Betty And Archie’s ‘Riverdale’ Series Finale Moment Proves Barchie Is Endgame, If You Want Them To Be

If you are a fan of The CW’s Riverdale, chances are you might be kicking your feet and screaming right now in some sort of fugue-style rage. That’s because — and spoilers past this point — the series ended in tonight’s “Goodbye, Riverdale” without any of the major, Core Four ships as endgame… Or did it?

No, it did. That’s how it ended. We did get the shocking news that Betty Cooper (Lili Reinhart), Jughead Jones (Cole Sprouse), Archie Andrews (KJ Apa), and Veronica Lodge (Camila Mendes) were in a polycule for all of Senior year — meaning they all dated and, you know… What’s the word… Fucked? But after that, they parted ways, and other than Archie who married a “sweet, strong girl,” it seems like Betty, Jughead, and Veronica were all perenially single for the rest of their lives.

But there is one moment that contradicts this open endgame, a scene that digs in on a core theme of Riverdale and points to the idea that the binary nature of what is ostensibly a teen show calling something endgame is not as simple as you might think. And that scene involves Betty and Archie, aka Barchie.

The moment in question takes place after Archie has straight up roasted all of his friends, Comedy Central style, calling out all the insane things that happened to them over the course of seven seasons while also lovingly paying tribute to their enduring friendship. Then it’s time to leave Thornhill — and maybe Riverdale, as well. That’s when Archie sidles up next to Betty, she says goodbye, to which he says the following:

“I know we’ll see each other again,” Archie says. “Maybe… We’ll even end up together. You know I’ve always felt it would be you and me at the end of the road. I mean, it started with us, didn’t it? A boy and a girl? Next door to each other?”

At this moment, you could probably hear the delighted squeals of Barchie ‘shippers everywhere. “Yes!” you could almost hear them scream, “this is what we’ve been saying all along.” Because of course Riverdale did start that way, for the most part, with Archie and Betty staring at each other across the gap between their houses. The first episode ended with Archie walking Betty home, the latter with a clear crush on him while the former was confused about his burgeoning feelings.

But it goes back even farther than that, because as the show unfolded we not only got to see that Betty and Archie have loved each other in various respects since they were children, but up until a climactic comet destroyed the town in the Season 6 finale (seriously), the two were ready to get married and have kids together.

So Archie’s speech here isn’t just him throwing out a few words in the finale, it’s arguably — particularly if you are a Barchie ‘shipper — the whole emotional arc of the show.

There are a few wrinkles here, though, and when we say “wrinkles” we mean “cracks so wide they make the Grand Canyon look small.” That’s because Betty isn’t really Betty in this scene; or at least not the 17-year-old Betty who appears physically here. In fact, Betty was never at Thornhill the night in question, she was home sick with the mumps. What we, the viewers are seeing is some sort of half-dream, half-wish fulfillment version of events that an angelic version of Jughead is showing to a now 86-year-old version of Betty as she sleeps on the ride back to Riverdale.

So not only is that not Betty, it’s also not Archie in that scene. Given the murky nature of the mythology on Riverdale it is possible that (bear with me here) this is some form of Archie in the afterlife, connecting with Betty once again. But without taking too far of a leap, this is in Betty’s head.

And in fact, despite sealing things with a truly epic goodbye kiss, Betty tells Archie his whole future. She explains that he makes it out to California as part of Eisenhower’s public works project. He meets a “sweet, strong girl, who makes you laugh.” He settles in Modesto, and has a beautiful family. He’s a professional construction worker, and an amateur writer. “And you are so, so content,” Betty says. “And happy. And when you die, you ask to be buried here, in Riverdale. Next to your father.”

That’s it for Betty and Archie, other than the end of the episode when Old Betty dies, and enters the great Pop’s Diner in the sky to reunite with her also dead friends, who have been waiting for her. Archie is there with a strawberry milkshake, her favorite; but that scene is more about the entire cast, not just Betty and Archie.

Here’s the thing: despite canonically ending up single (Betty) and married to some random strongwoman (Archie), there’s a pretty solid argument to be made that Barchie is endgame — if you want them to be.

What the finale does is have two trains that should be incongrous, yet somehow work in tandem, running at the same time. One is the fantasy element that Riverdale always lives in that plays with angels, and comic books, and insane murders, and everything we all love (and sometimes loathe) about the show. The other is a surprising turn into realism at the end, something that Season 7 of the series has been hinting at all along. This season has been not-so-sneakily digging into the idea of bringing these comic book characters from their 2-D origins all the way into three dimensions… Making them fully-rounded people, with all the hopes, and dreams, and flaws that implies.

So with that in mind, you usually don’t end up with your childhood sweetheart. You sometimes have a good life, instead of an exceptional life. The way things always happen on TV — hanging out with the same group of people forever, and getting married and having kids only in that group — isn’t how things always happen. In fact, they rarely do. You grow apart. You move to different places. You meet different people. That’s what happens in the “real” world version of the events of the Riverdale series finale.

But what the show is telling us is that in the show, emotionally, Betty and Archie are always connected, even as they grow apart and grow closer to other people. We get a goodbye scene for these two characters on the TV shows Riverdale, but as the closing narration from Jughead drives home… They’re still there. They’re still together. Whether it’s through rewatching episodes, or reading comics, or in some form of heaven, Barchie is forever.

To speculate wildly, there’s a version of this finale where that sweet, strong girl who makes Archie laugh is Betty. In previous seasons, showrunner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa has said that he always thought Riverdale would end with Archie becoming a father, bringing the idea that Archie himself started as a child raised by Fred Andrews (Luke Perry) to now having a son of his own full circle. The show has shifted and changed, and moved the central focus off Archie, particularly in this final season, to broaden it out over the entire cast. But it’s not too far a reach to imagine that some version of this scene, or the sense of this scene, existed at some point as the end of Riverdale; with Archie finally fully professing his devotion to Betty, them getting married, having a kid and settling down in the Town With Pep.

To be clear: that script does not exist to my knowledge. But by placing that scene where director/writer Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa does in the finale, it’s a clear indicator of the relationship’s importance to the show, and the characters’ importance to each other. So is Barchie endgame in the “real” world? No. But if you want to follow the emotional thread of the series, Barchie is endgame. If you want them to be.