Riverdale Recap: “Chapter Twenty-Eight: There Will Be Blood”

Secrets, secrets they’re no fun… unless you live in Riverdale. This week a Blossom family secret, a Lodge family secret, and a Cooper secret were revealed. Some were more jaw dropping than others and one a nod to the television show that has served as a great inspiration to everything from the backdrop to the story lines of Riverdale.

Riverdale Recap: “Chapter Twenty-Eight: There Will Be Blood”

Airdate: March 15, 2018

Mark Piznarski directed the episode written by Aaron Allen (#215). 

The Lodge’s plan is moving in forward motion perfectly and this week their goal is to seat Fred Andrews in the Mayor’s chair. Unlike Archie, Fred isn’t an idiot and he knows Hiram is just trying to put a yes man in office to do his bidding. Even with this information, Fred still thinks running for Mayor is good move for him and the community. Veronica, ever the diligent daughter, is doing her best to encourage Fred to run; offering to get the 1200 signatures needed and making mock up campaign paraphernalia. Archie, constantly worried about his father getting in too deep (even though he’s their partner in the SoDale project so I mean…), becomes irritated with Veronica and asks her to back off. In order to dissuade his father, Archie offers Jughead intel about the Lodge’s buying Pop’s in hopes Jugheads’ newspaper article will deter Fred from getting more involved.

Jughead seeks out Pop Tate and questions him about the purchase. He admits to it but begs Jughead not to make the secret public, it would kill his mother to know the business was no longer in the family. Pop Tate, the rat, then runs straight to Hiram to tell him someone told Jughead about the sale. Hiram confronts Veronica assuming it was Archie (it was) and falls on the sword for him. She claims she told Jughead so he wouldn’t get close to discovering the whole truth. This leads to yet the umpteenth fight between Archie and Veronica about her involvement with her parents business.

Photo: Katie Yu/The CW — © 2018 The CW Network, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Elsewhere, Clifford Blossom’s will is being read, because of course Clifford specified that his will would be kept under wraps until any illegal investigations had been finished. The will leaves Nana Rose, Thistlehouse and Penelope, Thornhill (whoops). It also states that 50% of his inheritance would be left to Jason and Cheryl, so Cheryl. The other 50% would be left to anyone who could prove they were a blood relative; so the Cooper’s are on deck for that. Alice spectacularly interrupts the proceedings to read Hal the riot act for trying to keep her out of the inheritance. Earlier in the episode, he asks her for a divorce and offers her half the money from the sale of The Register. Cheryl decides to make a speech, “The Blossoms have been bathing in blood since Great-Grandpappy Blossom killed his brother … I stand before you to say, no more. No more blood. No more madness. No more horror.” Unfortunately for Cheryl, the Blossoms always have some trick up their sleeves. This time it’s the case of Clifford’s twin brother.

Twin Peaks fans will remember that the actress that played Laura Palmer, the dead girl from Season 1, also played Maddy Ferguson her look alike cousin… Claudius Blossom, Clifford’s twin, also played by Barclay Hope, shows up for the will reading, causing Cheryl to faint. When she comes to they explain that Clifford ran Claudius off for fear that the Blossom twin curse would come true. Claudius joined the Merchant Marines and has been MIA ever since. Nana Rose confirms the story and Penelope allows him to stay in the spare room over the garage.

Polly, who randomly showed up this episode with her own twins in tow, is eager to cash that check and can’t wait to submit her blood test results. Chic is not so keen on the idea and insists he isn’t interested in any money. Betty, already suspicious, snags Chic’s dental floss and has it tested. As many of us guessed, it looks like Chic isn’t who he says he is…

Jughead, desperate to find something else on Hiram confides in FP who offers to go on the record about Hiram hiring the Serpents to trash the drive-in so he could buy it. Before he has to do that, Jughead receives a mysterious phone call from a stranger asking him to meet at the bus station. The bus station set is a lovely reminder of how Riverdale plays to that “every-town”, “anytime” facade. Looking like he stepped into an untouched set from the 1960s, Jughead finds the Lodge’s old butler, Smithers. He confides to Jughead that Hiram frequently visited Shankshaw Prison (where he was not being held) and received communications from the Warden. Jughead rushes off to expose Hiram, but Principal Weatherby shuts him down. He cannot OK publishing something that will be of the detriment to a student attending the school. My reaction to this was, “put it on the internet”, but alas it didn’t matter. Hiram and Hermione invite the Andrews’ over to tell them the whole master plan.

Photo: Jack Rowand/The CW — © 2018 The CW Network, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Now I cannot tell you what I thought the giant Lodge secret plan was, but turning Southside High into a private prison and the SoDale housing complex be the workers living space was 100% not even close to what I thought. Fred wants no part of this, but Archie, the sweet moron he is, wants to “hear Mr Lodge out”. This is the part where Archie produces his notebook de Hiram and together, along with their blood, Archie and Hiram toss it in the fire. Bizarre. Hermione announces her candidacy for Mayor and it seems that once again, The Lodges have won.

Cheryl overhears Penelope and Uncle Claudius conspiring to “get their house in order”. So much for Cheryl attempting to end the absurdity that is The Blossoms. Josie and Kevin both made an appearance this episode. Josie to help Archie convince his father being Mayor wasn’t a good move and Kevin helping Betty catfish Chic to find out what he’s hiding. My only question, where has Reggie been hiding? Charles Melton always seems to be on set as per the main casts social media, so either Reggie scenes are hitting the cutting room floor or he’s going to play heavy in the final 7 episodes of the season.

Line of the week goes to Alice Cooper: “Yeah I said inbred… shut your face you half melted, ten cent trollop”