SourK

Kay. Veronica's in financial trouble because her finances are mixed together with her husband's, and they're still not divorced, and the reason she owes money is actually because he owes money, and the whole reason she's scheming is to pay off his debts. So then he calls her and tells her he has a way to pay off his debt, and she's like, "No, I don't need your help. I'd rather pay all of your debts by myself." And then she purposely torpedoes the business he started -- presumably still with their money, since they are still married? Also LMAO, when she said she needed "one more person" for the auction, I assumed it would be a representative from an auction house. But no, it was Cheryl, and the auction was just randomly hosted by Veronica. I assume you can't just ignore one of the bidders in a real auction but, if anyone knows the rules, I'd love to hear. Archie's story also didn't make sense, but it annoyed me more because we were supposed to think it was righteous. I laughed at the part where Cheryl was queen of the bees. I know this won't happen, but I wish she'd just become a witch and turn this into Sabrina.

I would love it if the in-universe explanation for this was just that someone stands on a table and says, "You guys, you guys, you guys -- I'm gonna sing a song, and you need to imagine it's good." And that was, like, the Riverdale way of socializing.

I had mixed feelings about this. I liked the costuming, and that Melody girl is really talented -- and I would watch a spin-off where they solve mysteries on a music tour bus -- but I also sort of felt like this was the producers going, "You get ONE EPISODE about black characters, so you'd better enjoy it." The strangest, most off-putting part was when Toni randomly showed up to join a musical number, seemingly just so it would be three black women. And so she could do product placement for Baby GAP. Like, not to get super heavy, but ever since Vanessa Morgan rightly called them out last summer, this season has felt like a condescending effort to be inclusive done by someone who has no real idea how to do it. Having everybody stand around and smile approvingly at the Pussycats and Toni and say how great they are doesn't fix the writing problems that left those characters marginalized in the first place.

I forgot about that in wake of the Rat King, but you're right -- that bothered me, too. Going to a psychiatrist (which is different from a therapist, but whatever) is a lot like going to a medical doctor. They diagnose you and write a prescription, and then you get the prescription filled. They don't just take a bottle of pills out of their desk and give it to you.

It's hard to pick my favourite part. These are the two contenders: When it turns out that the big, important memory Jughead had to recover was the time he fell down a hole and landed on rats. When Cheryl tries to seduce someone by telling her the story of how Jughead fell down a hole and landed on rats. What I got out of it was that nothing happened when he got picked up by the trucker, and he made it back to New York, and solved the mystery of his memories of the rat king, and then went to AA. I'm not sure if this means the trucker didn't kill him because he's not a woman (which would actually be kind of interesting), or the writers just forgot they did a cliffhanger where Jughead gets in the truck. By the same token... Archie losing everyone under his command sounds like it's the outcome you'd expect, right? They really didn't know what they were getting into when they let him share. I thought it was interesting that she tried repeating the same threats the trashbag killer used on her. But I also thought it was hilarious that this started with her going, "I can make him talk -- this is what I do!" and it ended with her getting no information, him killing himself when she left him unsupervised, and pretty much every tactic she tried not working at all. I also thought it was funny and awful when Alice told Betty she had "permission" to kill the trucker. As an aside, when did they decide for sure Polly was dead? I agree that that's most likely, but it seems like they switched from holding out hope to assuming she's gone, and I don't remember when?

Why do TV shows suddenly believe that, when you watch someone die, you have to remember them as a dog? This is the third example I've seen. (I did like the dog though. When they cut to him snarling because he had PTSD, I was like, "Precious.") When Archie got depressed and said there was nothing in Riverdale worth saving because it was the worst town ever, I honestly just agreed with him. I was like, "Yeah, you finally get it." I also enjoyed his pre-murder chat, which was mostly just, "It's great to see the light leave someone's eyes." In seriousness, I like Betty and Tabitha as pair and I hope they continue to have a plot line together. Forget about the Serpents -- it seems like there's an initiation ritual when you join this show where you have to shake your butt at all of your coworkers for very spurious reasons. I get that watching young, hot people gyrate is part of the CW brand, but in universe, why are all of their problems solved this way? What kind of people say "I want to catch a serial killer, but the ultimate win would be if I could also turn it into a way to act out Coyote Ugly?" Riverdale is also becoming an Issue of the Week show, except, instead of cramming every news headline into the plot, it's cramming every movie that was popular with millennials.

If I'm reading Mark Consuelos correctly, I think he actively likes it when the plot line is stupid, which probably makes it more fun. But I agree, there's a level of professionalism in showing up for the script, no matter how silly it is, and performing it as well as you can in the circumstances. I think KJ Apa does that, too, and I've come to respect him for that as I watch this show. Riverdale is one of those trade-offs where you sacrifice being challenged as an artist in exchange for a bigger paycheque. So, psychologically, I think it would be harder to be on this show if you got cast straight out of drama school, because you wouldn't have a sense of where you fit into the industry, or what other jobs you could have booked, and you wouldn't be able to judge whether this was a trade-off worth making in the same way you could if you were 50 years old and you'd already had a career.

In a weird way, I kind of appreciate the retcon to explain why Hiram acts like he's in the Italian mob. But mostly I felt frustrated and wished I was watching a better show. The actor playing Young Hiram did a decent job of imitating him, though. ... And I just googled and it's Mark Consuelos' son. So that makes sense.

I'm late, but I've been binging the show on YouTube and I'm almost all caught up. I feel bad about Aisling in Series 5 -- she just seemed to have such a rough time, and part of me was like, "That's me if I were ever on this show. Not understanding the task, cutting my hand, and getting awkward sympathy sounds from the audience." The reason I came here, though, is that I'm curious as to whether anyone else thought Series 11 had a different tone? One thing I like about the show is that it seems pretty laid back and good natured, but 11 felt more hostile to me. There was one point where Sarah said sarcastically, "This is not demeaning at all," and I kind of felt like this season was more demeaning than most of the previous ones, just watching them back to back. But I'm also rushing through everything, so I'm curious about what other people thought.

I almost didn't realize this was back on. Gosh. I liked how Smithers tried to tell Veronica it was The Purge and she was like, "No, no, wait. I have to explain my recurring plot point to you first. See, I have this ugly rock..." I was mildly interested in the development where Jughead got high and apparently the lies he told the preppies started to come true... and then it somehow turned out that that lie was true the whole time, and the same homeless man who saved him as a child saved him again, and Jughead was like, "Thanks, I'll visit you some time." Maybe help him not be homeless, Jughead. Maybe ask your rich, powerful friends. I guess the long-term plan is for Betty to save Jughead from the Trashbag Killer, and then that's how they get back together? I don't know. When Tabitha said, "I know we haven't found Jughead yet, but..." I fully expected her to say they should stop looking, and I would have supported that.

Same. The scene had a menacing mood, and I totally expected her to be like, "I don't care what happens to me -- I just need to kill Fred." I guess it would have created a problem for the narrative if she'd murdered him in his hotel, but we could have arrived at the same point where Luke is like, "No, that's too far for me." She's kind of being a deadbeat. She doesn't seem to love Luke anymore or want to be in a relationship with him -- at least not as much as she wants to make out with Nick before they kill people -- and it sounds like she's expecting him to take 100% responsibility for raising the child she had in a different relationship. But maybe that's not really what she means and the living situation next season will be different than we think. I think maybe he's supposed to be a loveable scoundrel? Or some kind of warped mentor figure? IDK -- I don't get it either.

I thought this was dumb. I'm happy that Fred didn't get to just walk, but Gilead used to feel dangerous, and now it feels like anyone billed high enough in the credits can pretty much do whatever. It's annoying from a story-telling perspective, but it also kind of makes light of what totalitarian states are like, and how hard they are to deal with in real life. This is my favourite line of dialogue in the series. Yvonne Strahovski didn't really get anything to do this season, which bums me out because she gives my favourite performance on this show -- her line reading of stuff like is amazing. In retrospect, I think they did a sloppy job of setting this up as a Defining Choice between either going down the rabbit hole of vengeance, where June accepts that she's not the same person anymore and pursues violence against Gilead VS trying to heal and become her old self and make a family with Luke. I think the significance of this moment is supposed to be that they both realize she chose the option that's not her family. Luke and Moira have been supporting each other for a while, and seem to share the mindset that you have to be grateful for whatever victories you can get and not get bogged down in the sadness. That's a valid POV, but it's also valid for June to not want to do that. So I kind of liked this dialogue, since it showed how far apart they are in their vision for what healthy coping looks like. Lawrence pretty much had to have authorization to trade 20 prisoners for Fred, so the only way I can think of where he and Nick would be okay after this is if Nick were authorized to kill Fred and the higher-ups didn't care how it happened. However, displaying his body like that kind of goes against that narrative, since, if Gilead wanted to get rid of Fred quietly, posting him on a wall isn't quiet -- and, if they wanted to get rid of him noisily, they wouldn't let Nick just do it; they'd have a trial or something.

I think Fred and Serena are not really getting a great story line this season -- and the characters have probably outlived their usefulness. But that scene reminded me that Serena is (I think) manipulating Fred to get him to cooperate with the Americans. Which is what she was asked to do so her deal could go back on. So, I think the whole, "Gosh, Fred, how will you protect me and our son once you go to jail? If only there were some way out of this situation -- my feeble mind can't think of it..." bit was for his benefit, rather than the truth. But, it's hard to read the situation because we haven't spent a lot of time with those characters lately. I honestly can't tell if she's thinking about getting back with Fred.

I think it's a lot to ask Luke to be stoked that his wife, who doesn't totally seem to love him anymore, is going to go see her boyfriend. Then, add on top of that that he's spent the last seven years trying to find his daughter with no luck, but maybe Nick can do it. I thought the scene where they first talked about the idea of June going to see Nick was acted oddly. If I want to read a bunch of layers into it (which, I don't know that I trust this show enough to think the layers are actually there), then it read kind of like Luke was seriously proposing that June go see Nick, but also testing her, to see if she seemed excited or happy about it. The expression he had on his face was kind of like, "I think you should do something that's insanely hurtful to me -- oh, your eyes lit up at that idea. Cool. Cool." I'm worried about that. I'm undecided about how much I think Serena should be in prison, but I personally believe she's less culpable than Fred, so, if Fred gets to walk away and she goes to jail, that's BS. But I'm afraid it's where this is headed. Serena still hasn't learned that he's only ever nice when he feels powerless. Now that she talked him into cooperating with the Americans, I 100% believe he'll throw her under the bus in retaliation for what she did to him. He was talking about Janine, but I think that part of the convo was interesting. Because, if we read Lawrence as a bad guy, then he's taunting her by telling her about Janine. If we read him as a good guy, then he's letting her know what happened to her friend in a way that's safe for him if someone's listening in. This is already more interesting to me than the "Is Nick an eye??" plot thread.

The music almost made me care about Nick, and then I remembered that I hate him. I don't know how this stuff works in real life, but, if the whole point of the last episode was to try to convince the International Criminal Court to try Fred, does the USA actually have the ability to stop that? Like, if the ICC says, "We want to try him for war crimes, now," can the US government say, "Nah, never mind"? I found that weird, too, and I'm not sure what they expected him to say on the call. Like, obviously, it wouldn't be private -- or he wouldn't be able to trust that it's private. So, if you wanted his help, you'd have to go in with the idea that you were going to tell him what you needed, and obviously he would say no, and then maybe he'd do it. But the way they reacted as if they thought he'd be like, "Sure." (My money is on him coming through to help get Hannah and everyone being surprised.) What I like about this plot development is that the way everyone reacted makes sense because there are conflicting priorities. So, yeah, intellectually, having Fred jump ship is a good thing since it can help them bring Gilead down. But June's reaction makes sense too, and I'm starting to think that, as unlikable as I find her, the show is actually going somewhere with her out-of-control rage. One of the things that's really, really hard about surviving abuse (of many kinds) is that often the person who did it gets away with it and never really suffers any consequence. And, when that happens, it can feel like society is telling you that what that person did to you didn't matter. And it makes you want to go berserk. So, the question becomes, what do you do with that rage, if you can't ever really get justice? So, I'm interested to see where this goes. I thought those were interesting scenes, and I'm wondering if Janine's going to end up as an Aunt -- which would dovetail with the story line we already got about everyone being unwilling to forgive that other Aunt. I also think it touched on something really true -- when they're living in these kinds of circumstances, a lot of people do exactly this -- they try cooperate enough to survive and hope that things will get better. And there's a legitimate debate you can have about whether that kind of hope makes things worse for the person or better.

I think this is a good analogy. My reading of Serena is that she actually did want to be a stay-at-home mom and raise a happy family and live out some idyllic version of the past that never existed, but her wanting to do that was predicated on the belief that the men she left in charge of Gilead would make the exact same decisions that she would have, and rule in a way that she considered fair and just. In reality, she put ultimate power in the hands of people who immediately abused it in ways she hadn't anticipated -- which is the problem with setting up a political system that depends on the kindness and mercy of the person in charge rather than a shared distribution of power. I don't think she exactly expected to be treated differently from other women, or thought that other women should be treated like garbage -- I think she bought into the idea that a Good Man will cherish his wife and take care of her, etc, etc, and therefore she has no need for legal rights because she's safe with him, and he surely won't do anything to curtail her freedom unnecessarily. And that was mistaken. The more we talk about it, the more I can buy the idea that the protesters had probably read Serena's books, and might believe that the Handmaids were fertile women who volunteered to help repopulate the earth and the ones who ran away were outliers.

Here's what I'm confused about: if they're that young, and they were raised in Gilead, and they basically follow the rules... why are they Handmaids? Why aren't they being married off to creeps? What is the rule Gilead's using to decide who becomes a Handmaid, now, if the justification that it's because of what they did pre-Gilead is gone?

My favourite part was when Lawrence said June was good at getting people to like her, LMAO. My least favourite part was the weird focus during the group therapy scenes -- like, literally the camera focus. What was up with that? I wonder if, in the original script, Fred and especially Serena got to say more. Because, based on what we saw in the weird, weird hearing, I don't understand how it would inspire such a passionate following. I thought it was kind of funny that June ruined Moira's healing group by turning it into a vengeance group, but I 100% agree. Moira doesn't seem like the best person to facilitate this. Also, FWIW, I agree with the sentiment that justice is more helpful to abuse survivors than "moving on" but, in the long run, it's usually not that simple. Even though it might feel supportive to really, really dwell on the anger and constantly talk about it and agree with each other about how angry they are, that kind of thing can stop you from healing over time. That was also a really funny moment to me. Lydia's in the room for literally less than five minutes, everyone else is pretty chill, and then we just get this wide shot where she's standing over all the bodies of her victims. Like, Lydia's gonna Lydia. I agree with this. In general, I thought her testimony was really unfocused and seemed to exist mostly to recap the situation for the audience rather than convince the judge that Fred should be on trial. But, even on top of that, if she has no ill will toward Lawrence, why throw him under the bus like that? You're telling Gilead that he's disloyal. If the story about the Waterfords making him rape her was super important to the case, surely there were privileged ways to enter that into evidence without saying it in front of reporters. I think it was a terrible idea for him to surprise her by showing up for the hearing. If nothing else, it was probably going to throw her off and make her more nervous before she did something really important. Also, apparently he could just read what she said later? I think the show's missing an interesting opportunity to explore why June doesn't want the life she led in Gilead to intersect with her relationship with Luke -- and why she doesn't want the person she is now to intersect with the person she was before, and that he hopes she'll be again. I also think that there's complexity to these situations. There are pressures on people in the middle of the Gilead hierarchy, too -- it's not just the people at the bottom who are victimized by this regime, and very few people got out of Gilead with completely clean hands -- something June should appreciate, especially, since she bullied that one handmaid to death last season. It's fine if June doesn't see the nuances in the situation and turns everything into a black and white story about victims and victimizers, but I wish the show were pushing back on her worldview more. When he was arrested last season, they read off a whole list of things he was charged with, and I don't remember what it was, but I think it included war crimes and rape. Maybe treason as well. I'm actually confused that they're going to an international court, but I don't know how this stuff typically works. I guess maybe if people are acknowledging Gilead as a legitimate country, then they can't just extradite Fred to the USA? I don't know.

I'm actually surprised by the range of reactions to this scene, because it seemed pretty clear to me that both of them were miserable and no one was having fun. I actually agree with the assessment that this probably wasn't a traumatic experience for him, but something doesn't have to be traumatic in order for it to be wrong.

I like the exploration of trauma, but the dialogue in this one seemed... not great. Especially in the story lines that the writers clearly aren't interested in, like Fred and Serena plotting together. Also, I fully understand that your impression of a person can change over time and that you can retroactively realize that they were taking advantage of you or manipulating you -- or, once a power imbalance is gone, you can realize that you always really disliked them but were prevented from admitting it -- but I found June and Serena's relationship more interesting when it was complicated. Now that they just hate each other, it's kind of boring, IMO. No, it wasn't just you. It's really bad to start having sex with someone when they're asleep and then put your hand over their mouth when they ask you to stop. I think it was intentionally uncomfortable -- as someone else said, the show makes a point right after of showing Luke looking at June when she's calling Serena a rapist during The Speech That Is Really About Them Both. Oooo. I didn't notice that Nick was on the board before. I wonder what they think about him? And what June's telling them? He helped, but only kind of? He might be against Gilead or he might be super into it? I wonder how he's going to get roped into this, later. The fact that Luke could theoretically physically stop this from happening and didn't doesn't mean he consented to it, though. Part of the reason there's such a push for affirmative consent is that lots of sexual situations are complicated and involve weird dynamics that can make someone freeze and not know how to react in the moment. The fact that it was awkward and Luke probably felt conflicted is even more reason not to just ignore his feelings. I absolutely agree that people who've been in a relationship for a long time and know each other really well can choose to set different boundaries about how they want to interact, but these two haven't seen each other in seven years, which means they should be even more cautious about the boundaries rather than less. I'm from Toronto, and the only way you can afford to buy a house here is if you're literally a millionaire, so I call shenanigans.

Yes. By their nature, oppressive regimes need to oppress someone in order to function. No one wants to be oppressed so, if they're able to freely leave that situation, they will. If Gilead let its entire oppressed class leave, it would have to create a new one by downgrading people from the ruling class... who would then ALSO not want to be oppressed, and also leave. The only way oppressive regimes survive is through keeping people there by force.

Well, I was a sobbing wreck for the whole thing, but less because the show was good and more because the idea of a parent being forced to leave their child in a war-torn dictatorship is so horrible. My guess is that Janine is going to be alive with the left-behind people in Chicago. And then she's going to realize that June escaped without her. And then she's going to realize that her son is dead and June lied to her (which they've been building up to for so long, now). This may be a super villain origin story. I'm impatient to find out what happens in Canada, so I was annoyed that we still didn't get there, but, at the same time, I was complaining that Hannah was a plot token a few episodes ago, and I like that they invested in reminding us that June, Luke, and Hannah were a family before this happened, so that we could connect more, emotionally. From what we saw, it turned out to be stupidly easy to smuggle an extra person out of Gilead, so, yes, there shouldn't have been any question. But, theoretically, if they believed it was going to be virtually impossible, then it's much worse for them and their mission if they get caught trying to hide her than if they turn her in. They don't really have the ability to protect her. (For a minute, before they boarded the ship, I thought Moira and June were going to switch places so that June could go back by pretending to be Moira, while Moira stayed in Chicago -- and then Moira and Janine would be together for the next leg of the story, etc, etc. But, no, it turns out you can just make up a random person and that's okay).

In the earlier seasons, I had a real problem with the way the characters would each act like they were the only ones who remembered what the world was like before, and everyone else had somehow grown up in Gilead. At points, it was even hard to remember, as a viewer, that this all happened pretty recently.

This is a really good point, and I think it helps explain why a lot of the dudes, including Nick, are committed to this, now. There are some choices you make where you just can't back down. These guys jumped on board with terrorists to overthrow the government and set up a dictatorship -- they need the dictatorship to stand; it's all over for them, if it falls. My reading of Nick is that he was basically okay jumping on board with the terrorists and doesn't feel super bad about the world they've created, but he's also fond of June, and he wishes there were a way that he could keep her for himself. And, to that end, he's trying to stop her from getting killed, but he's not super into the idea of helping her escape.

tktkt Yeah, I'm afraid for her, but also it would be kind of funny if June immediately got her killed by proximity after her death aura became a plot point. I don't think she thinks they're treated well -- I think she thinks treating them badly is okay. My reading on Lydia, based on the back story we got, is that she likes to punish people who don't live in the One True Way that she's forced herself to live. The idea behind the Handmaid re- ecducation program seems to be that these women are bad people who can learn to serve a good purpose, so this is ideal for Lydia, because she gets to sit in judgement of others and vent her aggression on them while feeling like she's doing something virtuous. Believing that it ultimately benefits the Handmaids to learn the One True Way to live and be forced to live that Way is different from thinking that they're being treated well during the process -- I'm sure she's perfectly aware that they're suffering a lot and sees suffering as part of the point. This was my favourite part! 😍 100% agree. The next episode needs to June joining the refugees in Canada. If they make up some reason why she has to hang around in Gilead, even though she has a 0% chance of rescuing Hannah right now and everybody else she knows is dead, gone, or a traitor, I will lose my mind. (Also, imagine Moira just gets hit by a missile because she stepped inside June's death aura).