‘Riverdale’ Season Finale: Jughead ‘Spring Break’ Cliffhanger Leaves Social Media With Many Questions

Riverdale‘s cliffhanger-heavy Season 3 finale left multiple storylines up in the air to revisit in Season 4, but a potentially murderous time jump to Spring Break left fans fearing the worst for Jughead Jones.

The CW teen drama’s season finale finally uncovered the truth behind the dangerous Griffins & Gargoyles game going on around town, also taking time to reveal the identity of the mysterious Gargoyle King and leaving fans with more than one chilling cliffhanger.

The episode started soon after last week’s episode left off with Edgar Evernever (Chad Michael Murray) attempting to kill Betty (Lili Reinhart) to protect the secrets of his organ harvesting side job for his cult, The Farm.

After Betty gets free from the cult leader’s grasp, she, Veronica (Camila Mendes), Archie (KJ Apa), and Jughead (Cole Sprouse) receive an invitation to join the Black Hood and the Gargoyle King for the final showdown.

During a somber dinner scene, the show reveals Penelope Blossom (Nathalie Boltt) as the true mastermind behind the Griffin & Gargoyles murders and crime spree. During her monologue, Penelope reveals she joined forces with her lover Hal Cooper (Lochlyn Munro) and Chic Smith (Hart Denton), the true face behind the Gargoyle King, to wreak havoc on the town.

Penelope then challenges the foursome into a final test of surgical in the woods that tested each one of them. Meanwhile, Cheryl discovers a terrible secret while trying to warn her friends to escape The Farm, when she finds the dead body of her brother Jason in a wheelchair.

Upon her discovery, Edgar tells Alice (Madchen Amick) and Evelyn (Zoe De Grand Maison) that people discovering The Farm’s secrets has accelerated his plans and they must “ascend” that night.

In the woods, Archie is forced to fight one of the Gargoyle King’s henchmen, Veronica and Betty are forced to drink slow-acting poison, Jughead fights Chic and Betty is forced to choose between killing her father, Hal, or never get the antidote for the poison.

She manages to shoot him in the arm to incapacitate him, but when Penelope sees the friends broke the rules she shoots and kills Hal and seeks her gang on them.

Luckily, the four friends run into Cheryl (Madelaine Petsch), Toni (Vanessa Morgan), the Serpents and Poisons, who come to the rescue and attempt to seize Penelope.

After they overpower the gargoyles, the crew rushes to The Farm to save their friends and family but they find only Kevin (Casey Cott), surrounded by a pile of clothes. He claims all of the members of the group ascended and left him behind to tell the story of what happened.

After the chaos calms down, Betty and Jughead are tasked by the FBI, and the appearance of her real half brother, who is an FBI agent, with helping to find the missing Farm members. Veronica faces a twist of her own when her mother is arrested for her crimes after Hiram (Mark Consuelos) turned her in, as part of a new plan to bring down his daughter.

As the foursome meet for milkshakes at Pop’s and to reflect on what happened, they decide to move past the craziness and enjoy their upcoming senior year in peace.

The show then flashed forward to Spring Break, showing Veronica, Archie and Betty standing around a fire in their underwear and covered in blood. Betty holds Jughead’s signature beanie in her hand and says they must burn everything in order to cover their tracks. Once they graduate in a few weeks, they never have to speak to each other again.

After the bone-chilling glimpse into the future, the show returned to the sweet moment at Pop’s, and the group of friends cheering to their future.

What could possibly have happened? Is Jughead dead? Riverdale will return for Season 4 in fall 2019 on The CW.