Because I was shocked when he wasn't Jason Blossom's killer. He had a blood feud with the Blossoms in which:
- He threw around language like saying he'd die before he'd let a Blossom take his daughter.
- He punished his daughter for transgressing against him by sending her to the Sisters of Quiet Mercy and then lied to Betty's face about it for years. He also tried to force her to abort her child.
- He actively broke into Sheriff Keller's office to steal evidence.
- He tried to cow Alice into submission over Polly's daughter by screaming in her face about his blood feud.
- He spitefully fired Alice from the Register when she tried to publish a story against his own blood nemeses because she'd made him leave the house, demonstrating that even vengeance against his sworn enemies isn't as important as his wife and daughter's subservience to him.
Now, by the end of season one, we're told that he had reasons for what he did. Specifically, Polly's child was an incest-baby and he wanted to conceal that. Which is fine enough to explain why he made the choices he did, but it does not excuse his manner of going about it.
In Hal's actions, he demonstrated that he is a domineering and abusive person. He demands absolute control over his household and punishes disobedience. He has zero regard for the law and for basic decency; he considers himself the only authority and he reacts with swift retribution when undermined. The only thing he resents more than his sworn enemies, the Blossoms, is being questioned by the women in his home; in his mind, Hal Cooper doesn't need to explain himself to anyone.
Now, Alice has her own shittiness too, I should note. But her being shitty doesn't excuse Hal's shittiness. Betty's home life is awful. But between the two, Alice struck me as "LOL, it's cute that you try to have opinions," shitty while Hal struck me as "9/11, my dad is beating a man with a crowbar," shitty.
It was genuinely shocking to me that he hadn't abducted Jason, tortured him out of spite, and then murdered him for blood vengeance over Polly. He seemed like exactly that kind of person to me. He's an amoral, self-righteous, "traditional" misogynist who treats his daughters as property and would do anything to hurt the people he hates, with whom he reacts with equal parts contempt and disgust. He was my prime suspect.
So when the Black Hood started trying to groom Betty to follow in his footsteps, that was the only clue I needed to click it together and go, "Yep. That's him. Fits the profile perfectly."
Edited by TobiasDrake on Nov 16th 2018 at 7:50:36 AM
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.I think the reason all this went over my head was because unlike most examples of an abusive father and husband, Hal isn’t portrayed as being pretty much able to run the house. Alice and Betty repeatedly defy him to his face, Alice kicks him out and of course there’s the scene of her laughing at the idea of Hal killing anyone (talk about Harsher in Hindsight).
Alice’s shittiness stick out more for me because it seemed she was more able to get her way.
Edited by windleopard on Nov 16th 2018 at 7:06:32 AM
The show definitely used Alice's shittiness to deflect from Hal's. They liked to play coy with just how awful he is.
With the Blossoms, they were like, "Hal's terrible, Hal's terrible... oh, but it's okay because he's against awful people!'
And then season two came along and there was Chic. And it was like, "Hal's terrible, Hal's terrible... oh, but it's okay because he's against an awful person!"
And then we got the Black Hood, and suddenly "He's terrible but it's okay because he's against awful people" was exposed as effectively being his murderous M.O.
Hal is a great example of a point I like to make in morality debates: being against something that is bad does not make you good. You have to be for things that are good to be good. In the longstanding feud between Coopers and Blossoms, there doesn't actually have to be a "right" side. They can very easily just both be shitheads.
Edited by TobiasDrake on Nov 16th 2018 at 8:43:08 AM
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.Josie and the Pussycats' rival Alexandria Cabot is a witch, though I don't know enough about the show to know if she's in it or not.
The Protomen enhanced my life.After Jughead's G&G quest that he wrote up himself accurately reflected current events transpiring alongside the session, it'd be pretty hard not to.
This Red Paladin shit is significantly more contrived if the show tries to assert that there's nothing supernatural going on.
Edited by TobiasDrake on Nov 18th 2018 at 9:20:56 AM
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.Yes. In fact, Sabrina began her character life in Archie. Sabrina the Teenage Witch is a spinoff.
Greendale, the setting for Sabrina, is right across the titular river of Riverdale. It's appeared in the show already; Greendale is where Ms. Grundy went after leaving Riverdale in season 1, and where she was murdered in season 2.
Edited by TobiasDrake on Nov 18th 2018 at 10:50:28 AM
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.She puts her foot down, in other words.
Hermione is sick and tired of all this "criminal underworld" nonsense tearing her family apart.
Especially I imagine when you have a baby-sacrificing cult and a messed up, sacrifice ritual happy game in town. And I am convinced, 100% convinced, that the cult and the game are related. The cult founder's daughter was involved in it, and in the recent preview the Gargoyle King is described as having disciples.
Let alone the talk of sacrifice. What did we first see Alice and Polly's little friends doing? Yeah. Weird child sacrifice-esque stuff and vague mysticism.
So glad Betty is basically going "Okay, fuck this esoteric nonsense. No more secrets. All of you come clean. NOW."
Edited by NickTheSwing on Nov 23rd 2018 at 9:42:27 AM
...I just realized what the people saying we may have seen the King before might've been saying.
There was an interview saying we may have seen the Gargoyle King before.
Recall the episode where Jughead and Archie deliver a box to Greendale. The box was...moving.
I think that might've been the Gargoyle King.
Because the Lodges are the law in Riverdale.
You don't need witnesses to try a person for a criminal offense; you need them in the courtroom for evidential purposes, but not to actually start a trial. To try an accused suspect, you just need a prosecutor willing to press charges. Since the Lodges hold the mayorship and sheriff's office, that wouldn't be too hard to come by.
Technically, I could arrest you and try you for any offense under the sun. I just wouldn't be able to prove any of them without substantial evidence. Due to the Double Jeopardy law, this typically discourages prosecutors from initiating frivolous trials without sufficient proof; had Archie been declared not guilty of the charge, the Lodges would never be able to have him tried again for it.
But the rules and standards get kinda wonky when corruption takes hold of the system.
Edited by TobiasDrake on Nov 27th 2018 at 4:32:04 AM
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I actually thought Hal was the Black Hood pretty much from the start of season two. Well, to be fair, it was a continuation of my suspicions from season one, where I was convinced he was Jason's murderer.
Hal always struck me as a dangerous, self-righteous, potentially violent lunatic. Pretty much the moment the Black Hood called Betty for the first time, I was like, "Yup, it's Hal."
With regards to the Gargoyle King, I think they're going to have a hard time explaining him away as a non-supernatural entity after this episode. Jughead's game - the scenario of which he is noted to have come up with himself, mind you - so blatantly reflected the actual events transpiring around "the Red Paladin's" escape that it'd be a stretch to say it isn't magical.
I am all set for the Gargoyle King to be legit supernatural, because any other explanation is going to be unsatisfactory.
Edited by TobiasDrake on Nov 15th 2018 at 10:13:32 AM
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