Riverdale Recap: Chapter Twenty-Five: The Wicked and The Divine

Veronica’s confirmation, Archie’s new internship, Bughead and the Case of the Decapitated Head. All that and much more, this week on The CW’s Riverdale.

Riverdale Recap: “Chapter Twenty- Five: The Wicked and The Divine”
Airdate: January 31, 2018
Rachel Talalay directed the episode written by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa (#212).

Veronica is having her confirmation, a religious sacrament usually done at 13 or 14 but the Lodge’s really wanted a certain Monsignor to perform the ceremony and the plot called for a Godfather type event so here we are. For those of you who have been to an actual Catholic Confirmation, you’ll be confused by all of this, just roll with it.

Archie is in deep with this internship and Hiram’s impressed upon finding out Archie beat up Nick St. Claire. So impressed he asks Archie to act as manservant during the big poker game he’s hosting at Pops. One of the guys, nicknamed Poppa Poutine, thinks Hiram’s gone soft since his jail stint and is planning to take him out at the Confirmation. Archie, still reporting to Agent Fake Name (nickname credit to Archie Digest Podcast), is pressured to pick sides. He alerts Hiram to the threat on his life and Poppa Poutine is later found dead in his hotel room. Archie lies to Agent Fake Name about it, digging himself further into Hiram’s life.

He’s not the only one lying this week, Betty lies to Jughead by omission. She tells him nothing happened between her and anyone else in the time they’ve been broken up, even though she kissed Archie and is apparently webcaming as Dark Betty for cash. Jughead bares his heart to her, first admitting what happened between him and Toni; then later when he feels his world is crashing in on him and all the poor decisions he’s made this season, including their breakup.

Penny Peabody arrives back in town with revenge on the mind. She shows the Serpent’s the tattoo Jughead sliced off of her and agrees to help them get out of their evictions from the Mayor, if they expel Jughead from the Serpents and she can cut off his tattoo with a dirt knife. Feeling like this is all his fault (it is), he asks Betty to help him uncover the missing head of the statue and hopefully calm tensions between the Serpents and the Mayor.

They successfully find the head and the culprit. TallBoy. On orders from Hiram, he’s been working with Penny to oust FP and Jughead from the Serpents and cause trouble between the North and Southside, but once Bughead reveals this truth, the Serpents side with the Jones boys. They also send the statue head to Hiram as a gift, ala The Godfather. Both Betty and Jughead realize how much they’ve missed being a “we” and after much apologizing from Jughead, the two consummate their relationship.

Elsewhere, Sierra McCoy and Josie pay a visit to Hermione and Veronica to apologize for Josie’s behavior the week before. Mayor McCoy is finally beginning to realize just who she’s gotten herself into bed with. They agree to be friends again and Veronica asks Josie to sing an amazing cover of Bittersweet Symphony with her at the Confirmation. Ashleigh Murray does a wonderful job in this scene of portraying Josie’s emotions and desire to be anywhere but in this living room doing anything but apologizing. Also if you were hoping for more B & V this week, sadly these two have forgotten they’re best friends this season.

The episode ends with a jaw dropper. After a shady looking bleached blonde man appears at the Cooper’s front door looking for Chic, we cut to Bughead in the trailer. Once Betty returns glowing from losing her V card, she finds Alice on the floor mopping up blood and the bleached blonde lying there dead. WTF ALICE!!!!