Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13
Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | Chapter 18 | Chapter 19 | Chapter 20 | Chapter 21 | Chapter 22 | Chapter 23 | Chapter 24 | Chapter 25 | Chapter 26 | Chapter 27 | Chapter 28 | Chapter 29 | Chapter 30 | Chapter 31 | Chapter 32 | Chapter 33 | Chapter 34 | Chapter 35
Chapter 36 | Chapter 37 | Chapter 38 | Chapter 39 | Chapter 40 | Chapter 41 | Chapter 42 | Chapter 43 | Chapter 44 | Chapter 45 | Chapter 46 | Chapter 47 | Chapter 48 | Chapter 49 | Chapter 50 | Chapter 51 | Chapter 52 | Chapter 53 | Chapter 54 | Chapter 55 | Chapter 56 | Chapter 57
Chapter 58 | Chapter 59 | Chapter 60 | Chapter 61 | Chapter 62 | Chapter 63 | Chapter 64 | Chapter 65 | Chapter 66 | Chapter 67 | Chapter 68 | Chapter 69 | Chapter 70 | Chapter 71 | Chapter 72 | Chapter 73 | Chapter 74 | Chapter 75 | Chapter 76
Chapter 77 | Chapter 78 | Chapter 79 | Chapter 80 | Chapter 81 | Chapter 82 | Chapter 83 | Chapter 84 | Chapter 85 | Chapter 86 | Chapter 87 | Chapter 88 | Chapter 89 | Chapter 90 | Chapter 91 | Chapter 92 | Chapter 93 | Chapter 94 | Chapter 95
Chapter 96 | Chapter 97 | Chapter 98 | Chapter 99 | Chapter 100 | Chapter 101 | Chapter 102 | Chapter 103 | Chapter 104 | Chapter 105 | Chapter 106 | Chapter 107 | Chapter 108 | Chapter 109 | Chapter 110 | Chapter 111 | Chapter 112 | Chapter 113 | Chapter 114 | Chapter 115 | Chapter 116 | Chapter 117
Its Jughead's birthday, a day that the morose teen tries to ignore completely. But since its his first birthday with a girlfriend, Betty isn't going to let him just treat it as an ordinary day, and plans a small, warm party. Meanwhile, Archie's dad is out of town to finalize his divorce.
But, coming off the heels of last episode, Cheryl decides to ruin the party by inviting herself, Chuck, and about half the student body of the highschool.
What follows is classic, if not typical, highschool party with no parents (besides FP, who is there for Jughead but also to talk to Joaquin)—lots of drinking, shirtless boys, impulsive makeouts, and more. Archie gets drunk ahead of time due to his parent's divorce, and he and Veronica have a brief moment about their shared parental problems (Veronica having been caught up once again in her father's legal troubles), comforting each other.
During the party, Jughead lashes out at Betty, revealing his own insecurities with their relationship and confronting Betty with her feelings for Archie. She leaves in a huff, and Jughead tries to leave his own party, only to be stopped by Chuck and Cheryl, who decide to have an airing of secrets to publicly shame the gang. It is soon revealed that Hiram Lodge bought the drive-in, and Archie slept with faux-Grundy, along with Veronica calling out Cheryl's relationship with Jason and positing that she might have slept with and then murdered him (prompting a small tear from Cheryl, but not a denial). Chuck then details "Dark Betty's" actions when she forced him to recant his lies about Veronica, and he mocks Jughead for not knowing about this. Jughead punches him in the face, and gets decked in return. FP breaks up the fight and declares the party is over.
FP then convinces Jughead not to run away from Betty, urging him to work for happiness. FP then runs into Alice Cooper, who wonders why a Southsider like him is in the neighborhood. FP reveals that she used to live there as well, and implies she might even have been affiliated with the Southside serpents before he leaves.
At Pop's Jughead and Betty reconcile, with Betty admitting there's something wrong inside her, showing Jug her injured hands-from driving her fingernails into her palms as she did before with Cheryl. They kiss and make up. Archie, alone and drunk, is comforted by Veronica, and they spend the night together. Veronica leaves a sleeping Archie in the morning, witnessed by Jughead, who promises not to say anything to anyone. Ever.
Veronica meets with Betty and tells her that Veronica's father may have been involved in Jason's death because he hired FP to trash the drive-in so he could buy it. Later, Archie's father returns-with his mother.
Tropes
- Berserk Button: A downplayed example when Betty mentions that she hates the word "perfect", no doubt due to her mother's insistence on her acting a certain way.
- Big Eater: The morning after the party, when Archie gets up and heads downstairs to make eggs for breakfast, he finds Jughead munching on his entire birthday cake with a fork.
- Birthday Hater: Jughead is revealed to be one this episode.
- Dance-Off: Veronica challenges Cheryl to a dance-off for the role of captain of the cheer leading squad. The ensuing contest has nothing to do with cheer leading. The two girls flip their hair, shake their hips, and draw as much attention to their chests and posteriors as possible instead of displaying the kinds of skills a cheer captain would need to possess.
- Evil Is Petty: Cheryl is perfectly happy to ruin Jughead's birthday party (not that the party was going well even before she showed up, but she doesn't know that), trash Archie's house with a Wild Teen Party (Archie being one of the few people who is genuinely nice to her and she usually actually seems to give a damn about) and team up with Chuck, a misogynistic Jerkass that she herself helped bring down. Why? Because Veronica beat her in a Dance-Off.
- Fanservice: Veronica and Cheryl's dance off is this. It's also been so popular that it has its own official clip given to the public.
- Internal Reveal: A lot of secrets the audience knows about already are revealed to the characters, from Archie and Grundy to Betty interrogating Chuck.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Downplayed, but Jughead looks visibly regretful after his tirade against Betty. It's his last remark about Archie that stops him short.
- Papa Wolf: The moment the fight breaks out between Jughead and Chuck, FP steps in and grabs Chuck and forcibly drags him from the house, bluntly telling him to get lost.
- "Reason You Suck" Speech: Given to Ginger and Tina after the dance-off.Cheryl: You catatonic bimbos didn't even vote. So you stuttering sap-heads are too dim to exercise your own rights and you’ve got the combined vocabulary of a baked potato. Consider this your last practice as River Vixens and your last week as my social handmaidens. You’re fired, on all fronts. That’s all. Shoo, bitches.
- Shout-Out:
- Jughead compares the raging party to a Seth Rogen movie.
- Cheryl refers to Archie and Grundy as "pulling a Mary Kay Letourneau."
- Twincest: Veronica accuses Cheryl having sexual feelings for Jason right in front of everybody at the party.Veronica: I can think of someone with a very dirty secret. Specifically, Cheryl killing her very own brother.
Cheryl: Everyone knows how much I loved my brother.
Veronica: Exactly. But did you love him maybe in ways that a sister shouldn't love a brother? And as you got older, Jason started to think it was strange... unnatural. So he chose Polly over you. So you shot him between the eyes with one of your father's many hunting rifles.
Kevin: This is riveting, I can't breathe.
[Cheryl steps back, and wipes away a tear] - Villain Team-Up: Cheryl and Chuck ally to get Revenge on Veronica and Betty, respectively.
- Wham Line: Twice.
- From Hiram's lawyer to Veronica: "Is your mother as innocent as you think she is?"
- From Mr. Jones to Mrs. Cooper: "Southside Serpents don't shed their skin so easily."
- Wham Shot:
- Early in the episode, we see Cheryl talking to someone, making plans to crash Jughead's party. It's Chuck.
- The episode ends with Fred coming home to Archie—and Archie's mother is at his side.
- What Could Possibly Go Wrong?: Archie and Betty don't seem to consider that a party could get out of hand.
