The Blossoms invite nearly everyone in Riverdale to Jason’s funeral in hopes of narrowing their suspects in his death while Betty also continues her investigation into what really happened, learning a few things about her own family along the way. Meanwhile, Archie tries to get serious about his music in "Heart Of Darkness."

Betty is a regular Nancy Drew

Betty gets herself a date with someone who (surprise!) isn’t Archie. It’s not a date though (just like her last one), as Betty reassures her friends, since she’s hoping to pump Jason Blossom’s old friend for information that the police don’t have.

What she finds out is that just after Jason started dating her sister Polly, he changed. He cut off his old friends, started selling his belongings, and rumor has it he was even dealing drugs. It sounds like Jason needed some quick cash. That’s not all Betty finds out though.

She also turns to her father for information since her mother won’t ever talk about Polly without reminding Betty not to be like her sister. News to Betty is just why her parents sent Polly away: after a fight with Jason, Polly attempted suicide and they wanted to make sure she got help. (Though with the way we’re reminded that “Jason made her sick” and that she’ll be able to come home when “she’s not sick anymore,” it sounds like Polly just might be pregnant.) This puts her mother’s freakouts about Betty being off her meds or Betty having bad influences around her in a new perspective.

It’s not about Polly being a bad kid; it’s about being afraid she might lose both her daughters.

In a case of right-place, right-time, Betty also gets mistaken for her sister while she and Jughead are searching Jason’s room, and told that Jason and Polly are engaged. To top it off, she also found out that a Blossom once murdered a Cooper and that’s why their families don’t get along.

It’s a lot of information where the Coopers and Blossoms are concerned, but both families seem to fly off the handle relatively quickly at the mere mention of one another.

The icing on the cake? Betty and Jughead both realize that Betty’s parents could be lying about more than just the relationship between Jason and Polly. Betty’s father also had opportunity to steal the evidence from the sheriff that went missing last week.

Could one of the Coopers have killed Jason?

Veronica and Cheryl bond

Cheryl, who doesn’t want to be alone the night before she buries her brother, invites Veronica for a sleepover. As it turns out though, Veronica is the only one she invited since Veronica was the only one to help her when she had a panic attack at the pep rally. It’s Veronica who tells Cheryl that she’s allowed to say goodbye to her brother and that if she needs to do it in front of a crowd to settle the rumors, she should.

These two are used to being the queen bees, but they appear to have reached a middle ground of sorts and understand one another a little better. It’s nice to see that, yet again, the women on this show make more strides toward friendship than you usually see on teen television.

If only the show gave as much layers to Josie and the Pussycats. Valerie is the only Pussycat to put in an appearance this week, and while she’s self assured and smart, just like Josie, she doesn’t get to do much (again), other than help Archie with his music.

The Lodge family has a few more secrets

We all know that Hermione is still doing a few things for her incarcerated husband, but it looks like that might come back to bite her. In fact, it almost literally does as a box with a snake is left at Pop’s while she’s cleaning up. Turns out Hiram owes the Serpents quite a bit of money. How much? We don’t know. He’s also got bad blood with the Blossoms, so it’s no wonder she trusts no one in Riverdale.

The verdict and what’s next

This episode worked best when it minimized Archie’s involvement in the story and focused on Jason’s murder, which might not be the best for the show moving forward, but it’s working for now.

3 out of 5 stars.