10 things nobody wants to admit about Riverdale

1. It will go down in history as a cult classic

Riverdale may have achieved unexpected levels of success early on in its run but the more out-there it become, the more its audience diminished. And that’s okay. It might not have been the larger-than-life juggernaut it once was, but it had a core, committed audience who loved these characters, the adventures they went on, and the absolute absurdity that the show threw at them each and every week.

Riverdale thrived on its absurdity. Sure, sometimes it would outsmart itself with its own storylines but nobody was doing it quite like Riverdale. It was in a league of its own when it came to ambitiousness, unafraid to try anything and always willing to give it everything. Between its eerily beautiful aesthetic to its outlandish storylines, it’s very much this generation’s Twin Peaks. Granted, the formulaic writing is clunkier and some stories just didn’t land, but the stranger Riverdale got, the less it was appreciated. Just like Twin Peaks.

The thing is that Twin Peaks has aged remarkably well. The show found a new life via home media releases, streaming, syndication and more, ensuring that new audiences saw it when it wasn’t expected to look or behave like anything else. And Riverdale is very much in a similar predicament. It’s a show that was unafraid to be weird, one that had its own niche audience that appreciated it for what it was trying to do. And as the years go by and more and more people watch its whole run, they will appreciate Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa’s vision. One that, for better or worse, he ensured came to fruition.

This show was one of a kind, and now that its run has ended, it will live forever as a seven-season trip into madness that is destined to become a cult classic. And when that day comes, we’ll smile knowing that this misunderstood wonder is finally getting the appreciation that it deserves.

What are some of your opinions on Riverdale? Did you watch the show during its initial run on The CW or were you one of the many viewers who watched along on Netflix?