Riverdale review

Full disclosure, I wasn’t interested in Riverdale until I heard the creators were redoing Sabrina the Teenage Witch. I was intrigued by their description of a creepier vamped up Sabrina, which led me to give the quaint town of Riverdale a chance.

The squeaky clean town has a 50s vibe that contrasts the spooky summer murder mystery nicely.

The characters are pretty basic. Archie is the sensitive jock. Betty is the girl next door with controlling parents. Veronica is the fallen rich girl from the big city. And Cheryl is the resident reigning queen of this creepy white picket fence. And while Archie is only mildly interesting, the others more than make up for him.

Betty is constantly battling with her anxiety, her fear of turning into the Mistress Hyde to her Madame Jekyll. She discovers a darksecret about her sister Polly that fuels the witch hunt that is Jason Blossom’s murder. Veronica befriends Betty, determined to turn over a new leaf and be a good person. What better best friend for the good life than the good girl?

But in all honesty, they are truly a fun pair. Betty is adorable and reminds me a lot of Supergirl’s Kara Danvers. Veronica is like the lovechild of Blair Waldorf and the Shadowhunters version of Isabelle Lightwood.

So basically, perfection.

Plus, I love this era where women support each other instead of taking each other down. Even when Veronica acknowledges that Cheryl is being a bit much, she still is there for her. She doesn’t want to dethrone Cheryl, she’s fine being frenemies and even occasionally co-queens. I really appreciate how women are portrayed as being strong without being domineering, it’s something that television is recently starting to explore more and it’s so much more realistic and relatable.

Cheryl’s redemption is her brother. Her love for her brother leads her down some crazy and impressively dramatic storylines. She swings back and forth between being the classic cheerleading mean girl and the insecure popular girl with no real friends/unloved child of rich parents who wish she had died instead of her golden brother.

I like her. She’s scary, but genuine and intensely interesting.

With a cast full of gems, like Josie and the Pussycats and their beautiful music, along with Jughead’s sarcastic narration and Kevin’s glee at all things drama, this show is not your typical high school drama.

As for the plot…oh the drama, oh the mystery. Jason’s mysterious death unleashes a series of events that seems to unravel the town of tea gloves and milkshakes. He leaves behind a grieving sister and a pregnant fiancé, the Juliet to his Romeo.

There are raging grudges between the Coopers and the Blossoms, between pretty much anyone and Veronica’s father, not to mention the fact that the majority of the parents went to high school together, only adding to the layers of suppressed history and theatrics.

The clashing of “Honey I’m home” cliches molded in a murder on gothic street universe is both bizarre and delightful. I never read the comics, but I like what they’re doing with Archie the iconic redhead…mostly because of all the wonderful women in his life. Also, Jughead.