Riverdish: The Unauthorized Case Files of Riverdale

By Ryan Bloomquist and Samantha Gold

From the hosts of the Riverdish podcast, the unauthorized case files from the world of the CW’s teen drama sensation Riverdale.

For Archie Andrews, Veronica Lodge, Jughead Jones, and Betty Cooper, high school is more than just pep rallies and milkshakes. Based on the beloved characters from the Archie Comics, Riverdale is a dark, addictive, campy teen thriller that devilishly mixes adolescent angst with corruption, politics, serial killers, gang wars, and twisted secrets. The emotional exploits of Archie, Veronica, Jughead, Betty, and their friends and foes have riveted fans across generations and catapulted the teen drama series into an iconic cultural phenomenon spawning internet discussion groups and podcasts. 

One such podcast is Riverdish, hosted by the adoring and enthusiastic Ryan and Sam, and they have taken it upon themselves to complete the complicated and necessary task of creating the essential unauthorized case files on Riverdale's twisted web of lies, crimes and mysteries.

Featuring case files on Riverdale’s beloved ensemble cast of Archie, Veronica, Jughead, Betty and their friends and foes, Riverdish offers up comprehensive breakdowns of the many mysteries and crimes that plague the town of Riverdale, paired with laugh-out-loud commentary and photos from behind-the-scenes of the show. Tackling everything from The Black Hood to Jingle Jangle to the Southside Serpents to bogus FBI agents and everything and everyone in between, Riverdish is an insightful and hilarious sendup of the case files that the authorities should use to track the many twists and turns of the show.

With a deep knowledge of and appreciation for the show and all that makes it iconic, Riverdish dissects and celebrates the dramatic and thrilling darkness of Riverdale.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: May 7, 2019
• ISBN: 9780062908438

Ryan Bloomquist

Ryan Bloomquist is an actor and vocalist based out of New York City. He is a graduate of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts and has appeared regionally in shows all over the country. Most days he can be found spending far too much time on Twitter (@ryanbloomquist) and falling down deep YouTube rabbit holes of amateur productions of Legally Blonde: The Musical. He lives in New York City.

Book preview

Introduction

Hey, River Vixens! It’s Ryan and Sam, your hosts of Riverdish, coming at you in print! Since season one of Riverdale, we have gathered around a microphone with our friends and copious amounts of wine to discuss the goings-on in the crazy world of Riverdale. We have tried Jingle Jangle, threatened each other with sticky maples, and fangirled over the gay icon that is Nana Rose.

It all started one fateful Sunday afternoon when we sat down for a boozy brunch at Joanne Trattoria.

Yes, Lady Gaga’s parents’ restaurant. And no, she was not there. We were upset as well.

Now, not to turn this book into a Yelp review, but you could say that our service that afternoon was worse than the Jewels N’ Drugs track on Artpop. What should have been an hour-long meal eventually lasted three and inevitably led to us having one too many pitchers of mimosas.

Throughout our brunch, we could not stop chatting about the pilot we had watched for a new CW show called Riverdale. We’d both grown up obsessed with shows like Pretty Little Liars and Gossip Girl, so the pilot had everything that we looked for in a television show—i.e., sexy teens and murder. With the help of some liquid courage and the microphone Ryan had recently purchased for his audition self-tapes, as well as the deep belief that there were others out there in the world who would have an interest in hearing what we had to say about this show, we went home that afternoon and pressed record, and Riverdish was born. Narcissism knows no bounds after multiple mimosa pitchers.

To be completely candid, when we recorded our first episode, Ryan had no idea that Riverdale was even based off a comic book series. Sam, being the good Jewish girl from Long Island that she is, had a vague recollection of the comic books from her summers spent at sleep-away camp. But neither of us would have considered ourselves massive Archie fans. How quickly that would change!

Before we knew it, this television show had consumed our lives. Our text conversations began to read like Law & Order scripts, as we desperately tried to parse out who murdered Jason Blossom. Every night, we would fall down rabbit holes, scouring the dark corners of the internet, reading every fan theory ever written about the show. We followed the cast on all their social media channels, hungry for any and all content concerning Riverdale. Thankfully for the sliver of our sanity that remains, it turned out that we were far from alone.

After its premiere, Riverdale very quickly became the leading network show among viewers ages eighteen to forty-nine. While the first season had a steady following, the network saw impressive spikes when the show’s viewership grew more than 30 percent after launching on Netflix. When season two premiered, the demo rating and viewers more than doubled from the viewers who had watched the season one finale. More than 2.3 million viewers tuned in to the season two premiere alone!

Just as they had been for generations before us, the characters of Archie Andrews, Betty Cooper, Jughead Jones, and Veronica Lodge were once again at the forefront of popular culture. For Ryan, it is one of the few shows besides CBS Sunday Morning that he can actually talk about with his grandmother!

Yes, he is a devoted Sunday Morning fan.

Understandably, he does lose her slightly when he starts to discuss the serial killers and drug problems plaguing our favorite teens. Through Riverdale, our generation has been reintroduced to these iconic characters in a way in which they have never been portrayed before.

Now, as much as we adore this show, one thing that has always struck us about Riverdale is how incompetent the town law enforcement seems to be. No disrespect to Tom Keller, of course. We mean . . . have you seen his body? He could lock us up and we would thank him. But there is something so irresponsible about leaving the task of solving multiple homicides in the hands of teenagers who should be focused on school. Having traded so many theories back and forth about who is guilty of what, we have taken it upon ourselves to piece together the unofficial but essential crime files of Riverdale.

We suppose you could say that we were inspired by the detective skills of Jughead and Betty. Or maybe we were just jealous that they were living out the Scooby-Doo meets True Detective fantasy that we have always dreamed of. Perhaps this explains our obsession with escape rooms!

One time we were in an escape room that actually caught on fire! Being two theatrical people, we naturally assumed that the smoke pouring in from the outside door was all part of the room and were very impressed by the production values. By the grace of Nana Rose, we managed to escape just in time for the room supervisor to realize that we should escape the building. And that, our friends, is how you almost lost your Riverdish hosts.

If there is one thing that the history of Riverdale has shown us, it is that no one is innocent and that behind even the friendliest faces lie sinister aspirations.

Along with character profiles, we also have genuine photos from the scenes of some of Riverdale’s most heinous crimes. Oh no, we are not just wannabe detectives trying to piece together these crimes while sitting at home! Our task of uncovering the truth behind the seedy underbelly of this town inspired us to pack up our suitcases and take a trip to the one and only Riverdale.

We can only hope that this information will inform and inspire fellow Riverdale detectives everywhere. Who knows? Maybe just like Betty Cooper, you too will receive an ominous call from a serial killer and the answers to his dark riddles will lie within these very pages. We mean, we certainly hope this does not happen to you, but one can never be too prepared!

One thing is for certain: no one in this town is completely innocent. Though the severity of their crimes may vary (not everyone is guilty of killing their own son), even the smallest offenses in this town deserve to be punished.

Shout-out to Betty Cooper’s Serpent Dance.

Not to turn all Black Hood here, but he was not wrong when he called out all the residents in Riverdale as sinners. While we would never mess up our hair by donning a hood, we can continue to carry out his mission by keeping these hellions in check. Typically we like to operate under the assumption that people are innocent until proven guilty. In the case of Riverdale, however, experience has taught us time and time again that just the opposite seems to be true. And while it is not certain what lies in store for these characters, we do hope that these files will provide a blueprint for your own future sleuthing. Best of luck, and be careful around the Jingle Jangle.

Archie Andrews suffers from what we like to call pretty-boy syndrome. There is an old proverb that goes, If you give a young teen abs, he will lose his brain. Okay, so maybe we made that up, but it still rings true. After working at his father’s construction company over the summer before his sophomore year, Archie magically got ripped. Now, if those are the fitness results that you get from carrying wood and using a hammer, throw us a hard hat and put us to work! We have given half of our life savings to SoulCycle, and all we have to show for it is a graveyard of Smartwater bottles that we keep meaning to recycle.

Ultimately, Archie’s main problem is that he is crippled by his own hero complex. Like so many other straight white men, he feels as though he is the solution to the world’s problems. Let’s call it like it is: he finds true satisfaction only when he is the hero of a situation. Take, for example, his stepping in at the Leopold and Loeb Juvenile Detention Center to save Joaquin from getting beaten to a pulp in the Pit. The warden realized that all you need to do to get Archie to do something is to let him feel as though he is saving the day.

The Leopold and Loeb Juvenile Detention Center is named after two infamous murderers, Nathan Leopold Jr. and Richard Loeb. Collectively known as Leopold and Loeb, the two young men were wealthy students at the University of Chicago who kidnapped and murdered a young boy in 1924 in an effort to commit what they perceived to be the perfect crime. Appropriately enough, Leopold and Loeb were also featured players in showrunner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa’s play Golden Age, which was his first foray into the Archie universe. It somehow all makes perfect sense that the man who thought of putting a sexually confused Archie alongside Leopold and Loeb in a play would be the mind that would later go on to create Riverdale.

Archie’s situation is not helped by the fact that the female attention he receives is so unyielding. When the series first begins, he and Betty Cooper are sitting at Pop’s Chock’lit Shoppe, with Betty trying to convey her feelings for him. Ever since playing together in the preschool sandbox, Archie Andrews and Betty Cooper have been the best of friends. Though the two of them would never admit it,