Riverdale is a town with a past, and it sounds like season 3 could explore even more of that past, at least according to producer Sarah Schechter.
“Nobody in Riverdale ever dies,” producer Sarah Schechter said during a roundtable interview at San Diego Comic-Con, where FanSided’s Cody Schultz had the chance to ask her and Archie Comics’ co-CEO Jon Goldwater some questions about season 3 of The CW drama.
Yes, that seems to mean even the past of the town. “This year, the mystery is very much about sort of the DNA and history of Riverdale. It’s another mystery, because we need something for Betty and Jughead to do!” Schecter said.
Well, that’s not inaccurate. Betty and Jughead are back on after spending most of season 2 apart, or at least it seemed that way. But between the two of them, they’ve handled quite the set of cases.
What intrigues us is the idea that the mystery might hit close to home. Jughead’s dad and Betty’s mom have a deeper connection than first believed, since Alice confesses at the end of season 2 that she had F.P.’s baby way back when. The adults on Riverdale have always played a significant part in the current-day goings-on, and perhaps it’s finally time to shed more light on what went on.
Speaking of the parents, though, Schechter also noted that the “kids are in junior year, finally,” then elaborated on what that means for the show. “In American schools,” she said, “that’s when you really start thinking about your future.” It’s also when parents and kids see their relationships change a bit, she added, and for a show that’s never shied away from having the parents play a part, that could get particularly tense and dramatic.
But even in terms of relationships, what will happen between Archie and Veronica, Betty and Jughead, or even Toni and Cheryl? None of them have exactly the same interests or socioeconomic statuses. If they want to go to school together, what’s that going to do to their relationships?
(The answer, of course, is that if Riverdale is going to make it to the kids in college, they will all magically end up at the same college.)
Either way, it seems like the show has things pretty well planned out — although Schechter and Goldwater did go back and forth on the episode count, explaining that there was quite a bit of debate. Ultimately, though, she settled on 22, not 23, but that’s still plenty of Riverdale to love.