Riverdale to Take an Extended Hiatus Later This Year

It’s been a little over a month since the long-awaited return of Riverdale, after the series was forced to go on a break for much of last year due to circumstances surrounding the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. While the show’s fifth season is currently in full swing, preparing to air its sixth episode this week, it sounds like the series will soon have another lengthy hiatus. On Wednesday, The CW announced its spring 2021 premiere schedule, providing an indication of when shows like Legends of Tomorrow, Kung Fu, and The Republic of Sarah. will make their debut. In the process, the network confirmed that Riverdale will be taking a pre-planned three-month hiatus later this year, from April 7th through July 7th of this year. Kung Fu will be taking over Riverdale‘s usual time slot in that stretch of time, followed by new episodes of Nancy Drew through June 2nd, and In the Dark beginning June 9th.

This news will probably be bittersweet to Riverdale fans, especially to those who don’t enjoy the idea of the series being off the air for three months. Given the series’ proclivity for cliffhangers and plot twists, it’s also safe to assume that this hiatus will leave fans with a lot of unanswered questions.

Riverdale is currently in the middle of an unprecedented new creative direction, after the series jumped forward seven years into the future earlier this month. The time jump has already made way for some significant new relationships and storylines — something that is sure to only continue in future episodes.

“On a practical level we really wanted to — I call them still the kids [Laughs] — but for the kids to be playing characters closer to their age,” Riverdale showrunner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa explained to Entertainment Tonight earlier this month. “And I think one of the hallmarks of Riverdale has been that it isn’t a procedural. Every episode is its own genre and it’s constantly reinventing itself and it felt like if we had stayed in high school, we might run the risk of playing the same beats and the same stories over and over again. So I think the idea was that it would sort of be a creative boost for the writers, a creative boost for the actors, and after four years of very gonzo, intricate, incestuous plotting, it was like, “Oh!” Well, we can just drop everyone into new storylines that feel organic to the characters, but allow us to feel like we can move a little more nimbly. Without the burden of, you know, Bughead dating or the burden of Archie still wrestling with the immediate death of his father. It felt like a way to freshen everything up and I feel like that was the big goal.”

What do you think of Riverdale taking an extended hiatus later this year? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!

Riverdale airs Wednesdays at 8/7c on The CW.