Riverdale
Riverdale Season Finale – Killing Mr. Honey (4×19)
The rise and fall of Mr. Honey played out during the early season 4 finale of Riverdale.
Riverdale Season 4 Episode 19 was not supposed to be the finale, but alas, the coronavirus pandemic had different plans for all of us.
Still, it was a fitting way to end leaving us on a head-scratching cliffhanger that brings the mystery of the videotapes to the forefront.
The VHS tapes have been sprinkled in throughout much of the season but larger mysteries like the shenanigans at Stonewall Prep took precedence.
The episode blurred the line between fact and fiction delivering two very different realities that slightly paralleled each other and offered up some beneath-the-surface commentary about the murderous and twisted town of Riverdale.
Jughead, who was given a shot at attention the University of Iowa, had to submit yet another story and felt inspired by the group’s collective hatred for Mr. Honey, the principal who set out to ruin their senior year by cancelling the yearbook (gasp!) and senior prom (the horror!).
I had to dig deep and put myself in the mindset of a senior to fully grasp the motivation here. Admittedly, senior prom is a big deal, but the yearbook, well, a year from now, none of them will even know they chucked the thing.
Prom, on the other hand, was the student body’s treat for enduring a twisted year ranging from psychopaths to murderers, so they weren’t going down without a fight; they deserved this.
Mr Honey made a lot of enemies during his short-tenure and initially, it seemed almost justified since he’s never given the characters or the audience a reason to root for him. In fact, many of us were convinced he was the season’s villain and the man behind the tapes.
Alas, Riverdale had other, bigger plans for him.
Both storylines started off with an epic senior prank only in Jughead’s fictitious story, the prank was darker and involved kidnapping Honey dressed as Stonewall Preppies.
In reality, Honey retaliated to the sticky prank by cancelling prom completely, which is where the seniors brought in reinforcements: the hot moms and dads of Riverdale. The dads, aside from Hiram, were simply there for muscle. But the moms… oh, they meant business.
They threatened to sue, they threatened to gather the PTA, it was nuts.
Credit: Riverdale/ The CW
And they got their way until Honey made a copycat video pretending to be the Voyeur to get prom cancelled once again under the guise that it was too dangerous.
In Jughead’s short story, Mr. Honey was kidnapped and got a good beating from Reggie. Veronica and Archie found him passed out and the group covered up his “accidental” murder by pretending to never speak of this moment again. Sound familiar? Betty, Jughead, Veronica, and Archie have been down this road once before, so Jughead was definitely pulling from his own reality.
In the story, Reggie’s guilty conscience got the best of him so they killed him too. Ruthless.
In reality, once the group succeeded in firing Honey in reality and Jughead read the letter of recommendation that the principal wrote on his behalf did he realize that he needed to change the narrative of his story.
Miss Bell informed them that Honey has been the best principal Riverdale High has ever seen (sure, I guess), and was only trying to protect them.
At this point, Jughead realized he’s been reveling in the twisted narrative of the town and using it as an excuse. Mr. Honey may not have made a good impression on any of us, but he was right that the murder, mayhem, and manipulation was not normal and needed to be eliminated.
However, it’s hard to accept that Mr. Honey was truly trying to steer the students towards a new and promising reality since there was never any explanation as to why Honey wanted to cancel prom. He explained he was trying to protect the students and prepare them for the real world, but what did prom have to do with that? Did he know who was behind the tapes?
It didn’t explain why Honey cancelled prom at every other school he worked at or why he was a frequent visitor of the Blue Velvet where all the Voyeur’s tapes were found prior to it getting shut down.
It almost felt like the writers needed to redeem him so they did it without offering up expanations to any of our other questions and we were just supposed to go along with it.
And let’s say that we did just go along with it, the final moments in the episode were equal parts twisted and confusing.
Whoever is sending the tapes knows about the cabin where Veronica’s mom had an affair. They could’ve picked any place for Betty and Jughead to go, so what’s the significance of that cabin other than its the place Sheriff Minetta was murdered?
The Voyeur also seems to be interested in reminding Riverdale of all its sins while also trying to frame Betty, Jughead, Archie, Veronica, Cheryl, and Reggie for murder as the cliffhanger featured six masked people dressed as them killing “Principal Honey” by stabbing him.
This, again, paralleled Jughead’s story prior to his re-writing.
It seems they’ve walked right into the Voyeur’s trap.
Early on in the episode, Jughead gave away the point of the videotapes as being the rehearsal before the actual murder.
Everything we were seeing was “the rehearsal” leading up to that final moment where Jughead and Betty were visibly shaken and disturbed by the videotape.
It’s weird to say that I was glad to see them express such disturbance, but for a moment there, it seemed as though Betty and Jughead were normalizing murder as a way of life because they’ve been exposed to it for so long. The town turned them into monsters and they were okay with it. Thankfully, they diverged from that path rather quickly and their reactions to the tape of a man, a good man, possibly dying, prove it.
Now, the fact that Honey accepted a job at Stonewall Prep in the first place after everything that happened during Jughead’s time there makes me think he’s not as “good” of a principal as they let on.
It’s also unclear whether or not Mr. Honey was the man “murdered” in that final scene or if it was just a re-enactment as if the tapes were serving as a “I Know What You Did Last Summer” reminder.
And then, there’s the question of who is actually behind them.
Jughead focused on writing his story for much of the episode, and aside from his core group of friends, the only other person who knew about it was Charles.
In my review of Riverdale Season 4 Episode 18, I argued that their half-brother is behind the videotapes because he has time, access, and control of the situation. He’s been privy to every “private” situation, and could have gotten the other tapes when the FBI raided the Blue Velvet.
Think about it — what if Charles, Chic, Ethel, Evelyn, Donna, and Brett are all working together and the ones behind that final video to mess with #Bughead.
However, with Jughead leaving pages of his short story around the school randomly, it’s possibly its someone else entirely.
The mystery and all the relationship drama (that was completely absent from the episode) would have likely been wrapped up in the final episodes of season 4, but with the current situation, everything is being pushed to season 5.
So, no worries, Riverdale fans, we’ll get our answers soon, we just have to wait a bit longer than expected.
Other Sticky as Maple Syrup Moments
- The classic prank of sticking Honey to a chair and phone was an oldie but a goodie. I thought maybe it would foreshadow that he got his hand stuck in the honey jar (aka — he’s the culprit behind the tapes), and I still think that would’ve been cute.
- It was fun to see the cast all together in the scenes including Cheryl and Reggie. It adds a new dynamic because their personalities are so distinct.
- RIP Midge Klump.
- As of this episode, Cheryl is going to Highsmith College, Veronica is going to Barnard in New York, Betty is going to Yale in Connecticut, Archie is off to the Naval Academy, Jughead tentatively heading to University of Iowa, and Reggie is hopefully going to attend Riverdale Community College.
- I couldn’t help but laugh that they all have experience moving a dead body except for Reggie. Welcome to the team.
Saving Riverdale goes hand-in-hand with saving Pop’s. The friendly neighborhood ghosts ensured that Tabitha Tate was well aware of that on Riverdale Season 6 Episode 15.
As the small but mighty town prepares for a full-on good versus evil with Percival Pickens at the helm of the bad team, Tabitha attempted to salvage her family’s business first and foremost.
But every time they tore down Pop’s iconic facade, something went awry. When she saw a ghostly flashback, she tapped Cheryl and Heather, a self-proclaimed witch schooled by a coven in Greendale (hmm sound familiar) for help communicating with the spirit. It was then that she clued into the fact that the diner has been a refuge not only for the living but also for the dead, who were also very much aware of Percival’s plans.
Percival also knew that the spirits were standing in his way by bearing witness to the eldritch evil that they referred to as a ghost train.
It was complicated, even by Riverdale standards, but it confirms that Percival is some kind of evil entity that knows all too much. And the eldritch terrors, well, we’ve come across those in Greendale, so it’s a good thing that they have Heather on hand for intel and information.
The introduction of Heather also bridges the gap between Cheryl and the supernatural. She’s dabbled in it, but the fact that she’s a witch has never been established out loud until now. Heather’s confession about herself prompted Cheryl to be very open about her involvement in the supernatural. Cheryl has pretty much been guiding her powers of pyrokinesis all on her own — sans a few texts from her robust library — so it’ll be nice to have a guide who can help her lean into those powers.
And, of course, Heather is a librarian, so she’ll be able to lend a hand with Cheryl’s idea of expanding Thornhill into a local library. After all, plenty of people already use the location as a source of information.
Am I shipping Heather and Cheryl? I’m not convinced just yet, but maybe it’s because I’m still holding out hope — like many fans — that a Choni reunion is coming. However, I do think that Heather and Cheryl’s interests align better than Choni’s ever have, so that’s an exciting shakeup.
Toni has her hands full in her fight for custody of baby Anthony. She and Fangs are going up against Kevin, and since they are open “gangbangers,” there isn’t much working in their favor. But when the lawyer informed Toni that a healthy family front could persuade the judge, Toni decided to propose to Fangs despite being more and more aware that they aren’t soulmates.
As a mother, I totally understand where Toni is coming from. A mom would do anything for her child, and if that means she has to see eye to eye with Fangs and make him believe that they are destined to be together, so be it.
Fangs is trying his best. I can’t say I agree with his choice to go work for Percival knowing the danger that he poses to the town, but his actions are coming from a place of love, just like Toni’s. He wants to be there for baby Anthony and provide for his family, and Percival’s offer is allowing him to do it. The idea seems to be that he’s selling his soul to take care of his loved ones, but it’s possible having a personal tether can keep him safe from any mind control.
We should all be blaming Kevin for starting this mess to begin with.
We rarely see Jughead and Veronica team up, but boy was it incredibly fun. Veronica came up with a brilliant plan to bring in more revenue to the casino and stick it to the shareholders that were doubting her.
Listen, when you have a friend that can read minds, why not exploit it for profit? And thus, Forsythe the Fantastic — The Seer of the South Side was born. Everyone loves a good magic trick, and this act surely delivered.
And naturally, the haters wanted a piece as well. Reggie immediately hit up Veronica and attempted to blackmail her if she didn’t give him a cut of the profit.
Reggie dangled the fact that Veronica ordered the hit on her father against her, which isn’t entirely fair considering he was only privy to that information on a personal level.
Veronica wasn’t here for any of it, so she called up Jughead to see if his abilities extended to memory wipes as well. Sure enough, Jughead was eager to strengthen his powers, and before Reggie could even say “blackmail,” he forget exactly what he had against Veronica.
Unfortunately, he was aware that he lost a crucial bit of information, so he told Percival, who is now aware that Jughead’s powers are intensifying.
And based on what went down with Frank and Archie, he’s also aware that Archie figured out a way to become invincible.
Having Frank try to undercut Archie clearly underscores just how dangerous Percival’s manipulations are. Frank was always Archie’s biggest cheerleader, so there’s no way he would willingly try to sabotage his nephew’s business. And despite Archie’s best efforts, Frank wasn’t strong enough to use Fred’s memory as a tether.
Archie wouldn’t even know Frank was pulling a fast one on him if it wasn’t for Betty’s ability to see people’s auras. When Betty saw Frank glowing in a red hue, she knew that he wasn’t being truthful about his decision to call a truce.
Betty tried to hone in on her abilities so that she could determine why she was able to see some dangerous auras and not others.
She confided in an FBI agent — Drake — who was definitely helpful, but her help was also slightly concerning. Why didn’t she question anything Betty was saying? Why did she ask Betty if she’s happy living with her boyfriend? It was strange. Why didn’t Betty see any red flags there?
Betty initially thought that her blindspot was anyone with the serial killer gene, but when she tested Dagwood and Juniper, she realized that one of the twins had the gene, but it wasn’t the one glowing in red. I’m glad they are incorporating the twins into the mystery, but I truly don’t want them to be the inhabitants of evil. And I’m really glad Betty saved that cat before Butterscotch met the same fate as Caramel.
Alice dug into Betty when she realized she took the twins from her, and her tirade ended with her informing Betty that she was the villain and has always been bad.
Betty definitely seemed shocked and hurt by the outburst, but it was also leaning into her own biggest fear as she saw a red aura around herself in the mirror.
Who does Betty pose a threat to? Herself? Her loved ones? Juniper and Dagwood? The town? And does Drake know more than she’s letting onto?
Overall, it was an intense night of Riverdale that laid a lot of the groundwork for the final battle.
It’s pretty clear that Percival is going to come for Veronica and Jughead for their little “act,” and will likely take a stab at Pop’s new setup at the El Royale, but if they keep being one step ahead of him and keeping him on his toes, maybe they have a shot at winning this after all?
What did you think of the episode? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
I have no idea where Riverdale’s crazy train express is heading, but I do know that I’m fully on board.
Choo-choo.
Honestly, once you embrace that mess that Riverdale is, you start enjoying the episodes for every sliver of ridiculousness.
There were some grade-A moments on Riverdale Season 6 Episode 14 as the sad superhero squad attempted to wield their powers against Percival. A battle for Riverdale’s soul is imminent, and while they’ve all been graced with superpowers, none of them have been able to see them as a true blessing. Until now.
The episode also reunited some old couples — and yes, there’s definitely some nostalgia about those OG romances, even if you are a present-day Barchie fan.
Archie’s attempt at eliminating palladium as his weakness wasn’t working at first. In fact, it was killing him. He turned to Cheryl for some help in making himself immune to the palladium, but micro-dosing was actually killing him even quicker.
Eventually, Cheryl turned to the ancient alchemists for a solution and decided that the best option was to forge Archie. I didn’t really catch onto what the plan entailed, but basically, it boiled down to Archie chanting a Latin alchemical spell while Cheryl used her powers of pyrokinesis for the foraging.
It was — dramatic, to say the least, but it seemed to do the trick.
Archie was forged, and he became the most powerful being in Riverdale. And hopefully, more impervious to anything that Percival could conjure up on his end.
The decision to pan from a fiery-red, potentially deathly spell over to a product placement for Smartfood popcorn was quite hilarious.
It was yet another subtle reminder that Riverdale can get away with anything and none of us will even question it.
There seems to be a lot of product placement going on this season — don’t worry, Canva, we see you! — and I wonder if that’s how the series was able to secure another season at The CW amid mass cancellations. I’m not complaining in the slightest.
Also turning to Cheryl for some wisdom was Veronica, whose “power” was the kiss of death. It definitely didn’t present as a power at first, but once she got a handle on her abilities and knew that if she kept her chill, she wouldn’t accidentally kill anyone with her venom, she was able to turn it into her power.
The Kiss of the Spiderwoman — any Katy Keene fans here?
The raven-haired goddess — as Cheryl referred to her — rocked those goth looks, and as someone who despises musicals, I quite enjoyed her dark rendition of “Toxic.” Hopefully, Britney Spears enjoyed it as much as Archie did. When have we ever seen him let loose like that? Immortality looks good on him.
Archie’s new power was also able to help Veronica get back to her main character energy. If I’m understanding correctly, he sucked the venom out of her when he kissed her? Betty’s quip was also a subtle way of acknowledging fans who have been slightly peeved that Veronica, a former main character, was sidelined this season. They see you, they feel you.
Since Archie and Veronica fell back into old ways, so did Betty and Jughead as they teamed up once again to solve a mystery.
Riverdale — “Chapter One Hundred and Nine: Venomous” — Image Number: RVD614a_0226r — Pictured (L-R): Lili Reinhart as Betty Cooper and Cole Sprouse as Jughead Jones — Photo: Jack Rowand/The CW — © 2022 The CW Network, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Seeing them back in action reminded me of how much I missed these two working cases together. I love Tabitha, don’t get me wrong, but Jughead and Betty are the OG’s.
Anyway, Betty wanted Jughead to use his powers to get into her subconscious and help her answer any lingering questions about her father.
Jughead sifting through Betty’s mind was cleverly presented as him looking through the Betty comics — it’s always sweet to see the show acknowledge its roots.
Upon entering the darkest abyss of her mind, he unearthed that Hal Cooper was grooming Betty to be a killer since birth. He also found out that Alice has the serial killer gene and knew all about her husband’s penchant for killing. In one specific instance, he threatened to kill her if she didn’t help him bury the body of a deputy who came to investigate his crimes.
Admittedly, I’m not really interested in exploring Betty’s darkness anymore. I feel like most of the characters have moved on from their previous storylines, but they keep pushing this aspect of Betty down our throats. I’d love for her to fully grow into who she is now because honestly, it almost feels like two different characters and personalities sometimes. The Betty we see grabbing drinks with Vee and having a romantic night with Archie is not the same woman we see exploring this darkness. They have to pick one and stick to it.
Throughout the episode, particularly with Jughead and Betty, flashes of previous memories kept flickering through what seemed to be the fabric of the universe. Is this proof that the memories of the characters in an alternate reality are blending with the characters of this reality?
Even Archie experienced somewhat of deja vu when Jughead said “I contain multitudes” in reference to his comics. Was the multitudes a slight nod to multiverses?
And finally, Cheryl reconnected with Heather, who blew into town in spectacular fashion. She’s a librarian in Greendale now, and from the promo, seems to be dabbling in magic of her own, which isn’t surprising considering our dear friend Sabrina Spellman also resides in Greendale.
I know the consensus among fans is that Cheryl and Toni have to get back together, but I’m not opposed to exploring Cheryl’s past if it allows us to make a full circle and reunite the soulmates down the line.
Other Musings
- Cheryl has the power of pyrokinesis and yet she trusts a Magic 8 Ball to make decisions about her love life.
- I love the shade Cheryl and Nana continuously throw at each other. There’s love there somewhere.
- Betty telling Jughead that he “banged around” in her subconscious had to be a bone that the writers threw Bughead fans.
- It almost seemed like the cast had fun with this episode and just basked in the insanity of their characters.
What did you think of the episode? And where do you think we’re heading this season? Does the Riverdale four (+ friends) have what it takes to stop Percival now that they are fully in control of their powers?
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