Liam Hoofe reviews the fifth episode of Riverdale season 2…
One of Riverdale’s many strengths have always been that it rarely wastes a scene, and when you look at how far the narrative of season 2 has come in just five episodes, then you can see that the show’s second season is not about to let that slip anytime soon.
Like every episode before it, ‘A Stranger Calls’ put a lot of its focus on the mysterious ‘Black Hood’ and his murderous games, with Betty now being the key focus of his attention. Throughout the episode, the murderer instructed Betty to break her relationships with all those she holds dear, revealing more and more about himself after each completed mission. While the cat and mouse element of the episode did feel a little repetitive, it was a nice way of propelling the story forward quite quickly, and it all appears to be adding up to an imminent reveal. As for the identity of the killer, I’m sticking with my initial prediction that it is Betty’s long-lost brother, Chi. The show couldn’t be any less subtle about the relationship between Betty and the killer, and his fixation with the rest of the family only strengthens this. The episode’s ending also implied that Betty herself could turn further towards the dark side, continuing a storyline that began back in the show’s first season, with the introduction of ‘Dark Betty.’ This was also the first episode where Archie had not been the character fixating on The Black Hood, and the storyline felt like it actually managed to away from just being one about Archie’s quest for vengeance.
The season’s other big narrative has been the growing divide between the north, and the southside of the city and while that took a little bit of a back seat this episode, Jughead’s turn towards the Southside Serpents came to a head. Realising that the only potential way to prevent further violence between his friends and the Serpents was to join them and try and become some sort of mediator. While this was his initial plan, things went awry when Betty was forced to dump Jughead through Archie, with the resulting fall out indicating that Jug is now going to become fully committed to his new lifestyle. What makes this storyline all the more interesting, as well, is that FP is likely to burst back onto our screens at any moment, and his reaction to his son’s change promises to be very interesting.
The episode’s other storyline focused on one of Veronica’s old friends, Nick, coming to visit the town with his family, to help Hiram secure some sort of business deal that will see oversee a renovation of the town’s southside. Nick, however, was not all that Veronica remembered as it quickly turned out that since they had last seen each other, his take had taken a turn for the worse. After attempting to force himself on Veronica, he then tried to date-rape Cheryl, only for the Pussycats and Veronica to arrive to save the day. Nick, it appears, will only be in this one episode, with his fate being secured by Betty in the show’s closing scene, but it was great to see Cheryl back on the show. I write about it every week, but the show has had a serious lack of Miss Blossom this season, and every episode she is given significant screen-time in, feels all the better for it. Hiram, who has also been one of the show’s highlights this year, took a bit of a back seat this week, but his plans to basically destroy the Southside are likely going to play a major part in the coming weeks.
‘A Stranger Calls’ was a nice progression of the season’s storylines, and despite one or two over-the-top scenes, Jughead’s initiation in particular, this felt slightly more grounded after all the ‘Red Circle’ nonsense that dragged proceedings down over the last two weeks. This was also the first time this season Archie took a back seat, and it allowed some of the show’s other characters time to breathe, and further their own storylines a little as well.
Liam Hoofe is a teacher and a writer living in Madrid, you can follow Liam on Twitter here @liamhoofe
