And for you that worked out great, because your friends probably understood your wants and weren't putting together a party you weren't interested in to distract themselves from their own drama.

That was the greatest thing I've ever seen on TV. DRAG 'EM, CHERYL

Now that I think about it, I'm suddenly really curious to know what the hell was in that huge box. Did it get smashed when Chuck put Jughead through that glass table?

That's one thing that bugs me about this show—the actors are forced to do so much of the heavy lifting on character development through interviews because the writing doesn't provide it. Madchen Amick did an interview where she talked about how Alice approves of Jughead, but you don't really get that from the dialogue…

Yeah, I counted him having four distinct moments where he could have stopped the metaphorical flood, and he chose to make it about his own problems instead. The whole setup for the party was self-interest for everyone involved. Archie was trying to get over Valerie, Veronica wanted to wear a cute party dress and then…

That's the thing, though—in real life, parties aren't these wonderful events where everyone comes together, sets aside any real-life shit they've got going on, and focus on one person for several hours who's totally okay with being the absolute center of fawning attention.

Right after Betty stormed out of the garage, she passed Archie on the porch steps as he was making a public and drunken appeal to Valerie, and the look that Betty gave him was pure filth. It was great, like, "Christ Almighty, I was into that? For that long? Boys can all eat shit and die."

To be fair, I think Alice is actually trying. She had the binoculars to keep an eye on things, but didn't go running over there to beat down the door and yell at everyone until the party was already breaking up, and even then it was to confront her ex-boyfriend(???). Betty didn't wake up to a torrent of shrill…

This was the best episode this show has done so far.

Or maybe Jughead's the murderer, and when we find out, it smashcuts to him eating a giant burger in graphic slow-motion, umami juices dripping down his wrists and mixing with the little spots of Jason Blossom's blood before hitting the diner table.

This is reminding me of a tongue-in-cheek theory that the very last episode of Mad Men was just gonna be of Harry Crane puttering around his office, eating White Castle burgers and flipping through paperwork silently. Just to fuck with us.

I swear Jughead had a hamburger in front of him in one of the diner scenes. Betty's sitting next to him and has a milkshake kind of in the way, but you can definitely see him kinda pick up the burger and then set it back down.

Betty and Jughead remain a cute and mutually supportive narrative superteam. I keep waiting for the sword of Damocles to drop on that.

Your presence in the comments sections is what makes these reviews feel truly complete. "Oh, hey, it's Evil Lincoln—time to get out the jello shots and really get this party started."

He's purposely channeling Rod Serling; I'm willing to trust.

how DARE you question the Blossom superiority!

The way she said it was fantastic, too—all I could hear was Titus Andromedon delivering the exact same line with the exact same affect.

That's why it's so great that he's inexplicably attractive to literally everyone. Everyone's probably shrugging their shoulders, making sure their daughters are up on their Depo shots to avoid spreading that stupid around, and blaming the whole thing on "pheromones or some shit".

Co-signed; I've never thought of it that way before, but it makes so much sense now that I don't know why we don't talk about it that way more often in media.

I kept expecting Ethel to have a big monologue about how she was waiting for the other shoe to drop and for Veronica to turn into a raging bully. It felt like she was being set up to rip Veronica a new one for being so damn condescending.