makes her ridiculously anxious culminating in bringing out a cake and singing a hauntingly awkward rendition of Happy Birthday to Jughead and y’all… it was equal part of yikes and amazing!
After Cheryl and Chuck crash (and of course in this case “crash” means Archie selfishly wants to block out his own problems so he lets the football guys set up kegs. To recap: Archie Andrews lets the guy who sexually harassed his friends and the girl that is basically keeping his best friend’s sister hostage into his house because his mother and father who’d been separated for two years are finally getting a divorce, and oh look! Valerie showed up, you think she might get back with Archie?! SIGH! They have to know, right? The writers have to know he’s trash!) the party kicks into full gear, but our core four don’t seem to be having the blast the previews showed. Betty is constantly on the search for Jughead who, even after his dad’s surprise appearance, is trying to hide and leave. Archie is trying to convince Val to take him back, but she accurately reads him for the hot mess he is and he’s left with beer all over his shirt. Ronnie just can’t deal at all and is running around still preoccupied by her dad’s letter and the revelation that FP (the guy she saw take the handoff from her mom) is Jughead’s dad. Meanwhile poor Juggy is just breaking down all over the place and the divide between the fantasy of party night and the reality would be better drawn if we didn’t instantly go back into fantasy mode.
Cheryl stops the party and suggests a game of “Secrets and Sinners” which is the Riverdale version of Truth or Dare. I’m surprised it doesn’t involve maple syrup. Then, without anyone slapping her in the face, she begins to read the peeps for filth. Veronica, because she’s insistent on me liking her, paints a tale of unrequited sibling twincest so vivid that if anyone didn’t already think Cheryl was in love with Jason, they do now (including Cheryl). It’s also outed that Archie slept with the teacher and was at the lake the day of Jason’s murder and some other facts which are definitely important, but not so much as why these facts came from Doily?! I can spend a whole five more pages talking about how weird that was, but instead I’ll leave you with this classic Cheryl line that sums it up nicely, “Doily’s a psychopath, everyone knows this!”
Finally someone comes to their senses while Chuck is roasting Betty (which, they have some weird chemistry and I am not about seeing where that leads). Jughead steps up and clocks Chuck, but then gets one returned. FP comes out of the shadows and kicks Chuck and everyone else out of the party.
In a night full of revealed secrets, a very big one gets created when Veronica and Archie confide in each other. Of course we find out that Archie doesn’t even care that his parents are breaking up, he just doesn’t like change, and Veronica reveals she’s scared about the implication of her testimony pointing bad fingers at her own mother. Because those problems are definitely on par with each other, Veronica and Archie hookup.
Really, the first thing that needs to happen is they need to tell Betty, but of course they won’t and it’s going to be a mess when it’s revealed in a way that’s completely out of their control.
We also focus back on Kevin’s relationship with Joaquin which now has interested parties not only in FP, but in Betty Cooper as well. I hope it was fun while it lasted, Kevin.
Because we were so close to the end without another Archie mention, Fred decides to come home with a surprise. And that surprise is Archie’s mom, Mary (Molly Ringwald)! She smiles her pearly whites at Archie and we know for a fact next week is going to be unbearable.
See you then!
Next time on Riverdale:
Mama Blossom has a house of wigs she’s probably snatched over the years. Molly Ringwald tries to get Archie to Chi Town and Cheryl lays down the law for a snooping Polly.
Happy
0 %
Sad
0 %
Excited
0 %
Sleepy
0 %
Angry
0 %
Surprise
0 %