Riverdale Review: Chapter Twenty-Nine: Primary Colors (Season 2 Episode 16)

Y’all. I am really, really upset about what Riverdale is doing to Queen Cheryl “Bombshell” Blossom right now.

We all saw Clifford Blossom kill his own son last season, so it’s no surprise to learn that this show can get, uh, pretty dark. But Cheryl’s gothic horror family drama kicks it up to another level entirely on Riverdale Season 2 Episode 16.

On Riverdale Season 2 Episode 15, “Chapter Twenty-Eight: There Will Be Blood,” Claudius Blossom made his dramatic debut. Interestingly, rather than teasing out his motives or whether he’s a bad guy over the course of a few episodes, the show is extremely upfront with good ol’ Claud’s villainy.

After overhearing a very disturbing conversation between Claudius and Penelope on “Chapter Twenty-Eight,” Cheryl became convinced that the two were out to get her and Nana Rose. While Cheryl’s penchant for drama is well-documented, in this case, the writers waste no time in establishing that Cheryl has every reason to fear for her life — and freedom.

The Blossom family plot here does give us a few great moments, particularly centered around Cheryl’s burgeoning relationship with Toni.

It’s hard not to love Cheryl’s impromptu sleepover with Toni, Josie, Veronica, and Betty, which she claims is to celebrate Toni becoming a Vixen but is really about abating her fear of being murdered by her own mom. 

But hey, they all get to wear The Beguiled-inspired dressing gowns! And that tandem hair-brushing scene gets an A+ from me, for the eerie visual alone.

Notably, we also get the first Choni almost-kiss, when Toni is in bed with Cheryl as the rest of the crew is asleep on the floor. It’s a super sweet moment, particularly when Cheryl confesses that she really only wanted Toni there that night and inviting the others had just been to keep her mom from getting suspicious of their quickly-turning-romantic bond.

Unfortunately, the near-smooch is interrupted by Nana Rose taking an obviously-orchestrated tumble down the stairs.

Now, I’m not saying I don’t buy the fact that Penelope Blossom is capable of some truly heinous things. She’s said enough to Cheryl in past episodes that it’s clear she is a very bad mom and a very bad person. But the escalation of this plot is a bit too rapid for me, and it’s hard to suspend my disbelief enough to appreciate it.

Claudius didn’t even show up a full episode ago, Cheryl’s role as the sole heir of half of Clifford’s estate was just revealed, and Claudius and Penelope are already plotting to do away with Nana Rose and Cheryl to usurp Clifford’s fortune? That seems… kind of stupid. And so obviously suspicious!

In the closing moments of the episode, Cheryl (having recently been told that Nana Rose was likely being poisoned with tannis root) is committed to some sort of asylum against her will by Penelope, who insists that Cheryl is “very unwell” for believing that she and Claudius would have harmed Nana Rose.

I couldn’t tell if this is the same asylum that Polly had been imprisoned in to hide her secret pregnancy last season, but I’d buy that. At the very least, I hope there isn’t more than one of these terrible places in or around Riverdale.

Disturbingly, there also seems to be a conversion therapy aspect to Cheryl’s imprisonment, as her sketchy old lady captor promises to help rid Cheryl of her “unnatural thoughts.” Ugh. Double ugh.

I know that this is a real, horrific thing that happens to many at-risk LGBTQ+ teens all over the world. But seeing this happen to Cheryl, so soon after she begins to feel even a bit comfortable with her sexuality and her feelings for Toni, is unsettling and disappointing.

Cheryl’s been through so much, and I had hopes that the writers would give her at least a moment of peace and happiness before putting her through the ringer again with something so shocking and traumatizing.

My hope here is that Toni will rescue Cheryl, a development which seems likely given Toni’s obvious disbelief when Penelope claimed Cheryl had gone off to a boarding school in Europe. Fingers crossed Cheryl’s almost-girlfriend acts quickly to get her out of that mess and then helps her take down Penelope and Claudius once and for all.

So, that’s a lot of words re: Cheryl, mainly because her story is the most compelling part of the episode for me.

Of course, other stuff does happen to the core four: Betty, Jughead, Archie, and Veronica.

Archie’s mom, Mary Andrews, comes back to town to help Fred out of his situation with the Lodges, following the reveal of Hiram’s plans to build a for-profit prison. I’ve gotta name Mary the MVP of the week, because she really lays into Archie in the way that I think the vast majority of viewers have wanted to for the entire season.

Mary shuts down Archie impeccably when he continues to flaunt his allegiance to Hiram and disrespect Fred. The scene gets me practically standing up and cheering, and I’ve watched it about three times already. Two big thumbs up there.

It’s also a relief to realize that Mary is also the writers’ mouthpiece — in other words, the writers actually haven’t been trying to convince us to be sympathetic to Archie’s side here, which hadn’t been entirely clear previously. They’re now fully transparent about his ill-advised behavior being naive and straight-up idiotic.

I can’t sympathize with Archie at all at this point, now that he’s actively siding with Hiram over both his dad and Jughead.

Jughead’s hunger strike and chaining himself to Southside High to prevent its demolition is a bit much, but at least his intentions are good. On the flip side, the scene where Archie arrives to forcibly remove Jug and the other Serpents from the demolition side has me practically hissing with anger and frustration.

The only redemption for Archie, at this point, would be the reveal that he’s been plotting against the Lodges all along to take them down from the inside. Some viewers, including a few of our Riverdale roundtable participants, fully believe that this will be the case.

Unfortunately, I don’t have as much faith in Archie not being a total bonehead.

Perhaps the best development from Archie’s portion of this episode is his successful bid to get Hiram to release Fred from his connection to Lodge Industries — which in turn allows Fred to run for mayor against Hermione.

I’m not sure what I love more: the “Oh, crap” look on Archie’s face when he realizes he unknowingly opened the door for his dad to oppose the Lodges on a political platform, or the prospect of Fred and Hermione going head to head in the election.

Elsewhere, Veronica struggles with the effects of siding with her parents above all else and embarks on an ill-advised student council president run.

Ronnie is clearly conflicted, and her conflict makes sense — Hermione and Hiram are her parents, after all. Veronica being torn is far more compelling than Archie being torn, because she has an actual reason to be, whereas Archie just seems to be thinking with his, um, other head.

At this point, nearly everyone has turned against Veronica and Archie.

Courtesy of Ethel Muggs (who seeks vengeance for her family losing everything, thanks to the Lodges) and Josie (who has had just about enough of Veronica and her family), the truth about Veronica’s knowledge of her parents’ activities is spread all over school. This also manages to ostracize Veronica from Betty, once B learns that V lied to her about what she knew.

It’s too bad, because the show has pretty much ignored the fact that Betty and Veronica are supposedly best friends all season long. The idea of the two as running mates is great, but it lasts about 15 seconds before the two have a falling out over Veronica’s family scheming.

Betty has other troubles to deal with, though. At the end of “Chapter Twenty-Eight,” Betty confronted Chic about the results of his DNA test proving he isn’t a Blossom/Cooper. Much like Cheryl’s storyline, the writers waste no time teasing this out either. Alice quickly confirms that Chic isn’t Hal’s son, but insists he is her son, as I suspected and had mentioned in last week’s review.

She insists that FP isn’t Chic’s dad, after accidentally letting slip that she and FP had been ~involved~ back in the day. But I ain’t buying it. Chic is definitely FP’s son, and I’m sticking to that theory until we see the flashback proving it’s somebody else.

Falice having conceived a child together also explains why Alice has always been so anxious about Betty and Jughead being involved — and why she goes into hyper-anxiety when Chic “guesses” that Bughead is partaking in some kinky roleplaying.

Despite Alice’s confirmation that Chic is her child, the dude is still creepy AF. Betty’s solution? To out-creep him.

Lili Reinhardt is really stellar throughout this episode as she attempts to go head-to-head with Chic, after a brief attempt at a truce for Alice’s sake. I didn’t for a second think that holding a lighter to sleeping Chic’s head and going all crazy-eyes would really get him to back-off, but it’s a valiant try and Lili really sells it to the best of her ability.

I adore Dark Betty.

Sadly for Betty, Chic is ruthless and actually pretty cunning. When she threatens to turn Chic into the cops for murder, Chic correctly points out that there’s far more evidence linking Betty to the crime. Whoops.

Since I currently could care less about the Archie/Lodge family storyline, I’m more invested in finding out why Chic is so strange and what his endgame is.

Is it as simple as wanting Alice all to himself? That seems almost too easy. But I guess we’ll just need to wait and see.

Stray thoughts:

• So like… Why did Andy Cohen agree to be a part of this? I don’t understand! Also not understanding why anyone in small, podunk little Riverdale would care at all about which local mayoral candidate has non-resident Andy Cohen’s vote…
• I’m not super thrilled with Veronica at the moment, but her punching Reggie’s lights out is admittedly badass — though also unrealistic. Petite Veronica knocks gigantic, football-playing Reggie flat on his ass!
• Toni’s audition for the Vixens is SO GOOD. It specifically reminds me of Eliza Dushku as Missy auditioning for the cheer squad in Bring It On. The look on Cheryl’s face while she’s watching Toni audition = also very good.
• There’s been a definite lack of FP for the past few episodes. Thankfully, the scene between Jughead and his dad, with FP explaining that Hiram tried to bribe them into submission, is by far one of the hour’s best.
• I like how Archie apparently commands various athletic teams at Riverdale High, and they sort of just… do whatever he says. First the football team forming his Black Hood-hunting goon squad, now the wrestling team going to strong-arm Jughead and the protestors at Hiram’s behest. It’s so silly.
• I don’t buy that Kevin would rat Betty out like that to Chic. Kevin may think that Chic is innocent, but he truly doesn’t know the guy at all. Why would he seek Chic out to tell him that Betty arranged his catfishing? That’s just absurd, and poor writing to boot.

What did you think of this episode of Riverdale? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!

Reviewer Rating:

User Rating:

 

Riverdale airs Wednesdays at 8/7c on The CW.

Follow us on Twitter @telltaleTV_

Want more from Tell-Tale TV? Subscribe to our newsletter here!