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riverdale-retread · 2 years

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Riverdale S6 E21 (#116 The Stand)

Jughead Jones the writer is a person who either can’t or won’t abide by the rules of any genre. His fiction was basically a memoir, and his journalism is one in which he becomes the story. “This may be the last article I ever write” says journalist Jughead Jones, indifferent to the fact that in true journalism the object is for the writer to disappear, pretending instead to convey the voice of ‘objective bystander.’ What Jughead is writing is a personal essay.

Percival can levitate now, apparently, which is funny. Western media often takes very Good Things from Eastern media (such as the Buddha sitting lotus position when he achieved awakening) and then say YES, THE EVIL DOES THIS. Have him put on a druid’s costume and walk around a makeshift Stonehenge or something - wouldn’t that be more his speed?

Archie is given a military strategist role so he makes like Napoleon to move little dolls around on a map while the women do all the actual work. Heather and Cheryl find the opening of the Hellmouth by using two different kinds of folk witchcraft, after which Tabitha brings in the Catholic imagery (the one true religion? LOL). Placing the Holy Grail (remind me again how exactly she has this??) fills it with what looks like oil.

Percival has put the town on lockdown- nothing in or out.

Reggie is a step too late to intercept Percival at his shop. He’s instructed to burn it down. Reggie rescues the portrait of Hiram that Percival took from Veronica, then watches as Cheryl sets fire to the entire building. (I’m sad that Jughead didn’t get to see this. He would’ve had a much better time than Reggie.)

I find it impossible to feel anything other than glee and relief at the decapitations of Alice Cooper, Tom Keller and Uncle Fucking Frank. Not even Betty, with her Virgin Mary blue sweater, being very upset while talking to her sister Polly (who has come back wrong, You can’t tell me otherwise), can make me feel bad about it. Kevin seeking comfort from Fangs and Toni about his dad also didn’t make me feel a bit moved. I’m happy to see Moose though, who has come through in a way that Kevin has never come through for anyone, to lend Kevin emotional support in his time of bereavement.

Veronica comes to check in on Archie. Archie does not mourn Uncle Fucking Frank, not even a little bit. This is the smartest that Archie has ever been on this show and the most I’ve ever liked him. The second smartest that Archie has ever been comes immediately after, when he asks Veronica to come as the negotiation expert for when Archie will meet Percival to discuss the rules of engagement for this conflict.

Before they have the sit down with Percival, The Gang, such as it is, gather at the El Royal. Under a big photo of Fred, these are the people sitting or standing in a big circle, in order:

Cheryl, Betty, Archie, Veronica, Fangs, Toni, Tabita, Jughead, Kevin, Moose sitting behind Kevin and just outside the ‘main’ circle, and Reggie.

It’s a pretty depressing discussion. Betty correctly says this is likely a trap. Despite their efforts last episode, they don’t really know everything Percival wants in any specific way, and they really don’t have the tools to stop him from getting the things they DO know he wants.

What they want is also kind of odd to me. They want to negotiate the return of Alice, Tom and Frank.

Beyond two of them being parents of two in the core circle, why do they want these three people back? Simply from the manner in which they died I suppose. They were shit people and shit parents but Tom and Alice didn’t deserve to be guillotined on live tv. (Uncle Fucking Frank totally deserved it and I stand by that).

In any case, the lengths that the group is willing to go to get the three dead olds back is something the group itself can’t agree on. Baby Anthony (access to or custody of) is obviously a non starter. Veronica suggests offering half of Riverdale. Jughead objects to a reinstatement of a Northside/Southside creation in Riverdale. Curiously, Fangs and Toni do not object.

Cheryl wants to kill Percival, but Tabitha says no because she has seen multiple futures, most of which are bad. Rashness apparently should be avoided.

Over music that tries to ramp up the tension, Veronica asks the bereaved - well, really just Betty and Kevin - whether they’re willing to say goodbye to their mommy and daddy for good, or willing to give something valuable to a literal demonic sorcerer to get them back. Since sacrificing something they want for the benefit of other people are not traits that either Betty or Kevin have demonstrated, the answer appears to be no.

Just before Veronica and Archie take off for their sit down with Percival, Tabitha tells them that shooting Percival point blank actually helped come to a non-apocalypse resolution in one of the futures that she saw. Armed with this knowledge, Veronica and Archie arrive at the Babylonium.

It seems to no longer be functioning as a casino and is generally a Ghoulie hangout. Twyla Twyst is there in very interesting pants. Guess who are Ghoulies now, from mind control?

I had to actually pause to recognize Dr. Curdle Jr. because he just looks like he took to being a Ghoulie. Looks BORN to it. Doctor Curdle Junior and Principal Weatherbee are now confirmed as lovers right? Right? That’s what we’re being presented with, right? Also Principal Weatherbeen has GUNS for days AND is wearing eyeliner and I AM HERE FOR IT.

I think the lady who walked by in a sullen trance right after that was the social worker lady but she didn’t make as much of an impact.

At the sit down itself, in the now slightly rotten looking Babylonium CEO office, the power imbalance is so bad. Percival is sitting behind a desk, making Veronica and Archie stand. Veronica is super powerful, though, because Percival tells her he has taken all sorts of measures to protect against her venom (filters in nostrils, skin coated with sealant).

Veronica and Archie offer a very simple exchange: 3 dead bodies in exchange for Archie giving himself up as prisoner.

“I’ll be your prisoner.”

Archie COULD HAVE just left it at that, but then he gets weird about it. He adds.

“You can do whatever you want to me.”

I mean. That generally tends to be what being a prisoner under these circumstances would mean, right?

Then it gets weird. If he was trying to negotiate the terms of his imprisonment, he could’ve tried setting boundaries for things he does NOT want to put up with, but Archie starts listing things that sound like stuff he WANTS Percival to do:

starve me

chain me up

And Percival tries to head Archie off at the pass because I think he is slightly worried about what else Archie is going to say, because he interrupts with a mild, ‘Sounds great’ while Archie is still talking.

I admit I tensed up when the next thing Archie says is, “Force me-” but it turns out he was coming to a conclusion: “Force me out of the final battle.”

Percival brandishes some terrible looking weapon at them, explaining that this was forged and fortified with magic. He bluntly states that he doesn’t need to negotiate with any of them because he has so many magic weapons at his disposal.

Then Veronica, overriding Jughead’s earlier objection, offers to split the town in half. Percival doesn’t want that either. He just wants revenge on the descendants of the original set of people who tried to get him executed, and to own all of Riverdale. He wants total surrender.

Veronica makes the mistake of monologuing right before she takes out the gun to shoot him, which gives Percival time to do magic and transform the gun into a toy. The sarcastic lip-bite of sadness he makes at Veronica, whom he clearly thinks is so cute, makes me want to shoot Percival myself.

Percival offers to be ‘merciful and generous’ if they surrender, rather than fight, at the Diner (“wherever that is these days”) at 8:30 that night. He claims he is willing to be “merciful and generous.” Percival offers the return of the three bodies so that the others can ‘mourn or bury’ them. Ghoulies are shown wheeling caskets out for the failed negotiators as Percival looks down from on high.

I really like the theatricality of Ghoulie dress. One woman is wearing black and white checked print leggings that have red flowers printed on top of the check like bloody wounds.

Twyla wants to know why Percival gave them “what they want.” To which she gets condescended to (“How little you know of true warfare”) but we get treated to Percival calling Archie and Co. “meddlesome.” Percival says actually that he’s “paying them back in kind” for the plans that the gang ruined. Twyla doesn’t know what that means but doesn’t ask.

Back at the Diner, Cheryl is trying to explain her resurrection powers. I’m completely distracted by the fact that her skintight, high necked dress comes with matching gloves attached. The gloves aren’t fingerless exactly, but they expose the underside of her hands. What is this outfit?

Betty wants to say goodbye to her mother’s body. This is when they discover that Percival did a reverse Titus Andronicus and withheld the decapitated heads. This is a very sick, intense joke. Cheryl says she can’t do the resurrection unless the bodies are ‘whole.’

Jughead uses the words “our loved ones” in this extremely generous way to describe the three dead, but maybe this is for the article.

To balance out the grimness of what has gone before, we are treated to Jughead and Tabitha being sweet in their apartment, as a breather. I like the subtle color coordinating they’re doing with Jabitha, even if they seem dressed for entirely different seasons. Tabitha is in a violet summer top, sleeveless and light. Jughead is a warm red-brown fall sweater, long sleeved. Jughead is making a sandwich which on closer inspection seems to be cream cheese, tomato slices and lettuce on white bread. This is probably why Tabitha didn’t want one.

Tabitha, tears in her eyes, urges Jughead to escape from Riverdale (where nobody can leave) by using his portal powers, because as D-Day approaches, so does his death. Jughead solemnly says that he is not going to leave Tabitha (first and foremost). I don’t think his resurrection was voluntary, because Cheryl just forced it on him, but he’s reframed it to be something he did for a purpose that is meaningful to him: To do what he can to stave off the apocalypse, partially, but to stay with Tabitha so she doesn’t have to face whatever is coming without him.

The courtly gesture of Jughead kissing Tabitha’s hand as she weeps over his inevitable doom, that he himself has fully accepted, was very moving.

Meanwhile, Percival mutters Latin over a collection of big creepy dolls. One of them looks sewn together like Frankenstein’s monster.

Reggie is day drinking (beer) with Archie at Archie’s house, asking what the plan is. Archie wants to take the battle to the forest, and he lays out his plan - Cheryl is in charge of fighting with magic, Jughead is in charge of fighting with telepathy, and everyone else just um, fights. When Archie goes to get him another beer, something turns in Reggie and Bingo the unkillable magic dog starts growling.

Betty doesn’t want to see Polly right now, saying she wants to be alone, when she hears an intruder in her house.

Veronica is day drinking (absinthe) at her apartment with the lovely Kandinsky when her abuelita comes knocking.

Heather and Cheryl are at the main sitting room in Thornhill which is always dark, with lots of red candles lit. Just as Heather is about to tell Cheryl something important about Bailey’s Comet, Jason comes in calling for Cheryl in a creepily sing-song way. They call each other Cher-Cher and Jay-Jay.

Heather can tell something is wrong immediately, but Cheryl is highly manipulable by Jason- when he bursts out with WHY ARE YOU ALWAYS SO MEAN TO ME, she tries to appease him. Jason shoots an arrow right at Heather!

Even when pierced by an arrow, Heather has the presence of mind to tell that she wasn’t the actual target, urging Cheryl to run for it. Jason shoots the Cheryl Fox-head self portrait right in the center of its chest as Cheryl escapes.

Reggie continues to get the BEST LINES this season (“Are you a wizard?” being one).

“You know what Bro?” - STAB!!! - “You’re not that smart.”

From one himbo to another, oh my! The deadpan delivery of this made me cackle with joy. And this unleashed the most deranged and exciting few minutes of Riverdale EVER.

Betty sneaks down to her living room to see a big half naked man rummaging through her kitchen drawers, clearly looking for a weapon.

I LOVE BETTY ACTION HERO SO MUCH YOU GUYS! I can’t even begin to tell you.

You know how Cheryl screamed when Jason shot the arrow at her? That’s a typical Cheryl reaction. As a woman who screams at that same high pitch at every upset, I identify with Cheryl, but I admire Betty a lot more. Betty never screams or goes into denial at moments like this. She always makes the correct decisions when faced with mortal danger - accepts the danger, accepts the reality of the situation, scans the room for the best available weapon, retrieves said weapon and forms a plan around it which she then enacts with very little hesitation. She COULD have run out the door, but she decides not to. She’s gonna fucking DEAL with it.

I LOVE THIS about her.

In this instance, she uses her standby weapon - the poker at the fireplace. She takes advantage of the element of surprise. The thing is, the man turns out to be a revivified Glen, who also found the chainsaw equivalent - an electrified meat carver. When he turned it on to lurch at Betty I was HOOTING because this was clearly Chekhov’s chainsaw being introduced. Also, was Glen always so immensely muscular? Hot damn. Death looks very good on him.

Can we talk about though how perfect Betty’s kitchen is? A low vase of hydrangeas on the kitchen island, bowls of fruit hanging above the window, the ropes of garlic on the cabinet side.

Back at Veronica’s Abuelita Lodge gets the MOST DELICIOUS moment. She gets to make like Tony Montana, points a giant gun at Veronica, and have a SAY HELLO TO MY LITTLE FRIEND scene! “I wanted this to be a surprise!!” she says, in her sweet grandmotherly voice, before blowing Veronica’s door off its hinges as Veronica scampers away like a hunted deer.

Friends, I got HIGH from watching that elegant little lady wielding this enormous gun with grim determination and a joyful smirk on her face! Can we have more scenes like this in everything, where the short old woman shoots the shit out of things? I WANT THIS.

Archie is being stabbed by Reggie, Betty is being attacked by an angry ex boyfriend and Veronica is being shot at by her grandmother and we cut to the perfect peace at Tabitha’s place.

In their beautifully appointed little apartment, Jughead has persuaded Tabitha to partake of his sandwich. (The cream cheese, tomato and lettuce on white bread. This bothers me a lot, the meagerness.) Then Tabitha looks ill at ease before gifting yet another wonderful thing to Jughead Jones. For once, he’s not the person saying the strange thing.

“My sense of the divine is tingling!” Tabitha cries, before running towards the problem.

Betty beats the shit out of the giant zombie Glen by using all her wiles and upper body strength. After Glen is incapacitated, Betty goes right to the garage to get the CHAINSAW. The zombie breaks through the door but Betty just continues to rev up the engine. She even says a fun quip - COME GET SOME - before charging at him with it.

OMG I LOVE THIS SO MUCH.

Meanwhile, Abuelita Lodge is doing a thing that Freud was too stupid and misogynist to theorize about. When the daughter with an Elektra complex succeeds in defeating her father, what does the mother of that father think about the situation?

“You’re gonna burn in hell for everything that you’ve done!” says Abuelita Lodge. Veronica hides in her black bathtub. I did not know that Veronica could slime things! She’s paralyzed her grandmother somewhat, as she explains, climbing out.

Instead of moving OUT of the house, Archie has ended up somehow in his bedroom with the very resolutely homicidal Reggie. The stabbing looks very painful. The wrestling they do as Reggie keeps stabbing Archie looks very homoerotic. Is it simply because he’s super fit that Reggie is so difficult for Archie to overpower? They even collapse away from each other once Reggie is unconscious in an overtly homoereotic way.

At Thornhill, it is revealed that Jason has a sadistic side. He’s hunting down his sister, armed with bow and arrow, calling out “Marco” as she keeps hiding from him. Even though the blocking shows Jason that shooting at Cheryl is shooting at himself (She’s hiding behind a big mirror) he refuses to desist. Cheryl, drenched in tears, is forced to admit that she shouldn’t have brought him back to life. Then she sets Jason on fire.

Tabitha rushes in on Archie (he was the ‘soul’ that was dying) along with Bingo (where’s he been all this time?) as he lays dying on the floor of his bedroom, bleeding out. Bingo starts licking at Archie’s bloody wounds in a way that grossed me out. It made me yell “GET THE DOG OFF HIM” at Tabitha before the cut.

Veronica’s toxin, while toxic, apparently also counteracts evil mind control, because her Abuelita is back to being a loving grandmother again.

Polly comes to check in on Betty. Betty has the bloody chainsaw laid out on the dining room table in front of her, along with a half emptied bottle of whisky. She calls Glen ‘her old boss’ rather than ‘my ex boyfriend’ when explaining what she went through. Calmly, she says “his body parts are twitching in the garage.”

Cheryl, bouncing back, apologizes to Heather, who forgives her, and then they remember they had something important to talk about with each other.

At the Andrews House, Archie’s abs are looking perfect and fabulous. He doesn’t even have any scarring. Tabitha says that Bingo’s saliva ‘CLEARLY’ has healing properties. I’m still grossed out by this. Reggie is back to his senses, and apologizes, in the same flat tone (“I’m so sorry Bro”) as he used when he was calling Archie stupid.

In comes Toni saying that she has a plan. Seated around the table, Toni says an exceptionally clunky “Serpent saying.” Seriously. Serpents really lacked wit.

“Always kill a baby snake in its egg so it doesn’t grow up to bite you.”

This so shit. I mean, Bob Marley quoted a saying that is a thousand times better than this (“Kill it before it grow” - from I Shot the Sheriff).

Reggie thinks it’s a terrible saying too. He gives Toni the most appalled look. When Tabitha takes over to say, as though this is a natural sequence of thoughts, “The only threat to someone who is immortal is someone who is also immortal,” Reggie gives HER a look of great skepticism. I am so with Reggie in this moment.

Then it gets worse and Toni loses me as a supporter forever. She really is a Serpent in the FP / Tall Boy mould. She’s willing to use child soldiers in the way that FP used the teenaged Joaquin to be a honey pot and assassin. She talks about ‘missing out’ on her son’s childhood as a sacrifice that SHE has to make, without questioning the issues of what it would mean for Anthony to go through aging in the magic way.

“That’s some Looper level CRAP,” says Reggie.

Reggie Mantle, true MVP of this episode.

So. Tabitha ages up Anthony with his shitty parents’ permission. In the same way I feel no desire to see Alice, Tom Keller or Uncle Fucking Frank ever again, I cannot find it in myself to feel anything other than disapproval for what’s been done to Anthony. The fact that the aged up Anthony looks older than Fangs - WHO TOUCHES HIM FOR THE FIRST TIME now that he doesn’t have to change his diaper or feed him - is just the icing on the shit cake. The fact that Anthony looks eager to “kick Percival’s ass” does not alleviate my discomfort.

At the Whyte Wyrm, Fangs is holding court. Kevin is there in a leather jacket that I want Cheryl to set fire to because wtf. Serpents are going to invade the Ghoulies.

Jughead is in the news room at the school with Tabitha (who is having Pop’s take out because she was not nourished by Jughead’s fail sandwich). He talks about Serpents like HE WASN’T ONE OF THEM. AS THEIR LEADER. (And I am going to say - I MISS SWEET PEA. Fangs just is not cutting it for me as Serpent King. Just, the worst possible choice.)

As they wait to see if the Serpent invasion opens the path to a different conclusion, Jughead Jones tells Tabitha to not mourn him when he dies. Jughead Jones says he’s lived a wonderful life, which boils down to: 1) He’s gotten to fall in love (I would specify - more than once, and in different types of love too, which is great) and 2) he got to publish a book (i.e. realize a long held childhood dream) and 3) got to experience alternate universes (had special experiences).

I love Jughead Jones for the dignity of moments like this, where he just says the minimal thing that he really needs to say.

This last utterance gives Tabitha a sudden idea. All her We Lose scenarios happened in RiverDALE but now that they have access to RiverVALE they can try something different!

Meanwhile, Cheryl tells Archie that the calculations for the comet were wrong, giving their side a little more time.

The Serpent invasion of the new Ghoulie lair occurs. This is very unexciting but for the fact that Percival cruelly tells Twyla to her face that he considers her and all her found family to simply be cannon fodder, and for the fact that for the first time ever, Toni actually does vicious violence. She lodges the blades of throwing stars right in Twyla’s skull.

When confronted with the aged up Anthony, Percival apparates out of the room wholesale, buck naked.

Archie tells the assembled group that while the Serpents did manage to overpower the Ghoulies, they’re trapped in there because Percival sealed them in with magic and they haven’t found the heads yet. Percival is on the loose, which is bad news, and Kevin has been shot, which oh yeah that happened, but I don’t care.

Just in time, Jughead and Tabitha arrive back from Rivervale with a plan. The plan is to rebuild the Diner in its original location. They used the magic time bubble to achieve this, and Reggie continues to be MVP (“Even in hyper speed moving blows.”). Percival shows up on time to engage in hand to hand combat with Archie while the three women and Reggie, in matching black jackets, watch from inside the reconstructed diner. Using breath holding magic the others join in at the last minute, which almost defeats Percival. Except Percival summons magic fog that poisons Veronica, blinds Betty, freeze Cheryl and turns Reggie into a “lifesize dummy” (Jughead really does not like Reggie at all) and Archie into a ‘statue’ (I would say- a block head, because I dislike Archie lol).

Jughead was inside the diner all this time, in his mind reader outfit, with the ghosts. Percival swaggers in, to meet Jughead’s challenge. Jughead offers to be lobotomized unless he can save Riverdale’s soul.

Jughead goes into Percival’s mind but finds the door impenetrable. Percival manages to unlock Jughead’s door, which looks different from before. Percival begins ‘shredding’ Jughead’s memories. Kissing Tabitha. Signing his name to the projection booth of the outdoor movie theater before his father demolished it on Hiram’s behalf. Talking to Archie at the football game when they made up after their fight.

The plan was for the RiverDALE folks to take the major hit, and for the RiverVALE people to take over, once Jughead tricked Percival into walking through the portal he’d opened up into RiverVALE. Percy’s body has been viciously stabbed while he was enjoying ripping up Jughead’s mind. I’m wondering how it is that the RiverVALE people aren’t all spattered with blood, because Percival is perforated all over.

Jughead and Tabitha’s combined powers (I guess?) allow them to open a portal to a different time as well as place, depositing the now mortal Percival at the feet of the devil, who has a contract with no escape clauses.

Percival says, ‘If I can’t have Riverdale, no one can!’ which earns an eye roll from Tabitha.

Tabitha, the angel, says to Cypher, the devil, to take Percival, the sorcerer, ‘the hell’ out of wherever they are (the Ye Olde Forests of Rivervale). Nobody pays attention to Percival’s muttering in Latin as he’s taken to hell.

Tabitha and Jughead make their way back to the Riverdale diner where everyone else meets them in the parking lot. I just um, really like Jughead in the white tie. “We did it, we beat him!” says Tabitha. Jughead picks Tabitha up and spins her around while everyone celebrates while laughing and hugging. I haven’t seen any of these very pretty people laughing or even smiling very much in recent episodes that it came as a surprise how very attractive they all are when they smile! :D

The Gang go back to the casino, where Dr. Curdle Jr .looks so forlorn with his smudged eye makeup. Kevin who got shot is being tended to by Moose (who looks wonderful with the beard), and Toni, looking inappropriately cheerful, brings out the boxes of heads (!!!) from the freezer. Riverdale is the most unhinged show. Curdle reattaches the heads to the corpses WHILE STILL in his Ghoulies-issued jacket (but with a surgical cap on). I LOVE HIM SO MUCH.

Cheryl brings everyone back to life, but after this extremely long day she’s had, she comes home to be told by Heather that something is very wrong about the comet.

Jughead asks Tabitha how come he didn’t die. They both look shellshocked. Tabitha speculates that since all her scenarios of the future involved only Riverdale and the prime universe, their involving RiverVALE into the mix changed things. “I guess we’ll never know,” is how Jughead reconciles this. He’s now going to have to figure out how to live, isn’t he? He didn’t plan for this. He thought he was going to be kicked back up to heaven.

At the Cooper house Alice Cooper is cuddling her two daughters. At Toni and Fang’s, Tom Keller is sitting on the sofa looking very somber. He died, went wherever (would he have gone to heaven??), came back to life, to find that his son had been shot and his grandchlid that isn’t his (?!?!) is now a full fledged adult from magic. Moose and Fangs and Kevin are in the same space and Toni is sitting there going, What Am I Doing With My Life, I’m sure.

Veronica is cleaning up her apartment with her doorman and her grandma. Archie and Uncle Frank are sitting on the porch drinking beer and I really think, truly, all these scenarios are SHIT.

The only people who make me happy are Jabitha and Cheryl with Heather (Cheather? Heryl?)

Heather and Cheryl show up at Archie in outfits that have the same pink shades. Heather is really growing on me. Cheryl is so much more stable and calm with Heather around. Cheryl orders him to rally the troops, and they all show up to the Andrews house.

Cheryl says that the comet is headed straight FOR Riverdale, to crash into them, in 24 hours. Tabitha figures out that the destruction was because of a comet. She’s wearing very excellent pants, but everyone is duly concerned. It’s going to be an EXTINCTION LEVEL EVENT.

I love this show so, so much. If you’re going to do this alternate-universe-time-travel-magic mashup, then you HAVE TO have a comet that crashes into earth, right on top of YOUR town.

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