Not everyone celebrates their birthday the same way and some, like Jughead, don’t like to celebrate it at all. But there will be a party on Riverdale whether he wants it or not. As any good high school party does, it leads to fist fights, break-ups, and everyone’s dirty laundry being brought out for the whole school to see. Meanwhile, Veronica struggles with figuring out the truth when it comes to her father and Betty faces an old nemesis when his suspension is lifted. “Chapter Ten: The Lost Weekend” was written by Britta Lundin & Brian E. Paterson and directed by Dawn Wilkinson. Here is what happened.
BIRTHDAY BOY | It’s Jughead’s (Cole Sprouse) birthday but he doesn’t want anyone to know. Normally, he and Archie (K.J. Apa) would just go to a double feature and call it a day but this year, with Betty (Lili Reinhart) as his girlfriend, things are different. Archie fills Betty in on Jughead’s not-so-special day assuming that she will just take him to the movie instead but Betty is determined to make this year special (whether Jughead wants her to or not). She organizes a small surprise get-together of the inner circle at Archie’s house as his dad has left for the weekend and even invites F.P. (Skeet Ulrich) to come too. She then brings Jughead by after the movie where he is greeted by the inner circle plus Kevin (Casey Cott), his boyfriend Joaquin (guest star Rob Raco), and Ethel (guest star Channon Purser). He is less than pleased that his birthday tradition of pretending it doesn’t exist has been ignored.
Things only get worse when Cheryl (Madelaine Petsch) and Chuck (guest star Jordan Calloway) show up with the entire school, hell-bent on getting revenge for Betty and Veronica’s (Camila Mendes) actions against them. Jughead pulls Betty aside and they argue heatedly until they break up. He tries to leave but Cheryl and Chuck aren’t quite done yet. They instigate a game of Secrets and Sins where people are encouraged to out their classmates’ dirty laundry for revenge and no one is safe. It ends in blows when Chuck goes after Betty and Jughead steps in to defend her. F.P. breaks up the fight and ends the party before sending his son to talk to his girlfriend.
Archie spends most of the night in a drunken daze dealing with his own issues of being dumped by Val (guest star Hayley Law) and the fact that his dad (Luke Perry) is off with his mom preparing to make their divorce final. He drunk dials his dad and begs him not to go through with it and then passes out. He sobers up after the party is over and has a heart to heart with Veronica that leads to the two of them making out on the couch. The next morning, Veronica wakes up (fully clothed) in his bed and rolls over to see he was a gentleman and slept on the floor. After she sneaks out, he hastily cleans to house before his dad returns while Jughead eats his cake. Just when he’s got the house back in order he hears his dad come in but he’s not alone. It would seem Archie’s drunk dial had some effect because standing next to him is Archie’s mom (guest star Molly Ringwald!!).
[adinserter block=”3″]
DADDY’S LITTLE GIRL | Veronica is still not budging on her resolve to not testify on her father’s behalf after learning what his actions did to innocent families like Ethel’s. Hermione (Marisol Nichols) and their lawyer (guest star Lane Edwards) beg her to change her mind but she isn’t having it. Archie and Betty tell Veronica what Archie overheard at the Blossoms’ party – that Mr. Blossom was the one who got Mr. Lodge arrested. That causes Veronica to go into sleuth mode and she manages to dig up evidence that the Blossoms were paying the Lodges a large sum regularly but that payment stopped the second Hiram was arrested. Her theory is that Mr. Blossom got Mr. Lodge arrested in order to not have to pay anymore but when she brings that theory to her mom and their lawyer, they tell her bringing that information to light would make it easy to suggest Mr. Lodge had something to do with Jason’s death as revenge. The lawyer and her father both try and convince Veronica to testify on his behalf again but this time suggest to her that if she doesn’t her mother might get dragged through the mud. Believing her mother is genuinely a good person, Veronica finally agrees if only to protect her.
DARK BETTY | Just when Betty thinks her life is starting to seem back to normal, Chuck’s suspension ends and he returns to school, bringing a reminder of what Betty did to him along for the ride. The only other person who knows the details of that night is Veronica and she would never betray Betty like that but Chuck would be happy to. He joins Cheryl in getting revenge on Betty and Veronica by crashing Jughead’s party and during the game of Secrets and Sins, goes after Betty. He tells the whole room in vivid detail what Betty did to him that night at Ethel’s house right down to the wig and calling herself Polly. Jughead breaks it up by trying to break his fist over Chuck’s jaw and ends the party. After, Jughead and Betty go to Pop’s for a milkshake where they talk about their differences and why they are guarded about things. They reconcile and it would appear their relationship is back on.
OTHER THOUGHTS:
• Molly Ringwald. THE Molly Ringwald will be gracing the show with her presence as Archie’s mom and I couldn’t be more excited.
• I enjoy that Cheer Captain can/is decided by an impromptu dance off. The only way it would have been better would have been if Josie and The Pussycats were magically wheeled out to accompany them.
• I cannot believe the name of the lawyer is Sowerberry. That is amazing.
So what did you think? Are Archie and Veronica going to discuss their evening dalliances? What is F.P.’s connection to Jason’s death? Are we finally going to get to see Hiram Lodge? How excited are you for Molly Ringwald? Let us know your theories in the comments below!
Riverdale airs Thursdays at 9pm on The CW.