Posted in: CW, Riverdale, TV | Tagged: archie, betty, bleeding cool, cable, cw, Dog Day Afternoon, episode 3, jughead, Review, riverdale, season 4, streaming, television, tv, veronica

"Riverdale" Season 4 "Dog Day Afternoon": Cult Leaders; Topless Vigilante Car-Washers & Evel Knievel? Sure! Why Not? [SPOILER REVIEW]

"Have you ever heard of Waco, Betty?" Yup… welcome back to The CW's Riverdale, kids.

Oh yes, things with the farm are heating up – but we'll get back to that in a moment.

But first, welcome to this week's episode, "Chapter Sixty: Dog Day Afternoon"!

So ten minutes in and things are already absolutely bananas…

Hell, I'll admit – I'm a little confused as to what exactly is happening. It's like they're shoving a ton of exposition and plot for the upcoming season into the first ten minutes, but hey – I am here for it.

Jughead moves into Stonewall prep and meets his new room mate…Moose? I can't remember him falling out of the story, but after his dad was arrested for Gargoyle King nonsense, Moose had a mental breakdown and then started fresh playing football for Stonewall Prep. Oh – and part of that fresh start is him going by…Marmaduke?!

I'm not exactly sure why the name of the canine comic character was ascribed to a human, but I digress. Regardless, while Jughead is all set up at his swanky pretentious boarding school, Archie tries to turn the boxing gym he owns into an official community center…but to do that, he needs forty thousand dollars to bring it up to code.

Cue the car wash. No, really. Veronica decides that the best way for the boys to earn money is to host a car wash featuring shirtless high school boys with more muscle definition than a male stripper convention. Oh yeah – she suggests the boys turn to that too as a source of revenue after the car wash earns about a tenth of what their goal.

This show has interesting morals – I know it's CW, but suggesting that canonically 17 year old boys go "the full monty" is a weird move, even for Riverdale. But I digress.

Charles and Betty are still trying to infiltrate the farm…to no avail. Until Betty gets a call in the middle of school one day from Edgar Evernever, Riverdale's resident cult leader. He found out her mom is an FBI informant and hinted at cutting off fingers and threatened her mom if Betty didn't meet his list of demands in 5 hours – demands that include passports for every member of his cult, $250,000, and a school bus. Oddly, the bus is the most reasonable request in it all.

Veronica is trying to become her own person, which means separating herself from her parents. She tried to change her surname to her mother's maiden name, Gomez…but couldn't go through with it. She'll figure out a name – I mean it's not like she can just be "Veronica Doe".

Jughead – eh, Forsythe – has already made an advisary at school in the form of "diplo-brat" Bret.

Cheryl has her hands full playing house with Toni and taking care of Nana Rose as well as Juniper and Dagwood, Polly and Jason's twin babies. Toni hires an attractive muscley male night nurse to help out – oh yeah, this is going to end well. Cheryl hates it, thanks.

Apparently neither the FBI or the governor are willing to do anything about the hostage demands known cult leader Edgar Evernever has issued to Betty in leverage for her mother, FBI informant. Right.

As a sign of "good faith" he has released a hostage – Polly, with – surprise! – a bomb strapped to her.

And then we go into the sequence where Betty defuses the bomb strapped to her sister.

Okay, Riverdale. I've been with you for three seasons now, but this just feels cheap. Like…come on. There's so much happening that it's just far too insane now for its own good. Everything is an over-the-top parody of itself. I love you, Riverdale, but please, for the love of all that is holy, just get back to the smaller, less insane drama we know and love. What happened to "the high school kids take down the town's Jingle-Jangle ring" we know and love?

Regardless, I can't rage quit the episode like I would like to at this moment because I am loyal to you, the fearless reader. And so, I'm hitting "play" on the episode and carrying on. Into the shark-jumping waters once more!

Betty defuses the bomb and Polly tells her that she has to get Edgar his demands or everybody is dead, including her mom, and that blood is on her hands. But no pressure, right?

So Polly manages to get all the things to meet Edgar's demands and he, his creepy child-bride Evelyn (she's not really an actual child, but she's been masquerading as a high school student), and his cult knock her out and kidnap her.

Veronica's father threatens her, Jughead is getting bullied at his new school, and Archie's mom wants him to move back to Chicago with her. Needless to say, she is not Riverdale's #1 fan.

Archie is determined to raise the 40 thousand and he's back on his vigilante shit again trying to make Riverdale a better place – and of course, he beats up a drug dealer named Dodger with a baseball bat and steals his money to fix up the community center. Everything works out…until his buddy mentions that the money needs to be laundered first. Because that makes sense.

And who better to launder money than local teenage speakeasy owner Veronica [last name here]?

Betty wakes up in a motel room, tied up and next to her mom. At least she found her mom?

Alice tells Betty all of Edgar's evil plan in detail, which I'm picturing that he lectured to Alice in a classic villain monologue? Of course, these plans include but are not limited to Evelyn driving the bus full of farmies off a cliff as a diversion while Edgar blasts off into space on the rocket he's been building.

And Betty and Alice are to be tied to the front of the bus as shields. Okay, we'll pretend that makes sense. But alas, they are not shields, because they escape and knock out Evelyn and walk down the hall action hero style, complete with Betty in a military style beret spinning the barrel of a 6 shooter.

Side note, this episode has absolutely the most ridiculous shots in it. There's one of cult leader Edgar Evernever in a leather trench coat with the collar flipped up that just screams "I should be in a Terrentino movie".

Oh – and Betty found principal Wetherby – he was at the Farm, and had his finger cut off while Edgar was torturing him. This show can't possibly get any more ridiculou– oh wait. Edgar Evernever, cult leader, is wearing an Evel Knievel jumpsuit and getting into what can only be described as a real life sized toy rocket ship?

Excuse me, Riverdale – what even are you doing anymore?

Ah – Veronica officially picked a new last name – she is now Veronica Luna, after her father's last name before he changed it to separate himself from the family of criminals he came from. A lot of good that did him.

To wrap up: Alice shoots Edgar and ends this whole farm nonsense, I hope; Archie's mom helps him stay in Riverdale and build his community center; Betty and Jughead get a tape labled "famous last words".

Oh Riverdale, that's more like the pulp-y drama we know and love. Just…try to rein it in this season, just a little. Please?

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