Riverdale Meets ‘Sweet/Vicious:’ Girls Revenge Against Slut Shaming

This weeks episode of Riverdale “Body Double” combats against slut shaming but also reveals that most secrets can’t be hidden forever.

I definitely don’t want to compare Riverdale to any other show, because I think it easily stands alone as an excellent new show on The CW. It’s dark and twisted, but light and funny at times. It has characters that are relatable and realistic, but they also have this dreamy aspect to them. It’s a show that has potential to be on air for multiple seasons, and there’s one specific reason I’m saying that after this last episode “Body Double.”

A quick rundown of what happened last night on Riverdale:

Veronica goes on a date with one of the football players. They make out a little in his car before they go their separate ways and call it a night. The next morning at school, a rumor is being spread around that Veronica went a lot farther with him than she actually did. Betty finds a group of girls who have also experienced this from the football team and one of them, Ethyl, says that there’s a “playbook” they keep that documents their “plays” with the girls of Riverdale High. Polly (Betty’s sister) is listed in their next to Jason’s name, and that clearly strikes a nerve with Betty. But shockingly, it also upsets Cheryl to see this. Betty, Veronica, and Cheryl, along with the group of other girls this happened to, team up to take down the football team and the games they’ve all been keeping score of.

Now that we’ve caught up on what happened last night, let me rewind a little to talk about Sweet/Vicious, a new show that just ended its first season on MTV. It’s a show about two female vigilantes who are combatting sexual assault on campus, covering an issue critical to our society right now. It’s similar to Riverdale in the sense that two girls from very different backgrounds join together to fight back against an enemy. Sound familiar?

Jules and Ophelia are very much like Betty and Veronica. They’re total opposites but they find a deep friendship between each other, and both teams of ladies are taking down some bad dudes. Jules and Ophelia taking down campus rapists, while Betty and Veronica (and Cheryl) are crushing the misogyny that’s circulating around Riverdale.

It’s no surprise that a teenage angsty show like Riverdale is following the tropes we all know and love, but it is a surprise that they’re tackling it the way that they are. They’re not letting the girls play victim. The show is letting the girls fight back. I mean, Betty almost burned one of the guys alive in the episode, and she had a killer new look to go with it. I feel like we’re about to see a new part of Betty come alive in the next few episodes. She’s finally taking charge of one aspect in her life, and she clearly still feels responsible for something that happened with Polly. We have yet to figure out the whole story with that but I’m sure it’ll play a critical role in where this series goes.

Riverdale — “Chapter Three: Body Double” — Image Number: RVD103b_0086.jpg — Pictured (L-R): Madelaine Petsch as Cheryl Blossom and Lili Reinhart as Betty Cooper — Photo: Diyah Pera/The CW — Ã‚Â© 2017 The CW Network. All Rights Reserved

As much as I feel like this whole “empowering girls” and “taking our ‘campus’ back” is big, I think the bond that is forming between the three leading ladies in this show is even bigger- a force to be reckoned with. They’re all realizing things aren’t exactly as they seem, that what’s on the surface is never what’s lying underneath. And that’s what the entire essence of this show is- isn’t it?

The town of Riverdale is hiding something. Every character is hiding something. Everyone has a “playbook” that they’re keeping, and it’s all just waiting to be found.

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Riverdale airs on Thursdays at 9/8c on The CW.

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