The “Riverdale” Season 3 Finale Finally Revealed Who Is Under the Gargoyle King Mask
Riverdale has officially closed the book on season three, and the finale episode, “Survive the Night,” had more than its fair share of shockers in store. The main surprise wasn’t what Betty, Veronica, and the rest of the crew wore to their prom — it was that the Gargoyle King was finally unmasked, and I can’t believe who it is!
Major spoilers for Riverdale are ahead.
Remember Betty’s “brother” Chic? We haven’t seen him since season two, and we thought he was dead. Well, like most things in Riverdale, things aren’t exactly what they seem. Chic, played by Hart Denton, is alive and well, and he’s the Gargoyle King. Yep, you read that right — Chic Cooper is the one behind the mask! And he’s not working alone, either; Penelope Blossom took him in and groomed him to look like her late son, Jason. The layers of creepiness never stop!
When you think about it, it does make sense for Penelope to have been involved in the Gargoyle King drama. In the flashback episode, we learned that it was young Penelope who brought the game Gryphons & Gargoyles to the town and the Midnight Club, and she revealed that she’d been adopted by the Blossom family as a future wife for Clifford. Basically, Penelope hates the town of Riverdale, and she decided to use Chic to wreak havoc on the town and its people.
Riverdale showrunner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa knew it made sense to make Penelope the real villain. “Penelope’s a master manipulator,” he told Variety. “She suffered two core wounds in her life: One was she was basically bought by the Blossom family to marry Clifford, and then she lost her son Jason. When we were talking about who would want to take such an epic revenge on our families, on our town, it really felt like Penelope.”
Throughout season three, both Gryphons & Gargoyles and the Gargoyle King terrorized the town; Riverdale High students became obsessed with the game, and there was even a fan theory that the show itself was a mirror to the game.
The Gargoyle King mystery wasn’t the only drama wrapped up in the finale; we discovered that Alice Cooper wasn’t actually enmeshed in The Farm, but investigating it alongside her real son, Charles, who works with the FBI. And the final scene, where Betty, Archie, and Veronica are covered in blood and burning clothes, including Jughead’s iconic beanie hat? Well, that’s certainly a foreboding vision for what’s to come in the next season of Riverdale. We can’t wait.
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