S06.E08: Chapter One Hundred and Three: The Town

[AnimeMania]

THE WORST TOWN IN AMERICA — After learning that Percival Pickens (guest star Chris O’Shea) is behind a blistering article calling Riverdale the worst town in America, Archie (KJ Apa) comes up with a plan to prove him wrong. Meanwhile, after the Town Council goes after their casino, Veronica (Camila Mendes) and Reggie (Charles Melton) decide they’re going to do everything on the up-and-up moving forward. Finally, Britta (guest star Kyra Leroux) makes a risky move to help Cheryl (Madelaine Petsch).

Original Airdate: April 3, 2022   8:00-9:00 p.m.    CW

[nilyank]

3 hours ago, AnimeMania said:

THE WORST TOWN IN AMERICA — After learning that Percival Pickens (guest star Chris O’Shea) is behind a blistering article calling Riverdale the worst town in America, Archie (KJ Apa) comes up with a plan to prove him wrong. Meanwhile, after the Town Council goes after their casino, Veronica (Camila Mendes) and Reggie (Charles Melton) decide they’re going to do everything on the up-and-up moving forward. Finally, Britta (guest star Kyra Leroux) makes a risky move to help Cheryl (Madelaine Petsch).

 

Archie rather than fighting a losing battle, he should lean into Riverdale being the worst town in the world. Yes I went global with this horrible town filled with serial killers, weirdos cults, oddball maple fanatics and just plain dummies.

[the-grey-lady]

4 hours ago, AnimeMania said:

After learning that Percival Pickens (guest star Chris O’Shea) is behind a blistering article calling Riverdale the worst town in America

Where's the lie?

[Chaos Theory]

Lets be honest Riverdale kinda is a crappy town for everyone who isn't the lead and supporting cast.  And even for them they have to dodge the occasional serial killer, weird cult,   and gang war.

 

[Diapason Untuned]

Couple weeks ago, I was joking about Archie and friends turning into the Avengers, turns out I had the wrong MCU franchise. They're actually the Defenders! 

Archie is Luke Cage, Jughead is Matt Murdock, Percival is Killgrave and Betty is...Iron Fist maybe, with the auras? I'm wondering now if this was deliberate or just a coincidence.

It was so nice to see Archie and Jughead talking and working together again, even if Archie kind of wanted to beat him up at first. The tiny homes thing may have been ripped from the headlines, but it was such a nice thing to see them doing together. It almost felt like old times in a good way. Unfortunately, the show also reminded us of old times in a bad way with Kevin. First, we only see him when he gets attacked and then he ends up getting manipulated by the creepy guy again? Really, writers, some new material please.

If I was Mark Consuelos watching today's episode, I'd be howling. Hiram is gone but forgotten. Veronica's whole good CEO shtick only lasted so long, huh? First she puts up Daddykin's picture as a reminder what not to be like and reverts to type near instantly? I wonder how long it is before she's asking his image for advice on the lastest caper?

Reggie was almost refreshing with how his only interest was just scamming and side hustling. Never change, Reggie! Speaking of never changing, after a lot of episodes being decent, Alice reminded me why she was so annoying today.

All in all, a nice episode of the show.

Edited April 4, 2022 by Diapason Untuned

[thuganomics85]

Yeah, when that article came out, I was just like "Well, is he really wrong here?"  Because Riverdale kind of sucks in so, so many ways.  I normally have a soft spot for Archie, but I was cracking up at his agro "How dare he?!  Riverdale does not suck!  Let me kick his ass!" reaction to all of it.  Sure, buddy.  Riverdale is paradise!

Anyway, so this Pickens fellow has his own kind of power: the power of persuasion, where he can apparently make everyone do his bidding.  Already has the town wrapped around his finger, it seems.  I do wonder if it doesn't work against the other powered folks (and vice versa), because he never even attempted to use it on either Archie or Jughead.

Veronica thought about going legit for a hot second, but then was like "It's too hard and Alice sucks, so bring on the gangster and schemes!" at the end.

Cheryl is still trapped in Abigail's mind somehow, but thanks to Britta going into her "mind place" (naturally) and saving her from being tormented by an extra outlandish Penelope (Nathalie Boltt was clearly having the time of her life in those scenes), Cheryl can now communicate with Britta in the dream world?  Sure....

[SourK]

LMAO the devil spent four days in Riverdale then wrote an essay about why it was the worst town.

Cheryl's dream world was creepy, and I feel personally attacked by the scene where she had a bad haircut. Not all of us "got" how to do our own layers during COVID, okay?

I loved the scene were Veronica was like, "When we started this business, I just assumed we'd run scams and do crimes -- but what if we went legit, so I could really rub my thumb in the town council's eye?" I would be so happy if this is the start of a story arc where she follows in her father's footsteps and declares some random teenager her enemy so she can be the new villain of Riverdale.

Props to the characters and the show for remembering that other people exist and not just abandoning all of the homeless people. However, I think they also might be dead?

re: Jughead's hearing. Being able to read minds seems like it's sort of helpful in conversations, but he would still not be able to hear traffic, or the television, or anything else that didn't think about the sound it was going to make ahead of time. I feel like it would be obvious to the people close to him that he still couldn't hear.

[the-grey-lady]

1 hour ago, SourK said:

I would be so happy if this is the start of a story arc where she follows in her father's footsteps and declares some random teenager her enemy so she can be the new villain of Riverdale.

 

I burst out laughing at this. Everyone knows the Big Bad has to have an unreasonable grudge against a high school student!

[the-grey-lady]

Geez, this show is doing terribly. Didn't even crack 200k viewers this week. A whole 180k people watched. Viewers do not like what they're seeing, and they are not tuning it. How embarrassing.

[tennisgurl]

Percival Pickens might be a supervillain but...he isn't wrong about Riverdale being the worst town in America. Riverdale is a pretty famous garbage fire that has been an absolute hell mouth since its very inception. Archie's faith in his town is cute, but his "how dare you Jug, I'll kick your ass!" reaction was pretty hilarious. Oh yeah, Riverdale is awesome, as long as you like dozens of serial killers, gangs, massive drug issues, death cults, brainwashing nuns, the Blossoms in general, a history of witch burnings, crime lords that get into personal rivalries with teenagers, having martial law declared sometimes, its a damn Norman Rockwell painting. In any just and sane universe, everyone would have moved years ago and the city would have been razed to the ground and salted with the help of exorcists and shamans to finally purge it of its evil.

This guy is probably Satan or some other evil entity, and he saw Riverdale for about five seconds and was like "this place is fucked up even by my standards, maybe its time to go back to hell, where its nicer." 

It took Veronica, what, half an hour to go back to running scams? I cant fully blame her, Alice was really at her most annoying, but damn girl. First road block and your back to your life of crime?

Cheryl's dreams were pretty creepy, even if I find this whole plot to be really bizarre, even by Blossom standards. Nathalie Boltt was certainly having a blast getting her Mommy Dearest on. No wire hangers! Ever!

I did like seeing Jughead and Archie together working on a project again, they spend so much time with only their love interests and in various subplots that its easy to forget that they're supposed to be best friends. So I guess we are going full comic book now, even getting our own Killgrave, so when do we find out that this is another pocket dimension? How many genres are they going to be stopping into? We had horror, now superheroes, what's next? Riverdale in space?

So they remember that the homeless people exist, but now they might be dead? That "gone to a better place" certainly sounded ominous. 

[HeatLifer]

6 hours ago, the-grey-lady said:

Geez, this show is doing terribly. Didn't even crack 200k viewers this week. A whole 180k people watched. Viewers do not like what they're seeing, and they are not tuning it. How embarrassing.

It moved to Sundays. It is in Season 6. That’s not where the show receives it’s main viewership, regardless. 

[the-grey-lady]

14 minutes ago, HeatLifer said:

It moved to Sundays. It is in Season 6. That’s not where the show receives it’s main viewership, regardless. 

Sure, but there's no way to spin these numbers as anything other than putrid. They lost 60k viewers in the span of two weeks. People know when the show is on now, and they aren't interested. The Flash is in what, season 8, and a lot more people are tuning in. They're average more than twice Riverdale's viewership.

[Noneofyourbusiness]

5 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

what's next? Riverdale in space?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIMrGPxh1AM

[HeatLifer]

6 hours ago, the-grey-lady said:

Sure, but there's no way to spin these numbers as anything other than putrid. They lost 60k viewers in the span of two weeks. People know when the show is on now, and they aren't interested. The Flash is in what, season 8, and a lot more people are tuning in. They're average more than twice Riverdale's viewership.

The television ratings aren’t relevant, though. That’s not spin, it’s a fact. That’s not what matters to The CW because Riverdale is on air and will come back for what is likely a last Season 7. I think you want to make a point that all these viewers don’t like the story, but it doesn’t matter. The show will go on and end as planned. 

[the-grey-lady]

6 minutes ago, HeatLifer said:

I think you want to make a point that all these viewers don’t like the story

It's fairly obvious viewers don't like the story. If they did, they'd be watching.

You're absolutely right that season 7 will happen, and the writers will do...whatever they're planning to do.

Television ratings don't matter like they used to, but they still matter. Advertising revenue still matters.

[HeatLifer]

19 hours ago, the-grey-lady said:

It's fairly obvious viewers don't like the story. If they did, they'd be watching.

You're absolutely right that season 7 will happen, and the writers will do...whatever they're planning to do.

Television ratings don't matter like they used to, but they still matter. Advertising revenue still matters.

Viewers is a broad term. Not all viewers dislike the story and not all viewers are watching live. They stream or they watch on Netflix. If we talk about television ratings we would have to talk about how they started to decline years ago, as well. 

[the-grey-lady]

2 hours ago, HeatLifer said:

If we talk about television ratings we would have to talk about how they started to decline years ago, as well. 

Oh, definitely. No doubt. But going from over 1mil viewers to less than 200k is a rather precipitous drop. Even The Flash does better, and it's in season 8.

And of course some viewers like the show now (didn't mean to imply otherwise), but such a large drop in viewership is a clear indication that a lot of former viewers do not the direction of the show.

[rmontro]

On 4/7/2022 at 1:25 AM, the-grey-lady said:

And of course some viewers like the show now (didn't mean to imply otherwise), but such a large drop in viewership is a clear indication that a lot of former viewers do not the direction of the show.

I think one problem lies in all the fantasy stuff.  There's a feeling that these are just stories with no real consequences, because there will be a reset coming (I don't know if there will be a reset or not, but that's the feeling you get watching it).  With no consequences, it's hard to invest.  Plus the show was pretty crazy to begin with.  I'm not sure the characters are as likable or as interesting as they were early on either.  

[HeatLifer]

1 hour ago, rmontro said:

I think one problem lies in all the fantasy stuff.  There's a feeling that these are just stories with no real consequences, because there will be a reset coming (I don't know if there will be a reset or not, but that's the feeling you get watching it).

I don’t get the feeling there will be any reset. That seems like wishful thinking from those who want things to be the way they were before.

On 4/6/2022 at 10:25 PM, the-grey-lady said:

Oh, definitely. No doubt. But going from over 1mil viewers to less than 200k is a rather precipitous drop. Even The Flash does better, and it's in season 8.

And of course some viewers like the show now (didn't mean to imply otherwise), but such a large drop in viewership is a clear indication that a lot of former viewers do not the direction of the show.

That drop didn’t happen overnight, it was over time. Many factors go into why people may have tuned out and The Flash viewers are not one in the same as Riverdale viewers.  Anyway, nothing specific is powerful enough to fix the television ratings even if former viewers think certain ships or stories would do that. 

Edited April 8, 2022 by HeatLifer

[rmontro]

16 hours ago, HeatLifer said:

That drop didn’t happen overnight, it was over time. Many factors go into why people may have tuned out and The Flash viewers are not one in the same as Riverdale viewers.  

I like the Riverdale crazy, but they may have bizarred themselves out of their viewership.  At some point it gets hard to relate to.  Getting away from the Betty/Jughead, Veronica/Archie couples might have also hurt.  People accepted those pairings, and now everything seems more muddled.

[HeatLifer]

On 4/8/2022 at 3:53 PM, rmontro said:

I like the Riverdale crazy, but they may have bizarred themselves out of their viewership.  At some point it gets hard to relate to.  Getting away from the Betty/Jughead, Veronica/Archie couples might have also hurt.  People accepted those pairings, and now everything seems more muddled.

The television ratings started to decline while those couples were together. I understand they have their fans, but those fans do not represent the entire audience. Everyone was not watching for Betty/Jughead and Archie/Veronica. Those ships will not change the ratings. 

[the-grey-lady]

16 hours ago, HeatLifer said:

I understand they have their fans, but those fans do not represent the entire audience. Everyone was not watching for Betty/Jughead and Archie/Veronica.

Of course not everyone liked them, but they were the most popular, enduring couples for years. They certainly had/have more fans than Veggie, Jabitha, and Tangs. It makes sense a lot of viewers dipped out when more popular ships were replaced with less popular ones.

Edited April 10, 2022 by the-grey-lady

[HeatLifer]

3 hours ago, the-grey-lady said:

Of course not everyone liked them, but they were the most popular, enduring couples were years. They certainly had/have more fans than Veggie, Jabitha, and Tangs. It makes sense a lot of viewers dipped out when more popular ships were replaced with less popular ones.

Archie/Veronica were never the popular ship. This popularity contest doesn’t matter though because these ships will not change the television ratings. There is a lot more that goes into a decline in viewership than who is dating. As I said, the decline happened seasons ago. It has been steadily dropping as those couples were dating. 

[the-grey-lady]

1 hour ago, HeatLifer said:

There is a lot more that goes into a decline in viewership than who is dating. As I said, the decline happened seasons ago. It has been steadily dropping as those couples were dating. 

Definitely, but there's no denying that people get attached to characters and couples, and people got attached to the original couples. Without them, a lot of people have lost interest.

Would reuniting them help ratings? Some, probably. But having them gone, and replacing them with the current dreck, is almost certainly contributing to the putrid ratings (not suggesting they're the sole reason).

[Bill1978]

On 4/6/2022 at 10:59 AM, Noneofyourbusiness said:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIMrGPxh1AM

Not gonna lie, this is how I was introduced to Josie and The Pussycats as a kid and it has framed my knowledge of them ever since. To the point I was disappointed the live action movie wasn't them in space as I thought that was their schtick.

So just found out Jason Blossom appears in the episode. I have no idea what is happening with the show anymore but I do still enjoy a Jason cameo.

In regards to dropping viewership, I stop watching every week about half way through Season 2 and began to just fast forward to watch scenes of characters I cared about (basically not the Big 4) but even that got exhausting, and the i only tuned into the musical episodes and then fully dipped out once they graduated high school as it seemed the best closure for me. I really do miss the Season 1 days, the show had so much potential but the writers leaned far too heavily into the crazy stuff for it to be truly enjoyable and worth watching.

[rmontro]

2 hours ago, HeatLifer said:

Archie/Veronica were never the popular ship. This popularity contest doesn’t matter though because these ships will not change the television ratings. 

Archie/Veronica was a darn sight better than Reggie/Veronica.  I've always thought the show should make Reggie more of a main character, but as it is he's just getting dominated by Veronica.  He'll never be more than a sidekick for her.  

Anyway, I'm not suggesting they bring back the old couples, or that the loss of the more popular couples are the reason the show is tanking.  But I do believe it's a factor.

[Noneofyourbusiness]

1 hour ago, Bill1978 said:

Not gonna lie, this is how I was introduced to Josie and The Pussycats as a kid and it has framed my knowledge of them ever since.

Same, that and the other cartoon.

[HeatLifer]

7 hours ago, the-grey-lady said:

Definitely, but there's no denying that people get attached to characters and couples, and people got attached to the original couples. Without them, a lot of people have lost interest.

Would reuniting them help ratings? Some, probably. But having them gone, and replacing them with the current dreck, is almost certainly contributing to the putrid ratings (not suggesting they're the sole reason).

Archie and Veronica were together in Season 5 and did not impact the ratings. We can agree to disagree on this because none of it matters. The show will go on. People get attached to characters and couples all the time and sometimes we win and sometimes we lose. 

6 hours ago, rmontro said:

Archie/Veronica was a darn sight better than Reggie/Veronica.  I've always thought the show should make Reggie more of a main character, but as it is he's just getting dominated by Veronica.  He'll never be more than a sidekick for her.  

Anyway, I'm not suggesting they bring back the old couples, or that the loss of the more popular couples are the reason the show is tanking.  But I do believe it's a factor.

There are a lot of factors to this all around. People lost interest during the early seasons too. 

Edited April 11, 2022 by HeatLifer

[Dobian]

On 4/3/2022 at 6:36 PM, Diapason Untuned said:

Archie is Luke Cage, Jughead is Matt Murdock, Percival is Killgrave and Betty is...Iron Fist maybe, with the auras? I'm wondering now if this was deliberate or just a coincidence.

Riverdale has a long history of shamelessly stealing every every plot trope in existence.

I do enjoy the whole Cheryl/Abigail gothic horror story.  The Blossoms have always inhabited this weird world in their corner of Riverdale.  If Riverdale was Disneyland, they would be the ones living in the Haunted Mansion.

Riverdale, the next Atlantic City... with their two blackjack tables and six slot machines.

Penelope scared the hell out of me.

Riverdale the worst town?  Come on, it would be a vacation destination in some states!  :D