Later this year, the world of Riverdale is expected to grow even further, with an adaptation of Chilling Adventures of Sabrina set to debut on Netflix. But it sounds like one of the flagship series’ stars might not be appearing on it anytime soon.
Videos by ComicBook.com
In a recent interview with Vulture, Riverdale‘s Lili Reinhart was asked about the possibility of her character, Betty Cooper, appearing on Sabrina. But as Reinhart put it, she understands the new series to be its own separate entity, meaning that crossovers might not be happening anytime soon.
“I think Betty’s solely in the Riverdale world and it doesn’t make sense for a crossover.” Reinhart revealed. “That’s why the decision was ultimately made to move to Netflix — to make these Riverdale and Sabrina shows completely separate universes. I don’t really know what Roberto’s plan is for Sabrina or what aspect of the supernatural or magic will be used. I know that doesn’t exist in Riverdale. At least right now. So it wouldn’t make sense for those two worlds to collide.”
In a way, this sort of lines up with a recent comment from The CW president Mark Pedowitz, who reportedly said that Riverdale and Sabrina are not expected to cross over any time soon. But in a way, an argument can be made for the two shows crossing over in some capacity, especially what Riverdale‘s initial plans were for the teenage witch.
“The truth is, we did talk a lot about introducing Sabrina, but she’s such an important character and it’s such a big idea to introduce the supernatural into a natural world that honestly when we got to the finale — it was before that, it was maybe a couple of months before that — we kind of realized that there was so much stuff to play that if we introduced Sabrina, it would kind of overshadow everything that we had planned.” Riverdale and Sabrina showrunner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa told ComicBook.com last year.
“The show kind of has hints of the supernatural throughout it; there are visions of Jason as a ghost, as a zombie.” Aguirre-Sacasa continued. “Archie sees werewolves. There’s a lot of talk about angry, pagan gods and there’s a voodoo doll. We are going to continue exploring the idea of the supernatural being on the fringes of Riverdale, and that might be to lead up to Sabrina’s arrival or that might just be to make it more like Twin Peaks and the way they dealt with the supernatural.”
So, while there’s certainly a chance that Sabrina and Riverdale could eventually cross over, it sounds like Betty Cooper might not be the first choice for that. And according to Reinhart, there’s a pretty good reason narrative reason for that as well.
“So, I’d say don’t expect Betty to be in that world.” Reinhart added. “And that’s totally okay, because she’s got her own sh*t going on in Riverdale.”
Riverdale airs Wednesdays at 8/7c on The CW. Sabrina will premiere on Netflix sometime in 2018.
