A First Look At ‘Riverdale’ Season 5 Shows Archie’s Funeral, As If Things Couldn’t Get Any Worse

It's honestly a miracle Archie, Betty, Veronica, and Jughead have managed to survive four years in the murder-filled town of Riverdale, but it looks like their luck could run out in Season 5. Now that production has restarted on the upcoming season following months of delays due to the coronavirus pandemic, showrunner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa shared a few clues about what the new episodes have in store. One of the photos is particularly worrying, and has fans asking if Archie will die in Riverdale Season 5. The posts also seem to tease a big breakup, graduation, and what the Core Four's lives will look like after the time jump.

After Season 4 had to be cut short due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Riverdale cast returned to Canada at the end of August to begin work on Season 5. Aguirre-Sacasa shared that the cast had their first table reads for the first four episodes of Season 5 on Wednesday, Sept. 2 and Thursday, Sept. 3, and to get fans excited about what's next, he post the cover pages for the scripts to Twitter.

Fans already know what the first three episodes of Season 5 will be about, but the script covers do hint at one big change. Because the coronavirus pandemic forced Riverdale to shut down production on Season 4 three episodes before its intended finale, those final three episodes will now be the first three episodes in Season 5. The season premiere will be set at the gang's senior prom, and the following episode, titled "The Preppy Murders," sounds like it will do the heavy-lifting in solving Season 4's big videotape mystery. It looks like that episode may also contain a big breakup, as the comic strip on its cover references Archie breaking up with Veronica.

Everyone already knew Episode 3 — the intended Season 4 finale — would be all about high school graduation, so there's no surprises in its script cover. However, Episode 4 has been the big mystery among the fandom for months, and now Aguirre-Sacasa is finally dropping some details about it. The fourth episode was intended to be Season 5's premiere, and it will kick off with a massive time jump seven years into the future. Unfortunately, the future does not look so bright.

The script cover for Episode 4, titled "Purgatory," shows grown-up versions of Jughead, Betty, and Veronica mourning at a graveyard beneath a ghostly image of Archie.

The implication of the image is clear, but then again, Riverdale loves to do fake-outs about main characters dying all the time. The panel is from the recent Archie 1941 comic book, in which Archie was presumed dead in World War II but it was later revealed he had actually survived. Hopefully, this script cover is a similar fake-out, and fans can expect a lot more Archie in Season 5.

Riverdale Season 5 is slated to premiere on The CW at the beginning of 2021.