Riverdale Review: Lynchian (Season 4 Episode 18)

There is just so much to unpack here.

Riverdale Season 4 Episode 18, “Lynchian,” succeeds on a multitude of levels, allowing teen angst to combine with murder mystery in a way that feels so exceptionally balanced. Riverdale would do right by itself to simultaneously incorporate both of them more often. 

It also allows every character their proper time to shine, even if it also stalls an anticipated romance before it begins.

There are many things going down in “Lynchian,” but the main event is clearly the conflicted feelings between Archie and Betty, who are dealing with the fallout of their musically themed kiss, and trying to figure out what it all means.

It’s refreshing to watch Riverdale slow down long enough to sit with the characters and their feelings. Watching Archie visit Fred’s grave, while Betty searches through old journals as they work through what they’re hearts are telling them, feels more true to teen drama than Riverdale has ever really been before. 

Where the characters end up, however, is more or less where they started, proving this potential pairing may be more of a plot device than a new relationship. What begins as a childhood best friends to lovers trope, quickly swerves into a vessel for breaking the core four characters into pieces. 

Generally, a forbidden kiss would be an excellent strategy to force characters forward, especially ones who have been stuck in the same place for too long. Just the kiss itself coming to light is enough to spark dire flames in Riverdale’s core group of friends. 

It’s a solid move considering the upcoming Season 5 time jump, and a cataclysmic end to the teens senior year would set all the characters in exciting new directions. 

Unfortunately, the way “Lynchian” chooses to get there, feels like a half-finished story. In its choice to use Betty and Archie as a means to propel its characters forward, the episode ends up moving them nowhere at all.

Betty first insists a part of her will always love Archie, and that feels organic to the show’s narrative.

Betty and Archie have known each other from childhood, and have loved each other (in one way or another) every day since. A push-pull between those feelings reigning supreme over the bond she’s built with Jughead — mixed with a desperate fear of losing him — would be true to the dynamics that have formed over the past four seasons.

Cheryl being used as a mouthpiece for Betty’s feelings is a different story. Not only is it a straight contradiction to her position on the matter a few episodes prior, but canonically, Betty and Cheryl were not friends as children. In fact, they were enemies, as proven by Betty’s diaries.

That alone makes her opinion lose most of its weight.

It’s not to say Cheryl doesn’t have a point. What Betty has built with Jughead is real, and even maybe “endgame” (don’t ever make us say that word again) material. That doesn’t mean Cheryl has any sort of viable perspective on how — or why — Betty feels things for Archie now. 

Kevin talking Betty through her confusion would have been a much more sensible move here. Perhaps the “nostalgia” argument would hold more meaning if Betty was talking to someone who spent time with both her and Archie all these years.

At the very least, it would have been believable. 

Unfortunately, Kevin is much too busy doing other widely strange things around Riverdale to help Betty understand why she feels so connected to Archie these days.

Because of that, her conclusion feels somewhat fabricated and loosely pulled together; reading like she’s ready to jump on any excuse to avoid the truth, and the show is desperate to use Lynchian genre tropes to excuse themselves out of this narrative. 

Things turn even more peculiar when Betty listens to Archie’s love song (which, although we only got to hear a few lines, did not sound like a song about when they were in fifth grade, but we’ll get to that in a moment). 

As Archie begins to sing, feelings visibly stir in Betty, forcing her to shut down the song immediately. No one can blame her, and it does wonders for the character’s integrity. Still, if she’s feeling this intensely, it begs the question of how someone so smart, could possibly believe those feelings don’t hold any merit. 

Luckily, the episode ends with a sweet Betty and Jughead moment; her steadfast agreeance to jump back into status quo sleuth mode, selling her decision as earnest.

Which is all good and fine, but the truth still has to come out sometime, and what’s written in the diary Alice saves from the fire is more than slightly questionable. 

No doubt the pink book is bound to make an appearance sometime. 

There’s also Archies side of this storyline, which reads undeniably different than Betty’s.

Hearing the lyrics to Archie’s song would clue the audience into where his head is, but perhaps that’s something Riverdale doesn’t want to reveal. Archie very specifically does not say he loves Veronica when asked — Betty says it for him — and continues to play the song he wrote well after Betty turns him down.

True to form, both Betty and Archie are reacting perfectly in character — Betty with her head and logic, Archie with his heart and emotion. Where that takes them from here is anyone’s guess, but we’re not sold on Archie’s feelings disappearing just yet.

In fact, we won’t be surprised if Archie continues to struggle over where his heart actually lands. 

On the other side of town, Riverdale is returning to its roots, with a villain actually grounded in a reality that feels hauntingly disturbing.

Jughead is at his best here, and it’s well past time he bonded with Charles. Betty’s gotten plenty of sleuthing screen time with their brother as of late, and sharing is caring, after all.

It’s comforting to see Jughead back on track, solving mysteries that feel organically tied to all of the show’s main characters; something like clandestine murder tapes is certainly in the scope of believability for small-town America.

What probably isn’t in that scope, is a Tickle Ring. It’s disappointing to see Kevin back in this absolutely absurd arc after witnessing him in such a stellar place during Katy Keene Season 1 Episode 10, and it borders on depressing when you realize he’ll be teaching at Riverdale High five years into the future.

The actual point to the Tickle Ring, other than to give Riverdale’s secondary characters something to actually do, is still unclear. But, the storyline does manage to rope in the group of characters who constantly get the sideline treatment, so anything is really acceptable at this point. 

If Reggie getting involved with the Tickle business makes anything clear, it’s how hard Riverdale missed the boat on a Ronnie and Reggie romance. Reggie and Veronica are so like-minded, so similarly motivated, it feels like an absolute glaring shame the show didn’t invest more in that relationship.

Mixed with their insanely palpable chemistry, that relationship could have soared.

Instead, Veronica is off making gullible plans to go into business with Hiram, which audiences have already seen play out about ten or twenty times, so there’s really no need to even talk about it. 

Riverdale Stray Thoughts and Questions: 

• The Alice and Betty content is amazing this episode, and it’s a nice change of pace to see them moving forward in their relationship.
• Is Charles good or bad, and will we ever know why he was talking to Chic in jail?
• Kerr Smith is fantastic at playing the hunkered down straight-laced principal (who often makes good points). Kerr Smith can act, and Riverdale doesn’t showcase it quite enough.
• Speaking of Mr. Honey, is he behind the tapes?
• Hopefully, the show doesn’t drop Jughead’s PTSD storyline.
• The scene of Archie writing his song for Betty is shot absolutely beautifully. What stunning directional choices.
• Veronica is officially being treated as an afterthought by Archie at this point, so the show needs to end the Varchie relationship, or do something to show Archie still wants to actually be with Veronica. 
• Kevin and Fangs talking about having a future together is exactly the kind of content Kevin deserves.
• Will Betty ever let Archie finish a sentence when it comes to their feelings?
• What if Jellybean finds Betty’s journal, and it talks about the kiss?
• Archie is running away to the Naval Academy. What is he running from?

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

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

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