Page 7 - Riverdale Roundup Ch. 131: They've Made the Entire Universe Gay

Episode Date: July 8, 2023

"MAKE 'EM ALL GAY, PLEASE" Jackie shouts into the unforgiving Archie-verse! Page 7 and Wizard and the Bruiser are going on TOUR! Dates and links to tickets at lastpodcastnetwork.com Support us on our Patreon page and get weekly bonus Patreon-exclusive content! Patreon.com/Page7Podcast Intro song by Green Dreams Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ to listen to new episodes of Page 7 ad-free.Start a free trial now on Apple Podcasts or by visiting siriusxm.com/podcastsplus. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey, LPN fans, page 7 and Wizard and the Bruiser are going on tour. Yes, the Last Podcast Network presents the release of Butthole Cut tour could be coming to your town. Holden, where are we going? July 11th will be in Oklahoma City, July 12th, Kansas City, Missouri, and finishing out in July 13th, St. Louis. Be there. MJ, where can we get tickets? For tickets, go to Last Podcast Network.com. Say it again.

That's Last Podcast Network.com. All right, let me paint you a picture here. Right. I wake up at 6.30 in the morning, hung over to watch Riverdale. Mm-hmm. And I have another confession to make. MJ, I cried again. I cried too. Did you cry to?

Okay, thank God. I was like, as I was crying during the last song. The last song, yeah. I can't cry. I can't make this a thing. I can't be this person that cries at Riverdale. I can't. Well, I am going to go ahead and assume that you cry.

for a different reason this week than last week. Last week you cried because the book burning scene was disturbingly relevant to our actual horrific political hellscape landscape that we're living in. This week, if you're anything like me, you cried out of just being moved by the ensemble cast of Riverdale. Loved it. And their relationship to each other. I spent this and it was the musical. It indeed was the musical. The musical episode, guys. And I spent the entire time watching the, episode just literally sitting there and thinking, I hope they're having so much fun. And they seemed like they were. And that's all we want. We just want them to have fun together. I know. And I don't know how it makes you feel this way, but like watching them all, if you follow them on social media, them posting over this last week because they just wrapped the final season. So they're all posting these like really like beautiful memories and just writing these beautiful social media post like saying thank you to the show. And then I watched this episode and that last song and they're

all coming together. But I also, that's why I love a musical. I love an ensemble scene. Don't get me wrong. Oh my God. When everybody comes together and sings the power of song. That's the thing. And if you've ever been in a musical, you know that it's just really fun to stand there and sing with everybody. It's not an experience that you get to have in your regular life. And I think as actors, it must be so fun for them to be like, we're going to put on the cornyest fucking musical to turn from an actor on set doing a network show with all its pros and cons to then once a season get to be like, this is now a musical.

It must just be really, really fun. It just looks like they are having fun on set. And Riverdale does not always look like it would be a fun show to be a part of, especially with all the ups and downs of the last seven years. But this whole season has seemed really fun. The cast has really seemed like they're having a lot of fun. And yeah, there's just something about the musical episode that I always love the musical episodes, although I'm sure you can literally find me saying, I don't want a musical episode

of Riverdale, which was how I felt, I think, at first, because I was like, I want it to be like a dark sexy mystery. I don't want it to be a musical. I've come around on the musical episodes. And I think that just knowing that this is their last hurrah gives it all an extra heavy and meaningful weight to it. And I also cried. I'm so glad you cried to. I was like trying to blame the hangover.

And it was like, Jackie, and I said aloud to myself, you just love musicals. Yes. And I do. And I know, again, we've had lots of ups and downs with the musical episodes of Riverdale. We haven't even brought up what musical there's doing. I know. Did you spend the first five minutes trying to Google what musical is this? Researching Archie the musical. Yes, I did because I didn't know if Archie the musical was real or not. Yes, I was like, at first, I was, for the very first song, I was just like, okay, I was Googling what they were singing, like, okay, what is this from? What is this from?

Because in the past, they've done obscure enough musicals that I didn't know any of the music for them. And, you know, Heather's the musical and Carrie the musical. And so this time I was like, okay, what the fuck musical is this. And then you realize a few minutes into this episode, they have composed an original musical for this episode called Archie the Musical. And in the plot, Kevin and Clay have composed it together and are trying to put on an original musical called Archie the Musical at the high school and trying to get Principal Featherhead to green light it so that they don't have to do Oklahoma again. And as a musical lover who's also lukewarm on Oklahoma, I appreciate Kevin's disdain for Oklahoma.

Yeah, because then they're just like everybody else. Let them flourish. Please, Principal Featherhead. Although, it puts us in the strange position of, the songs are good, but since it's not a musical we know, I feel like it just sounds like kind of generic musical for the entire episode. I don't know if I can delineate which songs happen where.

Oh, am I offending you? It's, you don't think of it. was generic. Am I offending you? Oh no, it was insanely generic, but I loved it. I'm not complaining. I'm just saying that it's all kind of one big like, we're Archie the musical. I'm Veronica, like for kind of the entire time, you know, I don't know if I, except for the love songs. Yes, there was, there is, and they, and too, I love self-aware Riverdale. Self-aware Riverdale started off this episode by literally referencing the completely undefined character of Archie Andrews. Kevin has a line that says if the want song for the main

character has too many things going on, it leads to a poorly defined main character, which is hilarious because Archie is a pretty poorly defined main character. What are you talking about basketball or poetry, MJ? So it's very meta. It's not only a musical episode, but it's a musical episode that is explaining the structure of musicals as we go through it. They're like, this is the I Want song. This is the central romantic driver. And they explain what makes musicals good throughout the musical episode. Very satisfying. Very satisfying. I loved explaining the I want song. I love, like, because it also goes to show how much Kevin loves musicals. And even though This is Archie the musical.

This episode was definitely way more focused on what Kevin was going through. And we will discuss that as the songs go on during this. Because it starts off. The whole episode starts off as like essentially Kevin and Clay pitching this idea to everybody. All right, guys, we're coming together. They have this great opening number. It's very cheesy. It's very, I've seen multiple recaps liking it to high school musical.

And I said, how dare they? because now we've watched all the high school musicals, okay? And you can bet on that. Wait, how dare they... That we've watched it. Who are you offended on behalf of? Are you saying that... Riverdale.

How dare they compare high school musical to Riverdale because Riverdale is so much better? Is that what you're saying? Yes. Wow. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Wow. Yeah, it's big claim.

Now it's other people's turn to be offended. I mean, I think I'm going to agree with you because I was in, apparently the minority of people at our Page 7 community who was not especially moved by high school musical. I did not it did not stir much in me. We saw it too old. We saw it too old. I'm glad we watched that. But Holden loved it. Holden's old than us and he loved it.

Of course. He fucking loved it. I did like this. If you said MJ you can either watch high school musical or this episode of Riverdale. I would choose this episode of Riverdale five times over. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, because now I want to listen to some of the songs. Yeah. There's some of them I actually want to listen to. I said generic, but they are generically good. They are all, they are good. Especially, yeah, we get a great ensemble number right from the top. And it's, I really like it too because it does the Riverdale thing where it's

switching between where they actually are and kind of the fantasy. And so it's really them just workshopping the musical in the music room. But we also get like a big ensemble number where they're all on the steps of the high school. They're all dancing. They're all dancing. It looks great. They're all smiling with each other. And they immediately spoke towards where they like, Cheryl comes walking down the hallway and she's singing and she's in her vixen's uniform. And I was like, I thought Cheryl can't be in the vixen's anymore. And that was my first thought. I wrote it down. And then immediately, once they're back in the room, they're like, wait a second, you have us singing as we're seniors. We're not even seniors. We're juniors. Archie gets upset where he's just like, why is this all about me? Because it's very funny. because in the world, you know, there's not like archie comics or something like that. So he doesn't understand why it's all about him. And I also saw Cole Spouse singing up top.

And I was like, I thought Cole Spouse won't sing. And then he and Reggie are like, yeah, I'm not going to be a part of this. And they piece out. Again, self-aware Riverdale. In the first ensemble scene, Jughead is singing. And he's not only singing, he's singing very enthusiastically. Yes. And so you're like surprised.

You're like, this is not usually Cole Spruz's deal. And then, right, when we see them back in the music. music room workshopping. He's like, yeah, I'm not going to do this, which, you know, I guess props to Colesbrous for being like, I'll do it enough to like, he is in the opening number and in the closing number. And that's nice because it was really eye-roly to be like, for him to be like, I'm not even going to participate, you know. Yeah. And now I read some recaps too that talk about and like their ire towards not only this episode, but all of the musical episodes because they drop the plot of everything else.

However, yes, there is no plot. There is no plot. You're right. But they did write the music for this, so they're not just shoehorning songs in trying to desperately make them make sense in this episode. It's written for it, which I like that it's more, like, if you're going to compare it to a high school musical, I like how it blends the line of reality and the music. And like, I saw this person right, like, how are they all going to come in and sing the song at the end when Kevin just wrote it last night.

And I was that's what musicals are. That's just musicals. Yes. It's totally, yes, completely, totally fine that you suspend your disbelief. And yeah, and that way it is like high school musical where it just actually does feel like they're all spontaneously bursting in the song. We put everything on hold. This is what happens with every few episodes of magical Riverdale.

And also to that point, I would say this is probably the second most successful musical episode of Riverdale after Carrie. Because Carrie, it worked because the plot. of the musical could work with what was happening in season one. Right. And then the musical episodes started to fall apart after that because, like, it just didn't work plot-wise after that. But this does work because it is an original musical about these characters in this season.

So we get a song about queer love, queer interracial love in the 1950s, specifically, as outlined by Cheryl. I love that they didn't like the song at first. And they're like, but T.T. essentially was just like, we're not just going to be chorus girls. Are we actually going to have parts in this? Yeah. And then they wrote that beautiful song. Yeah.

I thought it was gorgeous the four of them singing together. Also, Clay can sing. Yeah, yeah. Clay is, I'm very glad that we have Clay this season. Me too. Clay is doing a lot of heavy lifting, both in terms of the good looks and in terms of advancing some interesting plot. And, yeah, so we get the queer love song.

We get Archie's Want song. And I love how, because Julian is playing his understudy. Right. And he's very upset about the fact that he is his understudy. And in fact, they have this, like, as they're singing the first I want song that Kevin writes for them, they're running and they're like competing. And then Archie takes his shirt off. And then Julian takes his shirt off. And I was like, man, I'd feel so bad if I was like taking my shirt off next to KJ.

Appa. I know. I know. The one who's not KJ. Appa is in a tough spot for sure. And honestly, I thought KJ. Apa did a great job in this episode. He's born for stuff like this. This is the thing about KJ. Apa is, I'm sure he's going to have a great career after this.

But weirdly enough, as much as we have complained about Archie over the year is, it really is, he is perfect at playing this character. He's just like, he totally understands the assignment. He's like, I'm supposed to be a corny boy from the 1950s. And he is killing it. there is really very little plot advancement for any of the characters, but they don't totally put everything on hold because we do get a lot of Kevin plot. And then we do get like a little bit more advancement of the, it's not the Archie plot because Archie's basically...

Betronica? That's the thing. Archie's like, actually my big conflict isn't Betty or Veronica. It's basketball or poetry, which whatever, snooze fest. I also want to commend Archie for coming in and actually have. a difficult conversation, even though it was very short, when Archie comes in, because the whole thing for the I want, because the main character needs to know what he wants, he needs to make decisions.

So this is like the whole plot for Archie through this episode is he doesn't even know what choices are his big choices. And he has to finally be like, what do I want? And so they write him a whole song of like, is it Betty or is it Veronica that I want? And he was just like, this isn't for me. This isn't what I'm going through right now. And as we know, he doesn't know how to write poetry while playing basketball at the same time. And so he goes to Betty and Veronica and he's like, I know I've kissed both of you,

but I don't want to kiss anybody right now. I just want to figure out whether I want to play basketball or do poetry. Snaps to that, bro. Snaps to that. And then snaps to Riverdale for being like, sure, we have to put all of the cool, fun, murder mystery stuff on the back burner for the musical episode. But what we could do is continue to advance the queer love between Betty and Veronica. Yes.

Auga! Auga! This was started, of course, during the Halloween episode, I think, where we see Veronica and Betty are, you know, both orphans and they're kind of confessing their plight to each other. And they confess that they each thought about kissing each other, but then they get interrupted by Smithers. So now we get to see them both after Archie being like, it's not really it for either of you that they both kind of look at each other and are like, I'm still thinking a lot about you. And it's really, just like it was before, it is very, despite this being the corny

kind of meaningless musical episode, it's very resonant and it works very well. And can I just say the chemistry between the two of them? That's the thing. Fireworks. Yeah. Like it's so palpable. And I think it's just because they're really good friends. So like they're very like intimate in friendship ways in real life. Yeah. And like that so they've got like they had this scene where they were like it was like an almost kiss and they were like hold like their hands. It like zeroed in on their hands. And I was just like kiss. Kiss. And then they continued the scene later on. They jump back in and then they kiss. And it was. it's everything. It's my everything. I had no idea. It's what I needed. I'm so happy they're not warring over Archie. I'm happy that they're choosing each other. Fuck, yes. And there's so many things that I have not appreciated throughout Riverdale in terms of, we talked about this a lot last week, how self-referential it is to the Archie comics and like how it turns out that, you know, Archie was this kind of like purity comic in the wake of all of,

the band comics and whatever, but I also love that seven years of Riverdale about a series of comics where the entire plot is, will Archie choose Betty or Veronica, to have it culminate with Betty and Veronica choosing each other? And Archie choosing himself. And Archie choosing himself, just like Samantha chose herself in Sex and City. Yes. Yes. I love it. And their song, their harmonies together, I loved it. I want to listen to that song. I know. I know. The first, like, season one

Riverdale musical, I was like, wasn't sure if it was all of them singing. And so I wasn't really enjoying the music and the singing because I was like, this all just feels kind of canned. But now that I know it's all of them singing, I can enjoy the cannedness. It's actually like they're good singers. All of them. It sounds good. It sounds corny, but in a good way. But also in watching it, you can tell that they all work so hard on this. Because it's got to be really difficult, especially for this where it's like learning music you've never heard before. Yeah. And having to like, just like, that's a lot.

That's a lot to ask of a cast. And I know that they do this once and now this is their seventh time doing it. So I'm sure it's old hat. But it goes to show that they are seasoned at doing it in this episode. Totally. And it's just a fun vehicle to do like a romp of all different, of like different styles. And like, so before they fix the, the love song for. Cheryl and Titi to make it the queer love anthem. It's like this kind of corny sock hop style

Valentine Friday love song. And it's just fun how this season they've been really leaning into the 1950s like stylistically in terms of the costumes and in terms of like how it's shot and how it's lit. And so the musical is also a really fun way for them. It just, it was visually a delight. You know, There's lots, it's really corny. There's a million costume changes. We're constantly switching back and forth between fantasy and reality. And it's just really satisfying. And the kiss, the kiss between Veronica and Betty, like, happens in the middle of a song

in a kind of like hyper-visual fantasy. I almost missed it. I was like, okay, we're doing this love song thing. And then suddenly they were kissing. I was like, oh my God. Like, but it really felt earned, you know? Yes. Oh my God. It was just, I was just, oh, sad watching it this morning and just being like, do I love this?

I know. Now after so long, I'm finally like, I don't really want it to end. Well, also we know that Betty and Veronica's song was so good because Cole Porter wrote it. Col Porter, right? Because Veronica was like, I'm going to call up Cole Porter. And I'm going to have Cole Porter. I'm going to pull in a favor and have him in one night write me this song. but I will say, Cole Porter, you did a great job. And they made the quote, quote, cold Porter song sound better

than the songs Kevin had written somehow. Like, they made it be like, this is a musical Kevin wrote, but then this song is going to be like way better because the premises that Veronica reached out to her pal, Cole Porter, to write her and Betty,

their own song. Yeah, I mean, I feel like the old, I don't have any real critiques of this episode. I don't, the Kevin's stuff, like the Kevin plotline felt like slightly shoehorned in. We haven't heard from Kevin's mom since we heard that his origin story is that she called him husky when he was a child, right? So, you know, I didn't have my Riverdale historian with me. And I was like, did we know in this season that we must have known that his mother, that Kevin's mother is alive.

That's the thing. We hadn't seen her this season. No. That I'm sure of. I don't think that we had heard Sheriff Keller even talk about getting divorced or being single or whatever, whereas in this episode they just jump right in like Sheriff Keller is sleeping in like the prisoner's cot. Which I'm kind of happy he's sleeping on a prisoner's cot this season's sheriff Keller. Yeah, he's a bad 50s dad this season. He's got a bed in the corner of the jail. And apparently him and his wife are going through this horrendous marital conflict, which we're all supposed to know was happening, which they've never referenced before.

And apparently it's really tearing Kevin apart. And, yeah, his mom shows up. And then he has a scene, they have a scene where they tell him that they're getting divorced at pops, of course. And then he has a scene with his mom where he's like, basically like, is this my fault? It seems like things have been bad between you guys ever since I broke up with Betty. All but saying it's just because I'm gay. And she's like, no, this has nothing to do with you. But I appreciate that she actually, she's the only one of the parents that was like,

but I accept you and it's not about, you know, like, I feel that that was an acceptance without saying it. Yeah, totally. But like, hasn't Kevin's mom, like, never been around for the history of Riverdale, like, ever? And she called him Husky. Right. I thought she was holding around as a kind of villain figure who called him Husky. And here she is in this episode being the only parent who seems to accept their child for who they are. Yeah. But yeah, that, you know, so that was fine. We have a scene where Archie tries to quit basketball, and Uncle Daddy's like,

fuck you, I won't accept you. Because he wants to write poetry instead, but also Archie kind of sucks for you to do that mid-season. Yeah, totally. He's like, I want to quit basketball mid-season. And I mean, Uncle Daddy is rightly like, well, you have a team that's kind of counting on you. But then everything else Uncle Daddy says is bad because he's like, I can't believe you can choose poetry over basketball. But we don't get anything from the Coopers.

We don't get anything from the lodges. There's no Hiram or Hermione in this episode. And we really don't get anything from Jughead. Jughead and Ethel are like around. They're always together. They come in for the ensemble numbers. But there is other than that, basically zero plot advancement. No mention of the Milkman.

No. No darkness. No darkness whatsoever. But I do love this. theory that comes in from Alanis, and I want to say Alanus, thank you so much for your email, because Alanus is new to our Riverdale Roundup, but was introduced to Riverdale through the quarantine and then has watched all of it and just recently found us. So I love this theory, and thank you so much for writing in. In episode 130, the Pepp Comics guys says in a throwaway line to Ethel

and Jughead, I'm looking at the dream team. Last season, didn't doppelganger Jughead trade his soul to stay locked in the bunker and write storylines for Rivervale with only Ethel for company while he writes? I know the showrunner says the season isn't a Rivervale continuation, which means exactly nothing. I mean, Michael, sure, jokingly gave away the good place twist at a convention. But what if something has happened in the Rivervale universe where Jug and Ethel have to have switched over to write? for Riverdale. It would explain why Ethel has such a big part in the storyline this season and also how they seem to be growing closer together.

And if that is the case and they are the imagination engine for this universe, then they actually would be the dream team. Uh-huh. Yeah. I love this. That makes total sense, right, because we are still ultimately in a world that we're in a Flashback. We're in a time jump. We're in 195. But I forgot that we also might be in a world of Jughead's imagination. We could be. It's possible. At least at times we have been in the world of Jughead's imagination. We're not in, we're not even in an alternate reality from regular reality. We are in a reality in the mind of somebody who's in a different reality. Because I mean, Jughead still narrates the episode. You know, it's like he still usually is obviously not this episode. But he usually, he usually. He's obviously not this episode.

But he usually is the narrator of it, which would make sense if he was the writer. Now I'm trying to find it. In the page 7 group on Facebook, somebody posted a recent article about Riverdale that says that it's going to finish in 1955. It's not going back to the present. What? Yes, I know. I need to find it. Also, Jackie, we just got an email in the inbox as we record about Archie the musical.

So I'm flagging that to make sure that we don't miss. it from Maxwell and also I know you're the you're the theory collector but let's not sleep on the email that we got that's subject line it's not too late to make everyone on Riverdale queer parentheses by Archie conspiracy so we got a lot to get to but I got to see if I can find this but basically okay this here we go comicbook.com Riverdale's final season will remain in the 1950s so if that's the case they're going to have to, what, it will determine what type of resolution we get. So Mad Chin Amick, who is, of course, Alice Cooper said, I don't know if I should answer

when asked about the settings, the various time settings of the final season. She said, no, we don't get out of the 1950s. So I guess maybe this is a big spoiler. I will say you do experience the characters in different dimensions, that you get a lot to see a lot of closures that are outside of the 1950s. I can tease it that way. I think that's saying enough. What?

That is a bit of a, that's a bit of a Tom Holland spoiler. Whoa, that is a spoiler, bro. Right? Bro! That's a huge spoiler. Yeah.

Alice. I know. I'm kind of amazed. Wow. This is from July 1st. So it's new. We're breaking news over here. Oh my God.

Yeah. Okay, so they go back and forth into the different dimensions. Yeah, because Tabitha just hasn't been around for a while. Well, and this is the thing. I say it every week, but I'm like, oh, my God, we have so many episodes left. How can they afford to have an entire episode with no plot advancement again? Because they have so many episodes per season. So much time.

So much time. Plenty of time. Honestly, can we just turn back this conversation just a little bit and talk about Archie being by? Yeah. Because they were multiple times that when he was like, he was thinking about something. He kept like looking over, like at one point he looked over a Jughead and then there was like this moment between them. And then he looked over, I forgot who else it was.

Yes, he was looking in my, he's trying to figure out himself and who he wants to be. I think he's looking at Reggie playing basketball. Yes, yes. And then Jughead writing. Yes. He's like, I'm drawn to writing and I'm drawn to basketball. Or is he drawn to Reggie? To the man.

Please, please, please, please, please, please. Please, please, please, please. I, uh, make them all gay. Please. May I, may I read this? Or by whatever they want to, whatever they identify as. May I read this theory from Rosemary about- Yes, queer it up?

Queer Archie. All right, so, hi Jackie and MJ. I'm sure you like me are absolutely thrilled to pieces with the Veronica developments in the latest episode of Riverdale, but I couldn't help but notice something else as well. During Archie's updated I Want song when he sings about choosing between Betty and Veronica. at one point. This is just what you just said, Jackie. Is that exactly what they're talking about? Because I can't find the email. I can't find his email. I've got it. At one point, we see him glance over at Reggie playing basketball and Jughead writing. Now, well, I guess this was meant to represent his Troy Bolton-esque struggle between ball and poetry. Wow, the high school musical comparison really is very real there. I can't help but consider the implications. Longingly glancing at another man when you're meant to be hanging out with your girlfriend. I mean,

Plus, listen to these lyrics. Sometimes I crave a little cotton candy. Yes. Sometimes I want to have some onion rings. They're both delicious. Please understand me. How can I choose between two perfect things? Rosemary continues.

Choosing between two girls, two life paths, super salad. Pretty convenient metaphor for bisexuality, if you ask me. At least that's what I, as a bisexual myself, am choosing to believe. Please. Oh my God. And but wait, there's more. I can't remember if you've discussed this on the pod before, but in the early 2000s, Roberto Aguirre Sikasa got sent a cease and desist from Archie Comics for trying to stage a play about Archie Andrews being gay.

Has this entire show been a long game for Roberto Aguirre Sakate to finally make Archie queer? Wow. And Rosemary sent a link to a piece called You Think Riverdale is Wild. Wait till you hear about Roberto Aguirre Sikasa's gay Archie play. In 2003, the Riverdale Showrunner got a cease and assist by Archie. Comics for making Archie gay. Wow. Whoa.

Wow. Well, would it happen again if it's like on Riverdale? Well, that's, I can't believe. I mean, I can't believe he, if Archie Comics didn't want Archie to be gay, does Archie comics know about Riverdale? I mean, they've made the entire universe gay. Wow. But also get over yourself Archie Comics.

Come on. I know. Why not? Have some, have a fucking smile. I am so grateful to this. And of course, because of course you spend the whole I want song being like, okay, it's about Veronica and Betty. It's about poetry and basketball. And honestly, it had gone right over my head.

But it is the perfect metaphor for bisexuality to be like, I can't choose, I can't choose between super salad. I can't choose. Cotton candy or onion rings. And then Jugheads like, I'll have both. So that would be great too. I would love a queer jughead, especially since I'm annoyingly thirsting for him this season. It's so,

I'm so annoyed that I can't believe. If you had said, Jackie, by the last season of Riverdale, you're going to be back to thirsting for the teenagers. I, like, you're insane.

But I mean, we have to thirst. It's a sexy show. Yes. Yeah. And their parents are gone. Yes. Yeah.

The parents, right. Who, It's their fault for taking away Skeet Ulrich. If they hadn't taken away Skeet Ulrich, we wouldn't have to thirst for Jughead. Yeah. But this is the world we have. And sprinklings of KJ. Epa.

Which is like, that's crazy to me. That's insane. I know, I know. I'm disturbed yet slightly delighted by how attracted I am to KJ. Epa this season, especially his Instagram is really fun. But, yeah, and I will. So the email that just came in, this second as we record. I identify. I feel so seen by Max and I just want you to know I feel this is

the email we just got in. Yeah. Because I wrote the same thing down to my notes that I was like, wow, Kevin's finally getting like not only a plot line. It's not about him becoming a cult member. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not like he's in a stable relationship. Yes. There's problems at home. And I was like, oh my God. And that's exactly what Max said. Seeing Kevin written with dignity is something we've needed all along, a love story for him that has care taken, a storyline with his parents that doesn't rely on some weird childhood trauma, and the musical being attached to his very essence at the end. As someone that is much like Kevin, in too many ways, I can safely say that I was crying by the end of the episode. Yes, Matt. The way they fixed Kevin's mom really gives me

hope that they're not afraid to retcon some other plot lines like Mrs. Grundy. I too was afraid when I saw her, but I honestly have faith in the writers to do something with her plotline that isn't what she did in season one. This was by far my favorite musical episode. Love you. Max. Max, I'm with you, babe. This is a great point because I actually didn't really realize the extent to which this is giving Kevin more.

I think I have such a, like, I, Kevin has been such a, unfortunately, like, not invested in character throughout the series that I, it didn't, until hearing Max lay it all out like that, it didn't really hit me that, yeah, this episode really really. gives Kevin the most interiority and, like, complexity that we've gotten from him, especially at the end when it, he's basically dealing with his parents' divorce by putting everything he has into this musical and just being like, can I please, can I please have control of something? You know, can I please express myself in this way that I constantly, I'm like still basically, you know, it's the 1950s, so he's not, and he's out to the, the,

three other queer people, but he's not really able to be himself and he puts like his entire heart into this musical. And then it gets roundly rejected. And you're so right, Max, this is the most, this is like a lot that has been given to Kevin in this episode. And that's great. I hadn't really thought of it that way, but I totally agree with you. Thank you so much for writing that in. I, I'm glad you joined MJ and I both crying at the end of this episode. So you were not alone. At least there was at least three of us crying at the end of this Riverdale. I wonder if there were more. Did you cry?

Right in. Let us know. You cried. Page 7 podcast at gmail.com. I'm telling you, the page 7 inbox right now is about 70% Riverdale emails. Love it. And we read all of them. And in fact, I want to go back and thank you so much, Carl, for bumping this up.

Because Carl wrote this in a while ago, and I missed it. They bumped it up in our inbox. box and they were talking about, and I didn't know this, Carl, and I appreciate you thinking that I might know this. Jackie probably already knows this as a hashtag nerd girl, but in our real life universe, this is also all about Dr. Worthers and where he comes from. Yeah, this is a really good email. There was a Dr. Frederick Wortham, a psychiatrist who wrote a book entitled seduction of the innocent, which essentially said comic books cause juvenile delinquency. Due largely in part to Wertham's efforts, the Comics Code Authority was created,

which was used to put some comic companies out of business and to censor storytellers for decades. So we were talking about this a couple of episodes ago, and I didn't realize that Dr. Wurthers is based on Dr. Wurtham, and that's where it came from. That's where the character comes from. Thank you, Carl. Thank you so much. Honestly, the listeners of Riverdale Roundup are helping not only like redeem this season of Riverdale, but the entire series. Like all of this, every email we get has some fascinating either piece of history or context that we didn't know or insight into why they are doing all of this. And it's just, it really is actually amazing

to see the intention with which the writers of Riverdale are approaching the, this season, especially after we spent so many years being like, why are they making these choices? You know, that to be like, this character with this weird name that we've all been wondering, why is this character named this is a very specific reference to this thing that is framing the entire, this actual historical, you know, real thing of the Comics Code Authority that is framing we found out last week, not only this entire season, but the entire series and how Archie Comics exists in the universe as informed by the Comics Code Authority. It's just a, so now we know why it's Dr. Wothers.

How is this show sticking the landing? I know. How is this happening? Where were they? I don't know. Where were they for all this time? You know what I mean? Like, how is it that we went on so many detours?

I mean, I guess that's just, that's just what happens. Sometimes you stick the landing and sometimes you don't. But like, we went on so many detours. There were so many things that happened in the series where we were like, are you making these choices? And suddenly it's like every choice they make seems so intentional. Yeah. And so thought out. Yeah. So that like we used to joke around about theorizing about things because it was so ridiculous that we knew nothing that we were saying was going to come true because it was so out of this world. Right. And now we're just watching a good show. And I feel

weird that we're just like celebrating it every week. But like what I don't know what else to do. It's great. We're watching a good show. We're piecing together all these like super subtle slash not so. I just I love how they're subtle in the sense that if you don't know about Frederick Wertham, it is really subtle. But it's also so heavy handed to be like not Dr. Wertham. Dr. Werther is like it's like subtle not subtle. You know. And and and so we're like piecing together more and more. And I think that the interesting thing that we learned about it, that we learned from this spoiler from Alice Cooper about it ending in the 1950s is we know that they're never going to be able to wrap up all these threats, right? We know that everything that happened in the

Percival season and with Rivervale, like, we're never going to be able to get it all wrapped up. No. And yet, I think that the reason why this season is so pleasing is like, we don't need every last little thing to be wrapped up because everything that's happening in this season seems to be happening for a reason. And I still want to know how they will possibly wrap up basically anything from last season. But it also, like, I don't really care because last season got us to 1955. And 195 is just like where the show should be right now. So it's just working. How they got here doesn't really matter because where they are right now is working. And even thinking about the last episode when we were talking about the crucible, Mariah wrote in,

wrote about using the crucible, which we didn't even bring this part up. And they wanted to add, was one major interpretation of the crucible is that it's an allegory for McCarthyism. At the time of writing the play, Arthur Miller was tangled up in that era of the Red Scare. And when ordered to do so, refused to name so-called communists. As a result, he received a conviction of contempt of court and was viewed with distrust by Finanagan. of McCarthy. Miller wanted to explore the themes of mass hysteria in contemporary American society, but through the lens of history. As the saying goes, those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Thank you so much, Mariah, for writing. Because they're,

like, this season is so well thought out. Yes. And like, I was talking to friends of mine that gave up in, I mean, in the middle of Percival, they just dead gave up. They were like, I can't anymore. And I was like, y'all, don't finish last season. Just don't. Just know that a comet's coming and then bam, they're in 1955. Just start this season. Just do it. And they did. And they watched all of the episodes in like three or four days. And they were just like, you're right. And I was like, thank you. Thank you. Yeah, totally. Like, I, again, I don't know what happened with the Percival season. I don't know if that was some sort of like bizarre long game to try to set up a kind of crucible-esque situation. because obviously the whole Abigail Blossom's 1660s print at the stake thing kind of was a bit about crucible story. But it just felt like we were out to see. We had no idea why anything was happening. Is it that Jughead gets stuck in 1955?

I mean, I don't know. I still have no predictions. I still have no strategy. I still don't know what's coming next. I have no idea how they're going to wrap this up. I don't know how they're going to connect it to anything that has previously happened. I don't know. I really don't.

If anything, I want more Jughead. That's the thing. I enjoyed having more Kevin this episode. Yes. But I need more Jughead because he is the one driving both the mystery plot, which is like really fun. And he is the only one connecting us to anything that has happened in the previous six seasons. You know, so like we need more Jughead. I hate to say it.

Sorry, Lily Reinhardt. I know we hate Cole Spouse, but we need more of him this season. And we hate him for you. Yes. We won't, we don't forgive him. Oh, no, we have parasycial relationships, don't we? Oh, my God, I just realized it. Talking about them like we're friends.

Did this just dawn on me seven seasons later? Yeah, no, we got Lily Reinhardt in the breakup. I don't know who got Colesbrows. I mean, we don't have Cole, whatever. Take out the trash. But we're not talking about Jughead. We're talking about Colesprose. So very different, very different things.

And we're allowed to have little crushes on him. where it all began, MJ. Yeah, and he is seven years older now than when the show started. I mean, I just can't believe that KJ. Appa is only in his mid-20s. These people, I mean, they really have been doing, the wonder they're also emotional, right? Like, these people just lived their 20s on Riverdale. Can you imagine? No.

And like what, like, a bat-shit time that was. That's why I loved watching all their, like, farewells as they wrapped last week. because it was like, what a time they must have had together. Like, that is such a unique, like, to spend all of your... Honestly, like, yes, I am going to compare myself with them. I was going to say, yes. It's kind of like the network. It's kind of like our network where it's like, well, we just, like, work together

through our entire 20s, through all of the doldrums of our 20s of just, like, being bat shit. And then, like, you come out the other side and you're just like, are we humans? Are we like whole people that can like be adults? And the answer is no. But we made it through. And it is kind of sad to, there was a viral tweet last week that was like, Riverdale is the last show of its kinds and the last like teenage comedy drama network show with tons of filler and like tons of bad shit twists. And it was like an RIP tweet that went viral. But it is as much as we've talked on the show about how much.

you realize how much filler there is in a network 22 episode season compared to like a 10 episode streaming service. You know, I mean, thinking about the writer's strike and thinking about it is like slightly sad to be like, this is probably the last, this really is the last time you're going to have like a teen dromody that has the room to stretch out and do so much of this weird shit. Do so much because you're not going to be able to have a musical episode and like a Tales from the Crypt episode. if you have only an eight episode streaming arc, you know, you just don't, you need, you need room to stretch out. And in many ways, that structure wasn't working for shows. But it is kind of, it's making me a bit nostalgic,

even though it's not over yet. It's making me nostalgic for the form, because it does feel kind of like a last hurrah of the form of this type of network dramedy. Am I going to start watching Riverdale from the time again, just skipping season six? Yeah, we, I think we can do seasons one, two, three, four, four. I think we can do one, two, three, four, Riverdale and then seven. Rivervale. Yeah, Rivervale. Yeah. And then, and then skip to seven. I think that that's what we need to do. I think that I need more. I'm, I'm, yes, I'm already pining for the end. I know. I'm not pining for the end. I'm scared. I know. I know. It's, you know, it's like as soon as succession finished, I was like, well, I guess I just have to rewatch succession. Yes. And I keep making Riverdale and Succession comparisons because,

they're the two shows that I'm watching that are ending right now. And no, they're not comparable in terms of quality, but they are bringing up a lot of emotions in me, both of them. I will get upset about their, like, comparing this to high school musical. But I, I do agree that Succession is, um, a brilliant genius show. So. And this episode totally must have been explicitly a high school musical reference. Has to be. Right. I mean, with the whole basketball versus art thing, you know. I just, I should have, looked into it. Who wrote the music? And if you know who wrote the music of this, was it Roberto Aguirre Sigasa? Because it is good. It's good music. I know I called it generic,

but that doesn't mean it's bad. Musicals are supposed to be generic. You know, Roberto Aguirre Secaza now, I feel like I need to go back on a do a deep dive with him. This makes me do like want to do a pop history, Jackie, on Roberto Aguirre Secaza, figure out what his deal is. Oh my God. Should we? Kind of. Are they actually, is there actually going to be an Archie the musical? Besides this episode, you mean? Writer director Adam McKay, like, Anchorman, Tal as I was going to say. The Adam McKay?

Have joined forces with Archie Comics, one of the most popular comics ever produced to bring Archie, Betty, Veronica Jughead, and the Riverdale Gang to Broadway in an all-new musical. McKay is slated to bring his singular brand of comedy to the musical, writing the book for the show, with a creative team timing for a New York run to be announced at a later date. What? Is that real? I don't know.

Is this real? I don't know. No, that was in 2015, and it hasn't happened. All right, that was 2015. Sorry. All right. Sorry. False alarm,

false alarm, everybody. Don't worry. False alarm. There's a lot of articles written about this episode, though, which is interesting because you had just been complaining the last few episodes that there was like no recaps about the last few episodes. But there is a lot of musical episode write-ups about this. So, I don't know. It does still feel like we're the last two people watching Riverdale, but maybe people are coming back to it.

Yeah. I feel like we're like out. I don't know if you watch the new season of Black Mirror, but it does feel like we're just like in space, like our bodies are in space, but our brains are here alone. Like our like other like form of bodies are here, just going through the motions and watching Riverdale.

Except that this season feels the least lonely, actually, because first of all, it's good. And second of all, we are hearing from so many people all the time about it. And so now we know we're not, we're not really the last two people. We're the last two people along with however many people are listening to Riverdale Roundup right now. And we're all in it together, you guys.

We're in it together, time enough at last. We are in it together. Thank you so much for joining us. And thank you again for writing into page seven podcast at gmail.com all of your Riverdale theories. We love reading them. Even if it's, again, you just being like, I love Riverdale. I'll read it. I will read that email.

And I want to say thank you to the people that have done that. and I appreciate you to. Thank you, MJ. Thank you for crying alongside me, dude. Yeah, man, I'll admit it. Thank you. I cried. We cried.

And, man, when you're crying before 7.30 in the morning, you either really need to look at your life or you really need to look at your life. And thank you so much, guys. We will be back next week, and I can't wait to see what happens. Bye. This show is made possible by listeners like you. Thanks to our ad sponsors. You can support our shows by supporting them.

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