Riverdale (4×10) Varsity Blues Review

For our review of last episode, click here.

And here we are, back in Riverdale after a chilly holiday and an even chillier cliffhanger. The students are enjoying Spirit Week as the Riverdale Bulldogs are headed to the football championship game against Jughead’s Stonewall Prep.  Here’s what happened in “Varsity Blues.”

For once Riverdale feels like a normal high school with the students focused on what high schoolers care about: American football. That is until they question Stonewall’s place in the finals and Betty decides to investigate. This leads to them discovering how Stonewall bribes refs and injures opposing players to win their games. This leads to a street brawl that ends with Munroe shattering his kneecap.

This leads to Archie starting another fight, going to jail and then Betty and Veronica failing at getting the Stonewall players to admit to their crimes. Regardless of his injury, Munroe plays the game in hope of getting a scholarship. While the team loses, Munroe gets an offer from Notre Dame, Veronica and Cheryl start a rum-maple syrup business and Jughead learns he got into Yale.

So while these teenagers managed to get into West Side Story-style fights, dirty football games and entrepreneurial endeavours, there were no supernatural or obscene things that happened. No murder, no FBI informants. Just good old fashioned teen melodrama. The themes of family are pushed aside at the beginning of this half-season to focus on the drama of typical high schoolers, and that really isn’t a problem. Riverdale does its best when the stories take a step back, breathe and then return to their craziness and Varsity Blues does just that.

The question remains on what Frank is doing in Archie’s life? He obviously tries to fill a father figure hole that is larger than life, but he must have some other motif for returning to Riverdale. When will we see the exit of Josie (and possible Veronica) as they travel to New York for school. Come to think of it, this season is the end of high school making it difficult for the story to intertwine the drama of its various characters as they go to different cities across the country. This will most likely follow the format that Glee evolved into as its characters parted ways, but will these characters continue to deal with the same level of madness in their individual lives? Perhaps Varsity Blues is a shift in storytelling that the show needs to allow these characters a sense of normalcy in their lives showing that the ridiculousness lies in Riverdale.

What did you think of “Varsity Blues”? Let me know in the comments below!

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Dylan Phillips