Riverdale: Jughead and Ethel Question the Official Story in "After the Fall" Clip (Exclusive)

By Nicole Drum

It wouldn't be Riverdale without a murder mystery and even though Season 7 of the series finds the familiar characters in the wholesome 1950s, a murder mystery is exactly what Jughead and Ethel have on their hands. Earlier in the season, Ethel's parents were brutally murdered — and Ethel sent off to the Sisters of Quiet Mercy for the crime — and more recently, Jughead's mentor Brad Rayberry was found dead, seemingly of suicide. However, a connection between the two deaths — a mysterious milkman — was soon discovered, but while Ethel and Jughead are pretty sure there's something much bigger at play, Dr. Werthers and Principal Featherhead have different motives. The CW has given ComicBook.com an exclusive clip from this week's episode of Riverdale, "Chapter One Twenty-Nine: After the Fall" and in it you can see that the powers that be just aren't having any questions.

In the clip, Jughead and Ethel both point out some discrepancies in the official story about who the murderous milkman really was, but Dr. Werthers is quick to try to shut them down, fixated instead on blaming comic books for corrupting a "drifter" and making him homicidal. That Dr. Werthers and Principal Featherhead are both anti-comics isn't of much of a surprise as we've seen them both be that way this season to date. The episode will also see other tensions rise. You can check out the synopsis below.

THE AFTERMATH — Archie (KJ Apa) and Reggie (Charles Melton) lean on each other as they prepare for their big basketball game against Stonewall Prep.   Meanwhile, as they deal with ongoing issues with their parents, Betty (Lili Reinhart) and Veronica (Camila Mendes) decide to throw a slumber party with Kevin (Casey Cott) and Clay (guest star Karl Walcott).  Cole Sprouse, Madelaine Petsch, Madchen Amick and Drew Ray Tanner also star.  Julia Bettencourt directed the episode written by Gigi Swift.

Morality and Society Norms Have Been a Major Aspect of Season 7 of Riverdale.

The idea of morality and societal norms — particularly those in the 1950s — has been an interesting aspect of Riverdale thus far in Season 7 and while Principal Featherhead, along with the school's child psychologist, aren't necessarily villains per se, they are making things more complicated for the teen characters. According to series showrunner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, society itself is one of the "villains" of the season — and these characters symbolize it.

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"Usually, when we talk about the season, when we're planning the season, we usually have a big bad or a villain that all of the kids are at some point or other engaging with and fighting against. And in season six, it was Percival Pickens who was an intergalactic time-traveling sorcerer. But when we were talking about this season, we really felt like the villain or what they were fighting against society was the 1950s," he told ComicBook.com previously. "And that the conflict that all of our characters to some extent or other were caught up in was, how do we live honest, authentic lives that are individualistic and that allows us to be exactly who we want to be in a society that represses that and that demands conformity and that punishes anyone who falls outside of the carefully constructed mores of the 1950s, the institutions of the '50s celebrated, which is to say via traditional American family, traditional American gender roles, traditional ... a social order that has since been exploded and broken down and rebuilt time and time again since that time? So, it felt like the villain, if there was one, were the 1950s. And by the way, we have characters that symbolize that... but the big conflict was with society at large and them sort of bristling against that."

Riverdale airs Wednesdays at 9/8c on The CW. "Chapter One Twenty-Nine: After the Fall" airs June 21st.

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