Page 7 - Riverdale Roundup Ch. 116: Ya Know, There's Like A Couple of Jesuses

Episode Date: July 30, 2022

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Hey, everyone, big news from the boys of the last podcast on the left. Check out the last comic book on the left. Our most sinister comic anthology. It now has a volume two. Please, pre-order now at z2com. We have an even bigger stable of artists and talent and writers and everyone that we did for the first one, although the first one is fucking amazing. And it's still available on z2com.

But we're asking to go pre-order number two, Z2 Comics. That's got to like the way you read. All right, everyone. Thank you so much. Hail yourselves. Hail Satan. Hey, Baby, that's what I like.

Oh, did we like this episode of Riverdale? Oh, did we like this episode of Riverdale so much? We are recording this episode again. After we lost the last episode that we recorded, it's keeping it fun. It's keeping it fun, and it's keeping it fresh. And you know what? I did.

I had prayed to my goddess last night. And I said, goddess. please let me talk about this an ultimate episode of Riverdale just one more time and then the goddess started playing daft punk and the lights came

on to my room and I was like this is exactly what I needed one more time and I'm just like oh you gotta kill the baby snake when it's sick and it's egg so that it doesn't grow up and bite you one more time am I having a mental breakdown I hope that you are because I am too

and I don't want to be the only one no we're in this together MJ Dear listener, it is Riverdale Roundup, and you know that Jackie and I love Riverdale Roundup. It's a great time that we have together. I love yelling about it. We're wondering sometimes whether other people are loving it because it's just kind of us stumbling through trying to remember these baffling episodes. But I will say I appreciate when you do write in and say that you enjoy it. It always puts a smile on our face, so thank you so much.

Seems like the people are loving it. And I am in bad boy jail because... No, you're not. Really, my SD card is in bad boy jail because it did not. It only recorded 12 minutes of the precious 51 minutes that we recorded yesterday. It was our longest Riverdale roundup. It was. And maybe that was why my SD card was like, you know what?

You should not spend longer than the episode itself. No. Discussing Riverdale. And so we did a beautiful, if I may say so episode, all about this incredible episode that we both liked of Riverdale. I might dare fight back, though, and the fact that we did a great job with this episode. I was actually okay when MJ, who was having a mental breakdown

because they lost after a minute 12. I was like, we didn't do a very good job in the first place. This is giving us, you know what, thank you for giving us the SD card, for giving us the opportunity to do this again, because I certainly screwed up the timeline of this episode. I certainly now that we've talked about the episode for 51 minutes, I'm like, well, now I know this episode. You know, you got to practice.

Maybe we should start doing every podcast. We do a practice run. And then we do, we had a dress rehearsal and this is opening night. It'll be just like Jughead's powers where you say everything that you're thinking before you say it. So the Jughead is able to understand what you're saying because he is deaf. So this really works out. So we're going to do an even better job today. And I will say, dear listener, I hope you have a friend like Jackie Zabrowski who when you are deep in a mental,

break down about a lost file that you're so sad about and you're just like absolutely frantic. Jackie will laugh through it with you and she will reassure you and she will tell you, don't cry for Riverdale. It's Riverdale. Don't forget it, MJ. It's Riverdale. It's Riverdale. And if this is our biggest problem, we're doing okay. It's true. It's true. The problem is it's, it was my biggest problem, but it was also the biggest problem on kind of like on a pyramid of other problems. Of other problems.

And that was the most glaring and apparent problem that you needed to deal with, which I get. And then you put all of it on it. So now that it's being resolved, I hope that it does. It dissolves some of the feelings of guilt in your chest. Yeah.

There is no guilt here. It is only Riverdale. The only people that should feel guilty are the writers of Riverdale for sucking us back in every three to four episodes, you bastards. Yeah. This is a good one.

This was a good one. It had one story, one, count of one, oh, any. And everyone was involved in it. And that's what, honestly, I want. I've just, yes, most shows have it A B and C plot. I don't want that many plots in Riverdale because it's just too hard. Give us one war every episode that everyone works together on. Especially in this show where even though there's only one thing going on,

there's about seven subsex of plot underneath the one thing, but that's fine. It has one ghost train taken us right through it, although no ghost train, because I guess now the ghost train is just broken because of the piece of dynamite from last week. Yeah, still no clarity on why we get at a physical train to bring in ghosts who can clearly travel between, like, what is the difference between a ghost at a different? a person who has come back from the suite hereafter. Totally different things, I guess. Not to throw in big philosophical questions right at the beginning here.

Well, this is great because, I mean, in our last episode, in the no episode, we even had to look up what being in an immortal was. And if you can be affected, if you are an immortal, if you can be killed. And the answer is yes, you can be killed if you are immortal. So you're going to see, all the things we're learning on this week's Riverdale Roundup. I think that a ghost is someone that maybe has not gone over to the suite hereafter, that they're still trapped here with undone business. But if they're trapped here, then why do they need to get on a train? On midnight train to Georgia, man.

How else are they going to get there? We don't know quite where Riverdale is. They got to get to Georgia somehow. But they're not doing it in this episode because Percival has closed down the borders. He's closed down the border to Riverdale. No one is coming in because they have to, oh, this episode. Okay, they have to seal the hellmouth. Right.

Remember, the hell mouth is not Pops itself. The hellmouth resides on the land underneath Pops. Yes, because that is like the hallowed ground where Percival and the ancestors and whatnot came. Yes, and used to do their witchcraft, I guess, of sorts. which I'm all pro, I'm pro witchcraft, but I think that he was doing naughty witchcraft. So he was in bad boys jail. That's not the SD card.

Percival's in bad boys jail this entire episode and this entire season. So the borders are closed down because Percival doesn't want the, you know, our superteens getting any help destroying him before he can destroy and take over Riverdale. And let the record show this is at least the second time that the, borders of Riverdale have been closed down quote of quote. I really want to know what that means. Like, because what that usually means in practice is like military checkpoints. And I just know, how are they closing down the borders? Like what, the only people in the town who work for Percival, I guess, are all of the goolies, which we'll get to. And all of the people he just

beheaded, which will also get to. Oh, we're going to get to it. But so this is my question for you, M.J. If he has mind-controlled whatever officials to get the borders closed down and to have like the army, because they did show a quick shot of like a police

barricades. Uh-huh. Okay. Yeah. Like right next to the Riverdale sign. So I'm assuming they're all under his mayoral brainwashing because they're certainly not just under his mayoral direction. I don't think that they could be to shut down the town like that. But they've

said in the past that like the one time when he took over too many people's brains, Percival got a nosebleed. How is he able to now mind control everybody and his powers are not affected? It goes against the rules they've already set up for Percival. Well, Riverdale would never go against its own rules, Jackie. It is entirely logically consistent from beginning to long, long, long end. Right, because in this episode, and I think honestly for the last at least four or five episodes, literally everyone in town is under Percival's control except for our superteens. Superteens, yeah.

And so, right, he has shut down the borders. Our superteens are ready for war. They're so pumped. They're so excited. And we have just learned at the end of the previous episode that Alice Cooper, Sheriff Keller, and Uncle Daddy have all been beheaded with a peatine. Beheaded. but don't worry. It was exactly what we knew that this was going to happen,

that they were just like, oh, they're just going like, they're dead, not dead. They're going to be, and you're out of way to bring them back because, like, we didn't properly see the goodbye of them, which obviously we were right. I keep calling it Order of the Phoenix. I know it's not Order of the Phoenix.

Phoenix Power is what it is. Phoenix Power? Is it the, whatever the fuck Rachel's. Oh, Ashes of the. Fishes. Ashes of the Phoenix. Yes. See, he came to me. Oh, thank you, Cheryl. Oh, yeah, you can come to me anytime. And so everyone's like, oh, I'm so sad. My parents are dead. Their heads have been cut off. But they're like, oh, good thing. Cheryl knows how to bring back to life. Because that's the whole thing with this episode. Not only are they going to, spoiler alert, defeat Percival in this episode.

And I am glad that they defeated Percival in a separate episode from the big battle that. that's about to happen. But also, the main plot of this episode was getting first the bodies back and then it was getting the heads back. So we will find out how did they get the bodies back and not the heads. Oh, Percival, you're so Boros-Norro.

And he's also Borosnoro because Percival, of course, like Reggie's like, we should go to his, like, magic curio shop. He's got all those weapons there. Right. Of course, Percival had burned, and he didn't burn down the shop. He took all of the weapons out. And so Cheryl goes with Reggie, burns it down, burns it down, burns it down.

And in this recap that I'm reading, it says that Reggie grabs Hiram's portrait from it. And I don't remember that happening. Was that a big moment? I don't remember that happening either. But that's a nice little Easter egg, Riverdale, because we all know Reggie's a fucking sucker for Hiram Love. Oh, man. he is such a, he is a cuck for Hiram and I would be too.

But I do also wonder if he's going to use that to maybe get Veronica back at some point. Yeah, you know. Save this for your daddy, you know. Right, right. They deserve each other, honestly. I mean, Reggie has a couple of, Reggie's a weak man.

He is a weak man. As is evidenced by later on in this episode when he is once again mind controlled by Percival. It's like, you know, the man cannot protect his own mind. Too bad. Him and Kevin. They're both up there.

Right. So an important piece of information to understand this episode, which is hard to understand, but important, is that there are certain daggers that hurt Reggie and his forged an ironness. Archie, yes. Archie. There are certain weapons that will, like, hurt Archie, even though Archie is invulnerable. And there are certain weapons that will hurt Percival, even though Percival is not invulnerable. But he is immortal.

He is immortal, and he is weirdly, mostly invulnerable. Yeah. Which is a question we have not yet figured out why. Because he's so evil, no one's ever just put a bullet in his brain? Right. That could have just killed him. Why has no one just shot this person? I guess we are to believe that he's always one step ahead of you because this is what Veronica tries.

She's like, oh, I'll just go shoot him. And he is like, oh, I do you are going to do that. And so I made a little flower come out the gun, you know? And so I guess that that's what makes him, like, you know, not able to be killed. But we think that Percival, we think Slash can confirm that Percival can be killed. It's just that he has somehow made it since 1580 without ever being killed. But also, he doesn't seem to have the same weakness as a regular person. Right.

He's definitely been attacked, like, even more than Archie, like regular attack. Like, and he seems to have magic powers that make him not die in addition to being immortal. But the distinction, I guess, to understand is that Archie, invulnerable, but mortal, Percival, immortal, but not invulnerable. He can get hurt. Correct. And they both can get hurt. So it really takes a lot of, a lot of the, like, oh, they can't get hurt off the table,

which makes it say, like, if you're going to be a Superman, shouldn't you be a Superman through it through? I know that there's always kryptonite. But it's, like, difficult to get the kryptonite, you know? I feel like it should be a little bit more difficult to get these. Like, oh, you're forged and iron, but I've got this special forged iron piercing dagger. But, you know, that's Riverdale, baby. Now, when does Veronica try to kill? Percival, this is after, so they know that the borders have closed down.

Polly, who I'm fairly sure here on Riverdale Roundup that we both agree, that Polly is going to be an angel of some sort because she's, emanating this glow, like, and now she's all at peace. She's at peace, but some fuck just going on with Polly. Well, also, maybe she, it's fucked because they didn't have her body to bring her back from the sweet hereafter. That's the whole thing. That's the linchpin of necromancy is having the body, apparently, the whole body to be

able to bring them back from the sweet here after. Right, which is the problem with the fact that our three. parents have been beheaded because they don't, Cheryl's like, I have to have the body to make them whole. But meanwhile, we still have JJ and Polly just hanging out back in the realm of the living, who, as Jackie pointed out, did not have, we didn't have their bodies. We all know that JJ's body has been through hell. We don't even know where that thing is at this point.

No. It's certainly not whole. Can't get dragged around as a reanimated corpse for months and months and then have your soul put into a ventriloquist dummy and then have your body dumped, I think, back into the original coffin. And then it was, yeah, I was in a trunk for a while, just kind of hanging out at Dornhill. Yeah, it was just sitting in a rocking chair in the basement for a while. That poor boy's body.

That poor boy's murdered body. Yeah, poor murdered boy's body. But he and Polly, who, you know, got back from the sweet here after because Cheryl was just like, why not? They are, I'm not going to trust him. I mean, we certainly can't trust JJ. We're about to talk about what happens to him. But also, Polly is over, Betty is on her bullshit of being like, oh, something bad's

going to happen. Well, yeah, because her mom just got to beheaded. This time, you know what? This time I'll give it to her. Her mom didn't just get beheaded. I guess you're allowed to be a little upset about it. Publicly beheaded. Well, Polly's mom just got.

bet it too and she's not upset at all, is she? Yeah, she's comforting, but I think it's because she's an angel. And while she's getting comforted, that's when Veronica and Archie go to Percival and they're like, this has to stop. There's got to be a way that we can stop Percival. We're going to get master

negotiator, Veronica Lodge on the case, the she-wolf of Wall Street, excuse me, the ex-she-wolf of Wall Street. Because she's a businesswoman. So let's have her fucking negotiate with the devil because she's all business. business bitch. Yes, she knows what she's doing. So she goes in, except she doesn't.

She does not know what she's doing. And she's like, okay, okay, personal, right? I know, like, you want Riverdale and you're doing all this stuff. But, like, what if we give you half of Riverdale instead? And we'll go back to the north side and this outside. And you could just, like, we'll just have evil Riverdale. And then we'll have, like, regular Riverdale. Which, to his credit, Jughead was very against, not because it doesn't make any fucking sense, but because he's, like, morally, like we can't go back to being a divided town. Right. Do you remember when we were a north side, south side town?

It wasn't that bad. Okay. But also, yeah, like, the devil is here. Like, do you think, Veronica, you really think the, fuck it. He's not the devil, he's a sorcerer or whatever, but he. We get it. Yeah, demon of some sort. Yeah, he's a, yeah, the devil has his soul.

And he, of course, is like, no, I'm not going to take half your town. I've been here destroying his town for months and months. and months and months. Why would I take half the town? And then what? You're going to have a normal life on the north side of Riverdale while a demon possesses everything like on the south of the wrong side of the tracks? Yeah. Talk about the wrong side of the tracks. Oh, don't go over there. That's not, it used to be where the poor people live, but now it's where the fucking devil's spot. The brainwashed. Trolls. So that doesn't work. No, of course not. But then, so this also, a lot of these threads all are pulled together because Tabitha,

remember Tabitha, the guardian angel of Riverdale, who also can travel through the alternate dimensions of Riverdale, can see all of the ways that Riverdale is going to end in apocalypse. So this is all, they're following her

ideas because there's only two ways in which they can go that they will actually defeat Percival in the apocalypse. And one of those ways in that room, Veronica just shoots him in the head. And so when she goes to shoot him in the head after he says,

no, I'm not going to just take half of Riverdale, he makes flowers come out of it. And Percival's like, oh, ha, ha, ha, ha. But what he does do, so then Archie just offers himself. And he's like, you can take my body. You can have my body. And you can have me. And then you have to give us back Riverdale,

which also, we're fucking talking about Archie. Symbolic. We're talking about. He is such a like, he is like the epitomey of somebody who's like, I'm going to just make it look like I'm how. thing. Like, what I mean, Archie? Take me. Archie, he's not going to take you. No, everyone gets it. You're a hero. You're the soul of Riverdale. Whatever. And yeah, so Archie tries to, like, sacrifice himself. Meanwhile, that's also a plot point that already happened. Remember, he already

sacrificed himself. He was working down in the ghost train. Yes. Well, for, like, you know, looking like Christ. Jesus imagery, which also is going to come back later, which I even hate, like, part of, like, the literature double major in me dies when I talk about Archie's Jesus imagery in these episodes because it's really, I think, now that we're talking about this episode again, it's got to be what they're doing with all of these sacrificing things. And then like with the ghost train thing where there was all the imagery of him walking with like the wood on his back. That was really intense. But in typical Riverdale fashion, their symbols are all muddled because it's like Archie's Jesus, but also baby Anthony is Jesus.

You know, there's like a couple of Jesuses. And I think that you should write a paper on it, Jackie, the Christ imagery. That's for nobody. No, I'll write it for the Patreon. I'll just like break it all down. I'll watch Olive Riverdale again. I'll pull it apart piece by piece of how we got to this point. And we're like, oh, they've been laying this out the entire time.

They haven't. Jackie, they haven't. They didn't know that it was going to get here, okay? If you could create a time loop, Jackie. Oh, I need Tabith. You could create a time loop and you could speed up time or slow down so that you could watch all season one from until now of Riverdale. Do you think that any of this shit would make sense? More sense, less sense, same amount of sense.

Well, I thought that this second redoing of this episode was going to make the episode make more sense, but even as I'm talking about it, I'm like, well, no, that also doesn't make sense. No, that doesn't. No, that still doesn't make any sense. So I guess the answer is no. Can't make sense out of nonsense. No, but we can get back the bodies of our parents by trying these just pitiful negotiations because right now they meet him inside of the Babylonium and the Babylonium is being guarded by the brainwashed ghoulies. Now, I got to say, we didn't bring it up on the last time we recorded this. The first time. Fits of the goolies are unbelievable, and I would like to dress like them.

It makes me think of the pretty poisons except on acid because all of their fits are like very like almost Mad Maxian, except with rhinestones. Yeah, totally. It's like Mad Max meets like the orphans and Oliver Twist. Yes, meets Rocky Horror Picture Show. Like I feel like it is because it is like sexy and like asymmetrical leather jackets. Whoa. You cut the sleeves off.

You bastard. I love it. And Twyla Twist is back. It is. And I was happy to see the goolies. I was happy to see Twilat, but as is often the case in a Riverdale upside, I'm just like, what's her deal again? Like what happened? Like, when was the last time we saw Twyla and the goolies?

It's been quite a while. Well, in River Vale, they signed the, well, I guess that's in the future. No, that was in the suite hereafter. They signed the like, we're never going to fight again contract. Remember because of growing up baby Anthony. Yeah. And the love of between baby. Anthony and the sun from Twyla Twist, but that's going to come up in just a moment.

Right now, we've got the bodies back. Cheryl can't bring the bodies back because the heads are missing because Percival is a bad boy. Boros nor a bad boy, but still a bad boy nonetheless. Yeah, so Cheryl's like, oh my God, I have all these bodies and I have no heads. Can some of our people sneak into the Babylonium and look for some heads? But before that can even happen, Percival is too busy. again, someone just sew his mouth shut. If he can't speak the incantations, doesn't that take away so much of his power?

So his mouth shut. He's constantly muttering Latin to himself. Oh, yes. And that's what he's doing right now because he takes these little versions of Veronica's Abolita, of JJ, of Reggie, and of stitched back together, cut apart body of Glenn. Yes. The old boss, the old like creepy, gropey boss of Betty from the FBI, who got killed by TBK, bad boy Glenn.

They all get brought in and they are mind control. This part was awesome. They are mind controlled by Percival. And Percival, he's going against the Fab Four. And he sent like Veronica's Abolito with a sawed off shotgun coming through Veronica's home just being like, Niata Boom

Oh, Nietta Boom looking for it And it was like Yeah, get her Abolita And then also Reggie who is brainwashed by Percival

Again Goes to Archie But Reggie has One of the Daggers that can get through The forge skin Of Archie So man

brutally Reggie starts stabbing the shit At Archie Like a lot But all in the side of his body at the same point. It has to be, and it can't be Jesus imagery, right?

Yeah. Am I looking too far into it, MJ? I don't think you're looking too far into it because it's one of those things like, I remember in ninth grade we had like, like our English teacher was trying to teach us about imagery and like anything you, any book we read, she would just play like, do you see the water imagery? And we're like, yeah. I guess.

Like, sure, there's water imagery. And I think that Christ imagery is just one of those things where it's like, Do you want to see this? There's just Christ imagery everywhere. But I also like where you're going, which is that they, I mean, obviously there has been biblical themes throughout this entire theme slash, you know, over. They washed her feet, the evil out of Betty, right. But washing her feet last episode. Yeah, you're right.

They washed the feet. They crucified Archie on the train. We've got a baby Messiah. And yeah, so the way that Reggie stabs Archie is also quite... Because why would he stab him only in like the same spot over and over again? Because like that scene really was kind of brutal. Yeah. Yeah, the Abuelita chasing Veronica scene is really scary.

Reggie stabbing Archie is really scary. Reanimated corpse Glenn chasing Betty also pretty scary. Which also was... Was Glenn that jacked before he had been cut to pieces? Because it was like, did Glenn get really thick? I was shocked. I think Glenn, I remember Glenn being like a, you know, kind of like a budget John Krasinski. But maybe like he could have had more just shirtless scenes at the FBI in the past if he was rocking that.

Like, CW, work with what you got. Yeah. Show us the good. Still has not been enough kissing in this entire season or even shirtless, you know, even if you're not going to kiss, give us some, you know, hot shirtless, reanimated corpses. Yes, which we got, I mean, but that's again, that's just me fishing for horny. Fishing for horny. Litting the bait out. I'm fishing for horny over here.

But we didn't get horny from JJ, which, thank God. So this is, Cheryl, of course, is talking to Heather, open-mouthed Heather. And Heather's like, oh, my gosh, I know. I see something like Bailey's comet. There's something wrong with Bailey's comet. Something's going on with it, which the comet thing I still don't quite understand. Yeah, Bailey's comet, when it comes closer,

it makes Percival's powers stronger. Stronger. And so they're all thinking that like this battle is about to happen today, but Heather's like, oh no, the comet doesn't come today. The comet comes tomorrow. So this isn't the battle day, but then as she's like about to like tell her all this stuff, JJ shows up with a bow and arrow and starts hunting Cheryl through short Thornhill

because he is also brainwashed by Percival. But then, so like to stop Abolita, Veronica put a neurotoxin on a doorknob and that stopped her and like unfroze her brain and unbrainwashed her. So Abuelita was fine. And Reggie was just like, was getting chivalent. choked and that's how he ended up coming. How did he come out of it?

I don't remember. I definitely remember that Archie fell down and bingo started licking his wounds. Yes, I know that. But I do also know that it didn't seem like, well, Glenn was already a reanimated corpse. So then he's straight up with a chainsaw, which was awesome, cut him back into pieces, which is technically really fucking badass. But then Cheryl, she's like, I'm sorry, JJ, I have to do this. sets Jason on fire and kills him again.

Yeah, none of the other people who were brainwashed by Percival had to be killed, but Cheryl's just like, you know what, I got to put a stop to this, and sets her own brother on fire just after bringing him back from the sweet hereafter. It is, you know, unkind of her to be like, I'm going to drag you from your, like, blissful, happy family in heaven to come back to Earth with me, where you will just sit in silence, perhaps to get a lower day rate as an actor so that we're not going to do the lines. And now you got totally no fault of your own,

got brainwashed by fucking Percival. And I'm just going to set you a flame to stop you. Cheryl, it was an overreaction. Yes. And so she didn't need to do it. But now JJ, I guess is back in the suite hereafter. I'm going to assume maybe he's also going to come back as an angel. We don't know.

But that's so. And another part that doesn't make sense, but we're going with it, Riverdale. is how Tabitha being the guardian angel of Riverdale. I'm the guardian angel of Riverdale, Jughead. I can tell that the soul of Riverdale is in trouble. Yes. So, which, did we know that Archie is the soul of Riverdale yet?

We did not know that explicitly, but I think we did know it. Kind of knew. Like, implicitly, because he's the only fucking guy who likes Riverdale. He's the only person who cares about Riverdale. Really loves Riverdale. He's the fire department, right? He's the... Oh, yeah.

Child Protective Services. Oh, yeah. So I think there's, we were, yesterday when we recorded, we were kind of balking at the soul of Riverdale line. But first of all, I'm balking at Tabitha being out. Tabitha. Get with it, Jughead. I'm the soul of, I'm the guardian angel of Riverdale.

Of course I know when someone's in trouble. And it's like, bitch, you were not the guardian angel of Riverdale until like yesterday. Yeah. You're a time traveler. How does that also like, you're a guardian angel? Are you still? Are you alive? Are you dead?

What does that even mean? Yeah. And she's like, oh, now I have fucking just, you know, powers where I can just tell that Archie's being stabbed. Okay, you just made that up. Yes. And so you only can tell that the soul of Riverdale is in trouble. What about all of the other, like, goolies that are getting their shit beat out of them

over at the Babylonium because they're brainwash right now. Do you feel that? Do you feel all of like- Yeah, what about Betty and Cheryl and Veronica? Yeah. You don't feel, you're not feeling, though, like, them being attacked by. people from their past and or their present? I mean, of those three, I would say Cheryl is also the soul of Riverdale, Betty,

soul of Riverdale, Veronica. Yeah, but if you think about it, Veronica and Betty both left Riverdale. And so to Jughead, like, Archie, well, Archie went to war, but I don't think that counts. It comes back to Riverdale's like, I'm never leaving Riverdale. And Cheryl never left Thornhill. So I feel like both of them together really are, you know, the yin-and-yang of the soul of Riverdale, yeah, we said it. Yeah, we said it here. Yes, because every town needs somebody who hates the town but never leaves, and that's Cheryl. Yes. And then every town needs somebody

who, like, loves the town completely uncritically. And that's Archie. Yes, yes, exactly. And so Tabitha goes to go find Archie, finds him having been stabbed many times by Reggie. And who comes over, which this scene, it was so funny because Jeff did immediately say, he's like, You're going to have to put that dog down. Because thinko, the dog comes over and starts chawing down on Archie's wounds, like heavy licking. It's like heavy petting except much more disgusting. I said it reminds me of the old SNL sketch called Headwound Harry with Dana Harvey,

where he's like this premise where he shows up to a party and he has a massive gaping head wound. And then he just like keeps like lying down on the white couch and like rubbing his head wound all over everything. and then a dog comes over and starts chewing on it. Chewing on it. It is so gross. It's so funny. It's so gross. And that is watching a dog just being like, oh, yeah, let that dog lick that.

Open stab wound. Everyone's standing there watching it happen. Watching it happen. Stop the dog. And then they're like, oh, good thing we just let that dog feast on Archie. Feast. Because we forgot that the dog has healing saliva. So I remember in the episode with,

apparently the real TBK, the random construction worker, when he was attacking Archie, that bingo the dog jumped on him and pushed him through a wall and out the second story of a home. Yeah. So he's a super dog. That's awesome. But if he has healing powers, which I don't think that we knew. No. Then in the fact that Jeff didn't remember the healing powers is usually a pretty good sign. Yeah.

And wouldn't you have them around all the time? Keep him around, especially Archie. Archie is constantly getting gravely injured. Keep your dog with you. Suck on the wounds. Yeah, make it like a service dog, but for healing wounds. Yeah, get a tent set up. Bring that dog to the battle.

Put a little jacket on him that says, don't pet me, I'm working. How cute would it be? And then he's just in there just like, roar, roar, roo. I love to lick blood. I love to lick it. just chawing down. Man, he really got in there. It was really disgusting.

It's so gross. They put peanut butter in the wound? Watching a dog lick an open wound and everybody being like, yay. Yay! Look at him go. It was disgusting. So gross. So now they're like, what do we do?

We need to get the heads back. How are we going to get the heads back? Because he's up, Percival's up in the Babylonium, and he's still surrounded by his brainwax. goooshed gooies and they're all really trying not to kill the gooies because the goleys are obviously brainwashed it's not their fault that they're supporting him so they come up Tony comes up with oh wow the best suggestion and the best line that has ever been said in riverdale yeah let me bring up the quote please bring up the quote j quote the best yeah so so something uh you know A long time Riverdale Roundup listeners might remember that Jackie really loves the quote,

A serpent never sheds its skin. Because it does. 100% that is what a serpent does. And so Tony and Fangs, you know, they've got baby Anthony. Everyone's sitting around trying to figure out what to do love personal. And they're talking strategy. And before they get to this excellent, excellent, absolutely no notes plan, Tony says the best quote of the entire series,

which is always kill a baby snake in its egg so it doesn't grow up to bite you. This is apparently a saying. What are you talking about, T.T. It's an old serpent saying, always kill a baby snake in its egg so it doesn't grow up to bite you. To bite you, that means there will be no serpents. You are a snake.

You identify. You are a gang of people who identifies as snakes always kill a baby snake in its egg so it doesn't grow up to bite you this saying should be about snakes enemies i don't even know what snake's enemies are i guess a hawk like that's a hawk yeah let's say the saying should be always kill a baby hawk in its egg so it doesn't grow up to swoop you away yes instead this we got so jacky and i decided we're going to get matching tattoos that say always kill a baby snake in a day so it doesn't grow up to bite you what the fuck does why would you kill your young. Especially when this plan is about using your young, baby Anthony, to save the world. And you're like, yeah, use my child. I'll give you an old saying about it.

Always kill a baby snake in its egg. So it doesn't grow up to bite you. We all learned a really good lesson, which is not, it's also the opposite of what they're doing with baby Anthony, because if you remember, baby Anthony is also immortal. and their idea in this, this is where it really, man, take your thinking hats off, put them up on the shelf because we're about to get some looper up in here. This is the second time loop of the episode.

We forgot to mention there was a Tabith that created a time loop where she sped up time. They moved the old location of pops to the new location of pops, the time loop. It's really, you're not going to want to think about it too much because you're like, what? Because the hell mouth. Because they moved.

So they didn't know that Pops is not the spot that Percival wanted, that it's the land that he wanted. So them moving Pops into the boxing ring, which they did like four episodes ago, that was for naught. It was not only for not. It was, I think, for worse. For worse. It was like wide open hellmouth now. Big gaping hellmouth, begging hellmouth, begging to be. It is just a big old gaper we got here.

They're like, oh, we got to go stuff that hellmout. Stuff that hellmout. And so they're like, oh, it will never be able to move everything back from pops all the way to old pops. And Tabith was like, I'll create a time loop. And somehow they do it. She speeds it up. She speeds up time. So that in like an hour, they were able to do like several days work.

But she only speeds up time for them. because she makes like a bubble. So she doesn't speed up time for other people, which I don't understand the physics of that. Like I would understand making it sped up. I don't know. I can't think about it too long. Take this.

Thinking hat off. Take it off. They just move it back on top. She speeds up time. So she's going to speed up time again. She's going to do another time loop because they decided, in the suite hereafter, they're like, oh my God. Our son, baby Anthony, is a warrior.

Even though we do not know. We don't know that because all he was is like he was wearing the sick serpent's jacket, yes. And yes, he is marrying the son of Twyla Twist and they ended their gang warfare ways with their love. Fine. But that doesn't mean that he's 18 and a warrior. Can't you just? So what they do is Tabitha, go with us, creates a time loop, takes the baby, creams the time loop, ages up baby Anthony to the age of 18 where. he is a warrior and uses him to be sent into the Babylonium to attack Percival, not to kill Percival,

but to get back the heads. Right. Just to get back. They lost their baby's entire childhood. Just to get back the heads. Wow. I thought that it was because they thought that he could like save the world. No, this is what I was wrong about in the last episode.

It was like, so he might be able to do something in this next battle that's coming. I'm not sure. But in this episode, he was just sent to get those heads back. Just get the heads. And Titi, at another great line, not as great as always kill a baby snake and it shell so that it doesn't bite you. But another great line. She's like, you know what? We will miss his entire child.

But that's a sacrifice that we're willing to. That we're just willing to make. Like, what are you? What? Just send him to go be killed? Because again, immortal does not mean that you. impenetrable. He could just also go die. You're just sending your son to also just go die. Yeah, you're just like, you just made your son skip his child. It's like one thing for a parent to

decide. You know what? I don't need ages zero to 18. But it's also a pretty big decision for the child themselves to be like, oh, I won't have a childhood. I'm a baby born to be a grown hymbo man who is hot and dumb as rocks, very queer and ready to kill. Which I am here for, because I'm assuming that that means of the next season that they're going to follow baby Anthony as a teenager now, hopefully to bring in a little bit more youthful sex. That's disgusting. But you know what I mean. You know what I mean? You know what I mean?

I'm not a creep. You know what I mean? Yes, that would be fine. And nobody wants a toddler around. You know, if you're going to have a baby in a show, they're always holding the costume and prop department has done such a terrible job of even showing Anthony. to be a baby. Yes. God forbid we have like a two-year-old

running around Riverdale or a too much. You know, we just don't want that. So I think from a writing perspective, make the time loop, skip the fuck. No one wants this fucking baby. It was like the Riverdale writers were like, what do we do with this fucking baby? Yes.

How are we going to have this baby? We need the symbolism of a Christ, but we don't want an actual character who's a baby. What the fuck do we do with that? And they're like, you know what? Time loop it. Hot hymbo, ready to kill.

So he gets, sent into Percival's office. Percival shoots him multiple times and Anthony just smiles, which again, goes against the idea of immortality that you are trying to sell us, Riverdale. Yeah, he's not Luke Cage. He is like, why is he able to get shot? Just because he's immortal doesn't mean he's invulnerable. Jackie and I's parsed this. We looked it up. And I think there might be some overlap, you know, But like, you got to spell it out for us for a day. I'll be like, oh, my son, baby Anthony, he's not able to be killed. And he's also not able to be hurt by bullets, you know?

Set out the rules and then follow the rules. Yes, but they're not doing this. So Percival escapes because he realizes it's baby Anthony, time looped to be 18 years old. He figured it out, which I don't know how he figured it out that fast. He magics out. He seals in the serpents and the goolies into the Babylonium. But meanwhile, the serpents apparently are still looking. for the heads inside because they know that the heads are inside of the Babylonium somewhere.

So while all of this is happening, which they never thought about it before, Jughead and Tabitha have been just like, they're just juking between like alternate universes. They're just like going back and forth. Tabitha then realizes, oh my God. Oh my God. I'm a guardian angel. And I didn't even think that like we, I always checked the. future and the outcomes of the apocalypse in Riverdale, but I never checked the future of the

possibilities of the apocalypse in River Vale. Vale. So they go, Chi and Jughead go to Rivervale. And I guess because of the supernatural energies, I love that they just throw that in there. It's because of the supernatural energies. There's more possibilities. Yeah, it's different there because everything's different there. Okay.

It's different there. All right. It's a long shot. But apparently the idea that like where the apocalypse can be, where they can actually defeat Percival is in Pops, in River Vale. So they get an idea of how to trap Percival. And we don't necessarily know what that is. But we do know that Percival is drawn towards Pops, which is now over the Hellmouth. So it makes it more difficult to get to the Hellmouth.

hell mouth. So that is good. One obstacle. But then they have another obstacle. And that obstacle is our fabulous teens that they all show up. And Archie comes out of Pops with a bat, which also a bat. That's it. Why don't they all have guns? If you know a gun can kill him, shoot him. Yeah. Also, like, do make fucking Heather put her to work and make her do some sort of like, Sorcercery. All these bullets have a special power for, you know, fucking do some witchery, man. Like, you got to be able to fashion some extra oomph in your weapons with all these witches sitting around.

Something. And, like, all now, sorcerers, like, there's nothing else that you can use besides a bat to Archie. So he comes out and he hits Percival in the face. But Percival's got this, like, fancy magic mace there that's just, like, swinging it around. and then he notices that the other, that Cheryl comes out and Reggie comes out and Rih comes out and Rihanna comes out and they all come out and they stand around him, they're like, this is our town, bitch. And they start punching him.

They're just punching him. And he's like, ugh, which doesn't make any, like, this is the whole thing. They're not all Superman. They're not, like, you can't, you're not all like super strong. If he could have just been beaten up, why hasn't he been beaten to death? already. Right, right. There's like, because there's the, you know, the, the, the, our fab five or whatever has always outnumbered him. But, yeah, there's, there's just, we're never going to get any clarity on what the fuck Percival's level of invulnerability is because it's sometimes and sometimes not. But he gets all shit beaten out of him by our, you know, our crew. And then he spells the fog.

He sends the fog and he turns their powers against him. And this is where you're going to really want to hold on to your fucking hats. I know you're looking at your watch and you're like, doesn't Riverdale round up usually end by this time? But we have to explain what happens at the end of this episode. We've got to get into this. A fog comes in. The fog uses everyone's powers against them.

So what happens? Cheryl turns to ice opposite of fire. Yes, turns to ice. Archie turns to iron. Because he becomes an iron statue. Betty, what happens to Betty? Turn to blind. Betty goes blind.

They're like, oh, guys, where are you guys? Everybody. And who am I missing? They turn Reggie into a life-size dummy. Yes, yes. Which is very funny. Because he's a fucking dumb ass. And because there's that little dummy of him who talks to him and I think

that they just wanted to reuse the prop. I think there's no way. They're like, we got this prop of Reggie as a dummy. May as well use it again. And Veronica was poisoned. She was poisoned by herself. Ah, yes, that's fun. And meanwhile, Jughead is sitting inside Pops.

In a magician's outfit? In a magician's outfit. And so Percival walks through into Pops. Now, what we as the viewer find out later, but we don't know at the time, but we're going to let you know, is that it's not just any old Pops. it's Rivervale Pops because Jughead put a little portal in the door of Pops. So instead of walking in in Riverdale, all of our friends are frozen and dead. But he walks, first of all, walks through a portal into River Vail Pops with Riverdale's Jughead, we think.

We think it's still the same Jughead, our regular Jughead in Riverdale, who meets him in Pops and he's like, let's play Domino's. And so they sit down and they have a little battle of the brains. And the Percival goes into Jughead's mind and starts rifling through. And he's like, you can't outsmart me, Jughead. And it was so, yeah, he's like ripping up all of the comic books that live inside of the library brain of Jughead. Which like, I don't even understand like what that, like you're just destroying his memories. Like I guess it's just trying to make him go mad. Like maybe it's memory madness.

But then Jughead's like, ha, ha, ha. Oh, Percival, jokes on you. While you were in here in my mind, distracted in my mind, we did a sneak attack on you. And then we snap back into, not in Jughead's mind, but back into Pops, where Percival has been gang stabbed by every other, all of our friends. And he's like, how's that possible?

You're all frozen and dead outside. And then Jughead's like, those are my other friends. River Vale. It was River Vale's version. of Cheryl and Veronica and Betty and Archie. And Tabitha was there too. And so he's there and he's covered in blood, which also great cutback scene because I was not expecting that to happen at all.

Yeah, this scene was very fun and satisfying. It is something you're not going to want to think too hard about because how did Jughead like mobilize all the other people in Rivervale? Keep the thinking hat on the shelf. Don't put it back on. Don't put it back on especially for this end part because even like MJ had asked last time we recorded this, like, how did they get Percival back into, because like we're about to go back in time? But it was because there's double portal.

So they get up also, well, I'm not going to think about how all of our, like the ones that were just like killed with their own powers, how they ended up not dying in Riverdale. But again, think he hats on on. So we don't need to think about it. So Tabitha picks up the stabbed person. He's not, brings him back through the doors of Pops, and it's another, he got double portled. He comes out in 1580 by his hellmouth in the cemetery that he met Mr. Seifer in in the first place. So the, yeah, so the key part is that they take him back to the time before he was immortal, even though this whole scene is about how this devil has his soul, which would have, which means that would have already happened.

But they're like, oh, let's go back to before. He can't die now, but he could die back before he sold his soul to the devil. So that they take him back to 1580 and the devil's like, oh, hello, the person who sold me your soul. So again, don't think about it too much. Don't think about it. Don't think about it. And so Mr. Seifer takes, like, takes his soul. Yeah.

Comes it actually takes him. But before he takes him, Percival yells, if I can't have Riverdale, no one will. And so he was, if they had just sewed his mouth shut to keep him from using these incantations. Yeah, he's always mumbling. He's inconted again. He's mumbling. He's like, oh, now I'm dying, but I'm mumbling. And Tabith is like, oh, interesting.

You're mumbling. Whatever. He's dead. He's dead. Yay. And then everybody comes back and celebrates in the pops parking lot. Yeah, he's dead. Everybody's like, we did a great job.

Our troubles are finally over. They find the missing heads in the fridge of the Babylon. in the kitchen, they find the heads, they're able to resurrect the bodies. Archie has a beer with Uncle Daddy. They don't seem to be talking about the many betrayals of Uncle Daddy. They're not talking about the traumas at all. They don't need to. We have all of our parental figures back.

But we won in the Battle of Good and Evil. Bum, bum, bum, or did we? Because then I haven't realized it's not a hater face. I really go full circle. I can't pretend. that I don't hate this character anymore. Jackie has texted me pictures of herself doing a face of Heather,

like an imitation Heather face. Because I have glasses very similarly to her. And I was like, look at this dumb. And so every time I wear those glasses, I pretend to be Heather. I'm like, stop, stop. And I just kill her up.

I go, halla, job. A job. I'm a witch job. It's actually a very, very accurate Heather impression. I'll have to post the picture. It's a horrendous picture. So they find out that in his incantation, what Percival was doing was he was summoning Bailey's

Comet to not pass over Riverdale, but to head right for Riverdale. So then Tabith was like, oh my God, all of these future things that I saw. It wasn't the apocalypse that killed everything and why there's ash all over everything. it's Bailey's comet hitting Riverdale, which also makes no sense. Why couldn't you have told that? Everything would be destroyed. Everything would be destroyed if a comet hits Riverdale.

Pops wouldn't still be there. No. Tabitha, why didn't, how can you time travel and tell the future and tell all the different scenarios yet you didn't know that that's what happened? This was going to happen. What the fuck? I don't understand it.

So. Fucking Tabitha. Yeah, it's not fallout from war. It's fallout from a comet. And so now this last episode, the last episode. We're quite sure it's the last? I'm very sure.

I'm looking at this. Don't miss the season six finale of Riverdale this Sunday, July 31st, where it is their last night on earth. And all I know is that, man, this better be a sexy episode before they figure out how to change this Bailey's comet. It better be sexy. Yeah. And we now have talked longer than we talked to the first. first one. And we were more correct in this one because the last time I definitely screwed up some big things. So talking about it again, really, now I know this episode. If anyone asked

a few questions about this episode, I can talk about this episode. Yeah, the dress rehearsal helped. I think we did get, I think we managed to tell the story of this episode to the extent that it can be coherently told, which is, you know, not completely. But no, we got close. We got as close as anybody will ever come. Oh, we got close, but we did get about 10 minutes over the running time of Riverdale. Oh, my God. Please tell us your thoughts, your anger, your rage, your happiness. What do you mean?

We have been on a journey. We realized that 24 episodes of a show is approximately the number of classes you take in a full year of grad school. So we're multiple doctorates of Riverdale. We're Dr. Riverdale. Thank you very much. Yeah, us, yeah, we're Doctors Riverdale. That would be fun. That's a fun duo name for us. Yeah, the Doctor's Riverdale.

The Doctor's Riverdale. Thank you, MJ, for joining me again. And you know what? I had more fun this time than I did the first time. Well, Jackie, I've got some parting words for you. Always kill a baby snake in its A. So it doesn't grow up to bite you. Even if you're a snake.

And everyone you know is a snake. It doesn't. We love you guys so much and we'll be back next week for the season six finale of Riverdale. Love you. Bye. This show is made possible by listeners like you. Thanks to our ad sponsors, you can support our shows by supporting them. For more shows like the one you just listening.

to go to lastpodcastnetwork.com.