Riverdale – Chapter One Hundred and Thirteen: Biblical

As Percival (Chris O’Shea) decides to punish Archie (K.J. Apa) and the citizens of Riverdale for not working on his train project, the plagues have now arrived to town. With frogs escaping from the biology lab, swarming flies,and children returning home with lice, the suffering starts to impact the town. Fortunately, the one bright spot is the wedding of Toni (Vanessa Morgan) and Fangs (Drew Ray Tanner). 

Veronica 

Toni and Veronica (Camila Mendes) have a sit-down where Toni is excited to share that she and Fangs have set a date for their wedding. While Veronica initially offers up the Babylonium, Toni asks Veronica to take on a larger role as wedding planner for their wedding. Later with Tabitha (Erinn Westbrook), Veronica shares how she no longer knows her purpose for returning to Riverdale. While Betty (Lili Reinhart) has Archie and so many of her friends are loved up, she is alone and not like her prior persona as the “She-Wolf of Wall Street.” Tabitha assures her that there is a purpose to her returning, one she needs to realize herself.  

When pestilence descends upon the rehearsal dinner, Veronica immediately steps into action and moves the venue to Pop’s. As Pop’s is considered a safe haven, everyone convenes there where Veronica gives a beautiful speech about Toni and Fangs…followed by a fairly uncomfortable rendition of “Ladies Who Lunch” from Company. After her performance Betty approaches Veronica and asks her to join her and Archie as their date. Veronica declines, later realizing that she came back for her friends.  

Kevin, Toni and Fangs 

Upon catching Percival in the act of enacting the plague of water turning to blood, Kevin (Casey Cott) decides to tell Toni and Fangs that he is dropping the custody battle for Baby Anthony as he knows he is not the father. Later, when the group needs to find a way to get an inside advantage to Percival’s world, they enlist the help of Kevin to gather intel and see if they can get an advantage. Because he has decided to drop his lawsuit, Toni and Fangs decide to invite him to the wedding.  

Archie 

Accepting an invitation to be a groomsman, Archie is excited for the upcoming nuptials while still trying to help the workers avoid going back to work for Percival. While Percival does try to convince Archie that he will keep torturing the town until the workers return, Archie finds that the workers stand strong in refusing to do any more of Percival’s dirty work. Unfortunately, this only enrages Percival further to where he inflicts a plague of boils on the workers and leaves Archie no choice but to approach Percival to call off the plagues. While Percival was more willing to acquiesce prior to the boils, he now demands that Archie complete his railroad instead and keep the work on schedule. With no other choice, Archie agrees.  

Betty, Cheryl, Heather and Percival 

To understand what Percival is inflicting onto the town, Betty begins to research religious texts. During her research she is haunted by visions of TBK and when he referred to her as “The Harlot of Babylon.” When Kevin provides her with the intel that he has acquired the stockade for “The Harlot of Babylon,” this pushes Betty to confront Percival at his shop and asks what he will need to stop the plagues on the town. Percival realizes that Kevin has betrayed him but tells Betty that if they hand over Baby Anthony this will all end. Betty relays this to the group when they are together. 

Meanwhile, Cheryl (Madelaine Petsch) and Heather (Caroline Day) are working on a plan of their own: to kill Percival as a wedding gift to Toni. At first Cheryl tries to use her pyrokinesis on Percival, which backfires when he then unleashes the fire back on Nana Rose (Barbara Wallace). Realizing they may need another way to counteract Percival’s actions, Heather then gets an idea after hearing Betty talk about the stockade….especially since placing Percival in this will prevent him from using his power. The group works together by having Betty pretend to bring Baby Anthony to Percival and Cheryl using her invisibility powers with Heather, Veronica, Kevin and Tabitha to ambush Percival. The plan works and Percival is then locked in the stockade. With Percival incapacitated, the plagues cease along with the latest plague that was enacted: darkness.  

Jughead 

Staying in the bunker to quiet the voices, Jughead (Cole Sprouse) tells Tabitha that he is hearing voices down here as well. But in writing out the stories that he is hearing the voices seem to quiet down. Tabitha takes that as great news, but quickly learns that Jughead is not ready to come out of hiding yet…which means he will not be at the wedding. But while down in the bunker, Jughead starts to experience strange things happening. 

When he tries to confront the voices he hears during these happenings, a lone bottle with a message rolls out of the darkness and says only two words: keep writing. As Jughead writes certain stories they also begin to disappear as he experiences what he writes. First La Llorona coming into the bunker while he sleeps and then Cheryl in her Rivervale garb stabbing him after Jughead ate a cheeseburger that made him sick. Eventually, Jughead does wake from his sickness to a figure in the bunker with him and is ready to confront the intruder. 

While placing Percival may have lifted the plagues, he is not down for long. Enlisting the help of his next plague of locusts, they break him out of the stockade and he can escape the vault Veronica locked him in. Across town, the gang celebrates Toni and Fangs as they get married. With everyone sans Jughead celebrating, Veronica laments at being alone and asks Tabitha who Archie ends up with. Unfortunately, Tabitha is unable to answer as Percival enacts the final plague of killing the firstborn by killing the oldest firstborn alive: Nana Rose. Soon, wedding guests start to drop and die before everyone’s eyes. Starting with Archie, we then see Toni, Fangs, and several guests follow suit. In the bunker Jughead asks the intruder to show his face and finds that he is staring at the Rivervale version of himself…before joining the firstborn in their demise.  

With Percival’s final plague in play the remaining guests which includes Betty, Tabitha, Cheryl, Heather, Kevin and Baby Anthony are sitting amongst the carnage. Everyone left is not a firstborn, yet Baby Anthony is and remains alive. Percival still has plans to come for Baby Anthony and the group must find out why. Heather poses a solution to their problem by deciding to contact someone she knows who is well versed in necromancy: her friend Sabrina (Kiernan Shipka).