Still reeling from the events of last night’s (November 16) Riverdale premiere? Spoilers past this point, but in the episode, titled “Chapter Ninety-Six: Welcome to Rivervale”, the show killed Archie Andrews (KJ Apa) by ripping out his heart to complete a fertility ritual. And while KJ Apa is almost definitely not leaving the series, showrunner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa emphasized to Decider repeatedly during an interview that Archie is, in fact, dead. But, and here’s the thing… The Rivervale five episode event isn’t done with the body count yet. So who will die next on Riverdale? And is it — gasp — Toni Topaz (Vanessa Morgan)?
In case you’re confused, though that’s sort of the general M.O. for even your run-of-the-mill episodes of Riverdale, the show is currently kicking off a five episode event over the next few weeks that takes place in an alternate universe called Rivervale. Though it will tie into the rest of the season, and Aguirre-Sacasa has repeatedly said that not only is Rivervale in continuity, but will also impact the rest of Season 6 when it returns in March, 2022, things are decidedly darker, weirder, more deadly, and far more overtly supernatural in Rivervale than they were in Riverdale.
That’s what led to Archie dying on the premiere: as the one pure soul left in town, with the maple trees dying and young women discovering they were barren, everyone got together to sacrifice him Wicker Man style to replenish the soil/wombs. When we pick up in the season’s second episode, titled “Chapter Ninety-Seven: Ghost Stories,” he’ll still be dead, and the ritual will have worked. The maple trees will be in bloom, and Betty Cooper (Lili Reinhart) will be very much pregnant with Archie’s child.
That doesn’t mean everything is hunky dory, though. An extremely terrifying looking ghost dressed in what looks like either a black funeral shroud or a wedding dress seems to be stalking the halls of Rivervale High, followed by Toni Topaz toting an axe. It’s also haunting Betty, and most ominously as seen in the promo for the next episode, seems to be carrying Toni’s son, Baby Anthony, in an open field.
That ties into a promo photo released by The CW that shows Toni, Betty, Cheryl (Madelaine Petsch) and Nana Rose Blossom (Barbara Wallace) all sitting around a table with an empty onesie laid out in the middle:
In seems pretty clear that whatever this ghastly figure is has taken Baby Anthony, and perhaps is interested in the children of the town — given her/its interest in Betty, as well. That definitely puts Toni in danger; but doesn’t mean she’s going to die, right?
Well, here’s the thing: The CW has released a synopsis for the season’s third episode, “Chapter Ninety-Eight: Mr. Cypher”, and three actors weren’t listed as appearing on the cast list. That doesn’t necessarily mean they aren’t in the episode, but those three actors are KJ Apa, Vanessa Morgan and Madelaine Petsch. It’s likely that Apa will be off-screen until the show’s hundredth episode (he was spotted filming then), but Morgan and Petsch raise a bit of a red flag. We do know that Petsch will definitely be in the season’s fourth episode, “Chapter Ninety-Nine: The Witching Hour(s)”, which will find Cheryl teaming up with Sabrina Spellman (Kiernan Shipka), and more on that in a second. But of the three, Morgan not being in the synopsis means Toni is most likely to be on the chopping block.
There’s another piece of evidence that Toni might not make it out of Episode 2 alive, and that’s promo photos released by The CW for “Mr. Cypher”. In the looks at the episode, Fangs Fogarty (Drew Ray Tanner) seems to be spending time with his ex-boyfriend, Kevin Keller (Casey Cott). Not that that’s out of the realm of possibility, but if Fangs and Kevin have reignited their relationship, what does that mean for Fangs and Toni, who are currently in a relationship themselves, and raising Baby Anthony together?
If Toni is dead (and hopefully not Baby Anthony too), that would conceivably send Fangs back to Kevin’s waiting arms, or at least propel him to reconnect with an old flame.
One big piece of evidence against this theory? Aguirre-Sacasa teased that the season’s fourth episode would make fans of Choni, aka Cheryl and Toni, “very happy,” which might be tricky if Toni is lying six feet under. Another piece of evidence is that after a season long push to put Toni in the front of the action, killing her off two episodes into the new season would be a real bummer, to put it way too lightly. And though this isn’t necessarily evidence against, like Apa, Morgan was seen filming for the season’s hundredth episode, so even if Toni does die, she’ll be back through some sort of multiversal magic.
But on the other hand, that episode is also bringing in Sabrina Spellman, who knows a little something about escaping from the underworld. So is it possible that the moment that will make Choni fans happy is Cheryl teaming up with Sabrina to resurrect her dead ex-girlfriend?
Whatever happens next, it’s clear that Rivervale is just getting started.
Riverdale airs Tuesdays at 9/8c on The CW.
This post first appeared on Nypost.com
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