S06.E04: Chapter Ninety-Nine: The Witching Hour(s)

[Bort]

As Bailey’s Comet passes over Rivervale, Cheryl and Nana Rose revisit the tragic stories of the Blossom women through the years.  Meanwhile, the once-in-a-lifetime celestial event prompts Cheryl to summon a familiar face to Rivervale - Sabrina Spellman.

Airdate: 7 Dec 2021

[Chaos Theory]

I continue to not be sure if I like the Rivervale season  or not.  This was an incredibly interesting standalone storyline just like last weeks “deal with the devil” storyline.   I really thought the actress who played Cheryl did an incredible job and she doesn’t get nearly enough credit for her work on the show.   All three storylines worked for me and were very well done.  The ending with Sabrina with the transference was a bit (actually more then a bit) confusing but I do t care.   I thing WB should buy the rights to Sabrina and restart the show.  
 

Abigail Blossom had an ax…..

I really liked the Poppy and Bitsy storyline as well and that ended the only way it really could have.   But still it worked for for on a sad kind of way.  

I mean I am still really confused but I kinda dig the whole Rivervale thing.  

Edited December 8, 2021 by Chaos Theory

[ruby24]

That was interesting. I think.

I'm more looking forward to next week's conclusion with the universe melding going on or whatever. Also pretty sure based on the preview that next week will kick off the eventual Betty/Jughead reunion storyline- by the end of the season I bet.

I enjoyed seeing the guys all play stereotypical pigheaded men. Fangs's delivery of "time to perform your wifely duties" made me laugh out loud.

[rmontro]

All that hype about getting Sabrina on the show and it turns out she's only there for about five minutes.  

I've enjoyed this mini-season, but this episode kind of annoyed me, with all it's "men are bad" messaging.  I'm sure this story was derivative of something, they had another show in mind when they wrote it, but I don't know what it is.  Still kind of neat with Abigail, Poppy, and Cheryl being the same person. 

Interesting to see "Jughead and Betty" back as a couple, and Jughead as a monster husband.  And once again in Rivervale Betty kills her man lol.

Oh, and I have to say, that's not how comets work.

[rmontro]

I never watched The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, but that actress who played Sabrina was giving me the creeps.

I'm going to go ahead and make my prediction now that Rivervale is Jughead having a hallucination during one of his Jingle Jangle-induced writing sprees.

 

21 hours ago, Chaos Theory said:

I mean I am still really confused but I kinda dig the whole Rivervale thing.  

It wasn't that confusing, except for the multiple timelines I guess.  Apologies if you understood this already, but:

Fangs (Fen) the warlock put a curse on Abigail, making her immortal.  To cover her lack of aging, she renamed herself Poppy, and later Cheryl as the years passed.  When Nana Rose died, they cast a spell to switch their souls so that Abigail/Poppy/Cheryl died and went off to witch heaven to be with Thomasina.  Nana Rose went into Cheryl's body so she could enjoy her youth again.  And I'm not sure but I think they also broke the curse while they were at it, so Nana Rose/Cheryl will age normally.

[Noneofyourbusiness]

4 hours ago, rmontro said:

I've enjoyed this mini-season, but this episode kind of annoyed me, with all it's "men are bad" messaging.

There was a serious dearth of enlightened men in the time periods being depicted. It would be unrealistic and revisionist to say otherwise.

Edited December 9, 2021 by Noneofyourbusiness

[tennisgurl]

Having Abigail being Poppy and Cheryl was a pretty good twist, it was certainly easy to hide as the show always has the main cast playing their identical ancestors and family members anyway. I have liked the Rivervale miniseries pretty well, even if it doesn't end up meaning much to the main story its become a cool creepy anthology show. Its not like the actual plot of Riverdale has ever been its best feature anyway. This has been an interesting idea, this show is usually at its most entertaining when it embraces the crazy. 

I'm disappointed that after all this hype Sabrina was just a minor cameo at the end, although she could show up next episode if the two universes start melding. My first thought on seeing Sabrina and getting confirmation that Rivervale Cheryl/Abigail is a witch was that Rivervale is the Riverdale that exists in the Chilling Adventures of Sabrina universe, and that's the universe we've been in, but its also fully possible that this is all Jugheads drug induced fever dream as he tries to finally finish his novel. It being an alternate universe is more interesting, but the show usually pulls back from using the actual supernatural, so we'll see. 

[thuganomics85]

Again, while he wasn't bad or anything these past few seasons, Cole Sprouse really seems to have a new energy to him so far this season.  He is clearly relishing every moment of the narration stuff, but he also seemed to be having a blast being in full douchebag mode as Jack.  Maybe the beanie was holding him back!

So, now it's Cheryl's turn to be front and center on good old Rivervale and it turns out that... well, she's actually been here a long time!  Yep, she was actually Abigail Blossom from way back in 1890, but thanks to a curse (naturally) from an Evil Warlock Fangs on the eve of a comet, she was made immortal, but destined to always be alone (man, don't you just hate when that happens?!)  That led her to having a brief stint in 1960 as "Poppy" as well, which involved her having a brief romance with Bitsy, which I feel like was mainly to have a way for Madelaine Petsch to make-out with Lili Reinhart for a second and not deal with the whole "Betty and Cheryl are actually cousins and that might even be a line we can't cross!" thing.  But now her soul has been friend thanks to a sacrifice from Nana Rose and now Cheryl's body is inhabited by Nana Rose, I think?  Wild!  But Madelaine Petsch did a great job her, I think.

After all the hype, Sabrina finally arrives.  Never watched the series itself, but I still find it weird seeing Kiernan Shipka here because while there is nothing wrong at all with appearing on CW shows (despite the hate they can get it at times), it just feels weird seeing someone who started out on what will likely be considered one of the best shows of all time (Mad Men) appearing on good old Riverdale/Rivervale!

The next episode will be the last of this arc, right?  Curious to see how this all plays out and if there will be a reason for all of this or will just be chalked up to more craziness.  Either way, it's been an interesting journey so far.

[rmontro]

1 hour ago, thuganomics85 said:

So, now it's Cheryl's turn to be front and center on good old Rivervale and it turns out that... well, she's actually been here a long time!  Yep, she was actually Abigail Blossom from way back in 1890,

Since Cheryl was actually Abigail here, I guess that would mean that in "Rivervale", there would be no modern version of Jason, no twin brother of Cheryl in recent times.  That in itself changes the character quite a bit.

 

15 hours ago, Noneofyourbusiness said:

There was a serious dearth of enlightened men in the time periods being depicted. It would be unrealistic and revisionist to say otherwise.

Eh, I don't know.  I find it hard to believe every guy in olden days was a jackass.  Different times, different gender role expectations.  I firmly believe you can't judge different times by 2021 standards (which are pretty poor anyway, IMO).

[Noneofyourbusiness]

1 hour ago, rmontro said:

Eh, I don't know.  I find it hard to believe every guy in olden days was a jackass.  Different times, different gender role expectations.  I firmly believe you can't judge different times by 2021 standards (which are pretty poor anyway, IMO).

Those two statements contradict each other. What in olden days would be considered normal behavior for guys would today be considered being a jackass. I've read enough first-hand accounts of the era and seen enough media produced during it to know this was not an exaggerated portrayal (apart from being able to hold Poppy under house arrest for so long without a warrant or involvement from the government, but that's more of a Rivervale thing).

By 1950s standards, those jerks were nice, normal husbands who weren't doing anything wrong. Finding a guy someone from 2021 would want to marry and consider non-oppressive would be a challenge and he'd be a real outlier, because even the kindest would have been brought up to believe that women don't need as good an education as men, that women's happiness and purpose lies in producing babies and they don't need other sources of emotional fulfillment, that wives should obey their husbands, that anyone proscribing contraceptives or aphrodisiacs is a dangerously subversive meddler, etc.

Edited December 9, 2021 by Noneofyourbusiness

[rmontro]

26 minutes ago, Noneofyourbusiness said:

By 1950s standards, those jerks were nice, normal husbands who weren't doing anything wrong. Finding a guy someone from 2021 would want to marry and consider non-oppressive would be a challenge and he'd be a real outlier, because even the kindest would have been brought up to believe that women don't need as good an education as men, that women's happiness and purpose lies in producing babies and they don't need other sources of emotional fulfillment, that wives should obey their husbands, that anyone proscribing contraceptives or aphrodisiacs is a dangerously subversive meddler, etc.

Seems like an overly cynical view.  The man's role was more of a caretaker role, he was supposed to take care of the provisioning and the challenges from the outside world so the woman could focus on the household, the children, the family life.  These were expectations, the family was the focus, and each gender contributed in their own way.  And I would argue the children and the families were more valued then, more so than now.  Have you seen the odds of growing up with both parents in the house today, especially among some minorities?  

I don't think life was lived this way with a goal in mind to oppress women, it was just the reality of  the day. the way things had evolved.  You might as well complain about how the cave duties were divided up in prehistoric times.  You can't go back and change it now.

[Noneofyourbusiness]

No, it was just a literal list of the things they believed. I didn't say oppressing women was the conscious intent, but with beliefs like that, that's what's going to happen, because as nice as a husband of the times may think he's being, it doesn't occur to him that his wife wants things outside of that framework.

I'm not the one complaining about the accurate portrayal. Again, either you judge them by modern standards and they're jackasses or you judge them by the standards of the era and they're not jackasses.

Edited December 9, 2021 by Noneofyourbusiness

[rmontro]

3 hours ago, Noneofyourbusiness said:

I'm not the one complaining about the accurate portrayal. Again, either you judge them by modern standards and they're jackasses or you judge them by the standards of the era and they're not jackasses.

I disagree.  Those guys in this episode were acting way over the top, they were little more than caricatures of evil.  I don't buy that's the way all men acted back them.  If men acted as heads of households, it was on them to act with a kind and fair spirit, to be good leaders of the household.  Not to abuse their positions of power. 

The point back then wasn't to give the wife what she wanted outside of the framework, or to give the man what he wanted for that matter.  They both served the family, each in a different way.  Some may not like the way that worked, but that was the way it worked at the time.  Personally, I'd rather have a successful and intact family and risk being called a jackass, than to have a broken home and be called whatever else. 

[MaggieG]

So if Cheryl was Abigail and Poppy then where did Nana Rose come from?

[SourK]

I liked this! Like, really truly liked it. I didn't know before now but this is what I want instead of Riverdale: a dark, gay, supernatural anthology show with dramatic costumes Agnes Obel on the soundtrack.

It also weirdly warmed my heart to see Lili Reinhart, who's out as bi, play a gay/bi character, even if that character kind of sucked.

[Glade]

The story itself was pretty cliche and eye-rolly, I think Poppy's storyline was the least necessary and could have been cut in favor of having Sabrina enter the narrative earlier and play a larger role.   I miss that show/those characters.

[Affogato]

On 12/10/2021 at 2:06 PM, MaggieG said:

So if Cheryl was Abigail and Poppy then where did Nana Rose come from?

I think that comes clear in Rivervale 2.0

[Affogato]

On 12/9/2021 at 9:16 PM, rmontro said:

 

The point back then wasn't to give the wife what she wanted outside of the framework, or to give the man what he wanted for that matter.  They both served the family, each in a different way.  Some may not like the way that worked, but that was the way it worked at the time.  Personally, I'd rather have a successful and intact family and risk being called a jackass, than to have a broken home and be called whatever else. 

And how far would you go to keep that successful and intact family? What if your wife wanted to do something you thought would be inappropriate, like have a really successful business that is better than yours, what if your son was gay? No, most men weren't evil, of course not, but like many people today they wanted their entitlements and their privilege.  Again, remembering that women couldn't independently get a credit card until 1974. We are talking about a lot of entitlement and privilege.

Also, if you look at the fifties there is an awful lot of popular culture not about how badly the women are treated but about how horrible the situation is for the men. "Incredible Shrinking Man" is an example that speaks for itself, but there are others.  all of the western fantasies, all of the male motorcycle and beat stuff. In the fifties men felt trapped and actively hostile at any power women had--they were being forced to give up their freedom and independence to raise the children of harpies.

 

Edited December 12, 2021 by Affogato

[Affogato]

I would just like to take a moment to say: "Bailey's Comet". Hah.

I'm going to miss this miniseries.

 

[Dobian]

I had to laugh at the feminist fantasy of this episode.  Rivervale being run by a patriarchy of brutal and ogreish men who demand babies and are incapable of satisfying their wives in bed.  So the oppressed women all run to Thornhill to join Abigail/Poppy/Cheryl's lesbian cabal.  But Riverdale's silliness, even when the show is kind of trying to be serious, has always been sort of endearing to me.  I did like Sabrina's exposition at the end about how all three were the same person who was cursed by that warlock.  Nice tour de force by Madeline Petsch.

Edited December 13, 2021 by Dobian