Honestly, all of this is also discovered at this point in my face. Image: The CW
Riverdale has a long history as A Whole Ass Lot, but somehow the series managed to surpass even “hey, we’re building an Archie multiverse” with its recent horror event crossover with Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. If you thought last night’s episode was a return to… what’s considered normal for the series? Well, you were surprised.
So let’s get that out of the way: I think Riverdale could be just another CW superhero show now? Maybe.
“Amazing,” technically the sixth episode of the show’s sixth season — the aforementioned crossover made up the first five late last year — picks up again in the, god, I can’t even believe I’m allowed to say it, “Prime” Riverdale reality. More specifically, it picks up steam again after the Season 5 finale, which ended with Archie and Betty about to tackle it when it was revealed to the audience that Veronica’s father Hiram planted a bomb in Archie’s room after his death banned from the city. Because, you know, that’s just a thing that happens on Riverdale. Anyway, the bomb went off, destroying the Andrews household… but miraculously, Archie and Betty escaped largely unharmed.
Not everyone is spared from the explosion. Jughead, who was nearby, eventually discovers that the blast has left him largely deaf and Archie’s poor dog, Bingo, has broken all of his legs, crushed under the rubble of Andrews’ destroyed home. But yes: Archie and Betty are mostly safe because, as they learn in the course of the episode… the bomb gave them superpowers. Archie gets the most traditional super-overhaul here, complete with the obligatory “gets kinda even more of a jacked-up CW show protagonist” overhaul, giving him more strength alongside a weight gain, and, in a riff on the episode title, a Nodding to M. Night Shyamalan’s Unbreakable in the form of impenetrable skin, who explains how he managed to survive the blast and protect Betty, who only sustained a few bone-crushing injuries.
Image: The CW
As she recovers in the hospital, she learns that she too has powers, a type of spider sense-like aura detection that allows her to spot people who pose a threat. An absolutely incredible power to give to someone who has also, because this show is this show, been an FBI agent for a few years. But either way, she and Archie use their skills to stop a murderous orderly who was putting Betty in a bad mood. Oh, and did we mention that Bingo has a healing factor and miraculously recovered from his broken legs in just a few days? Yes. Shit being Jughead I guess, close enough to get hurt but not close enough to get superpowers unless he’s about to become Riverdale’s equivalent of Clint Barton or something.
There’s a lot more going on in “Unbelievable” – Hiram might actually be dead after Veronica punched him (!!!) which she immediately regrets (!!!!!) only to find out when trying to take a shot to make -backsies on a hitman (!!!!!!!!!!!!) who supposedly already did the job (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!), oh, and Cheryl might now be possessed by an evil spirit? But really, the point here is that Riverdale, literally having had its own unconventional dedication to genre elements, is now completely goofy plowing ahead. It’s hard to tell if this will be revealed as yet another alternate timeline like the events of Rivervale, or if this is really just the show’s status quo now, which is really funny considering how “weird” Riverdale is to be It all started with Archie sleeping with his teacher. But right now, Riverdale is…is it too mean for Agents of SHIELD to say that it’s Agents of SHIELD with even less budgets?
Which, to be fair, just takes another page out of the Archie comics at this point. Archie has been around for so long that it’s given us superheroes, major franchise crossovers, zombies and werewolves, and of course a certain teenage witch, so Riverdale itself takes on the utter madness of the source material, especially when it’s doing such a great job Being that crazy yourself before is more of a lateral step than a giant leap. Screw it, let the Predator show up or something! Heck, make this new comic a reality and let comics meet Archie Riverdale Archie! Now that would be fun.
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