Riverdale Queer Watch season 5 episode 2: The gay Dexter of Riverdale

Welcome to Riverdale Queer Watch, where we look out for Riverdale’s LGBTQ+ folks each week. Whether it’s a snuff film or prom night, we’re watching.

As Riverdale continues to hurdle through its unresolved season four plot lines, this week’s episode focused on closing the case of the voyeur tapes, while adding in a few random Preppy murders along the way. Because this is Riverdale after all.

After receiving an especially unsettling voyeur tape that “came from inside the house,” Betty and Jughead conclude that only one person could have access to the knowledge needed to make the tapes: Charles.

After finding the bug he planted in the Cooper-Jones’ phone, Betty and Jughead get him to confess, and the whole thing is a sad denouement.

Charles is the gay Dexter of Riverdale

For fans who have been consistently watching, we learned at some point in season four — when Charles was introduced — that he was in a relationship with Chic, the first person who pretended to be Alice’s son.

While Charles actually is Alice’s son, Riverdale never again explored Charles and Chic’s relationship other than to remind us in occasional recaps that we had seen that moment. Instead, the show spent a year making us like and trust Charles just to pull the rug out from under us at the last moment.

Riverdale seemed to want to pull a Dexter by having Charles be an “ethical” serial killer. In the span of one episode, we learn he had Chic kill Bret (for some reason only after he had already gotten into prison), killed Jane and David, and tried to kill Donna, all because they were “degenerates.”

This felt like a lazy repeat of the Black Hood storyline, except lacking any stakes or emotion. Because these episodes have been so hurried, we should have at least been given a beat for Charles to tell Betty he was killing for her, since most of his victims were connected to her and Jughead.

Instead Riverdale once again gives us a half-baked introduction of a queer character (remember when he and Kevin flirted?) only to reveal them as evil and ship them off with no resolution.

We all knew there would have to be a climactic conflict with Charles at some point once we saw him with Chic. It’s simply disappointing that Riverdale thought he didn’t deserve more.

What did you think about the big reveals in Riverdale‘s latest episode? Let us know in the comments below!