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The Walking Dead: What Lies Ahead
It seems like a very long time ago that we last saw this band of survivors, they finally made it to the Center of Disease Control in Atlanta. The depressed scientist, shatter proof glass, big ass clock counting down till lock down. So what did they do? Break the tension with a hand grenade, firey good-bye to the sad sack scientist and that one chick who never said, did, or mattered much and hit the road! Off to salvation at Fort Benning (where Shane said they should head in the first place.) Episode one of season two opens with Rick Grimes talking into his walkie-talkie, another one sided conversation with Morgan from season one. Luckily it acts as a nice recap of the last season for any viewers that are just hopping onto the Walking Dead, I found myself wondering if and when we’ll ever hear Morgan squawk back. That doesn’t last long since the opening credits start and we are well on our way into the first episode of season two.
“What Lies Ahead”
I’m flipping the spoiler switch on, so be warned.
The episodes starts exactly how it should, with exactly what you don’t want ahead of you when you are trying to survive after the zombie apocalypse, the mother of all traffic jams. If you’ve been paying any attention to the internet, you already have seen a good chunk of what happens. On route to Fort Benning, our survivors drive head-on into a total gridlock of abandoned vehicles. Now, as a viewer, we know whats coming. This is a death trap. That’s when the radiator hose on the Winnebago blows and we are literally two teenagers foolishly having sex away from the classic horror movie setup. Do not get me wrong, this scene is anything other than ordinary, the tension and character drama plays the whole way through and you find yourself inching towards the edge of your seat. From Shane starting to teach Andrea how to field strip her gun, to Rick and Lori reminiscing about the better times. You know whats coming, but it still shocks you when you see it.
Faced with an RV in need of repairs and a sea of cars, trucks and whatever else to loot, the gang starts to turn lemons into lemonade. Of course someone, Rick’s wife Lori, has to exclaim ”this is a graveyard”. Lady, North America if not the world is a graveyard, get your rig back running and get out of this death trap! I found myself talking to the screen a lot during this scene. Our rag tag band of survivors thinly disperse themselves among the derelict vehicles, just begging to be zombie food. Sure there is food, gas, water and more to be found. So is the gnashy teeth of a zombie. Those gnashy zombies come up quick too. Both Dale and Rick spot them as they slowly lurch towards the maze this grid lock has made, that my friends is a zombie feeding ground.
Let’s break this down. Everyone spreads out thin amidst a stumbling ground of dead vehicles, a herd of walkers comes up on them. We’re talking a big herd, maybe 50 to a hundred or so. They seek salvation and protection under the cars and trucks. Really? How is this protection?I don’t want to get all king nerd here, but were were shown previously that the zombies can track by scent. That’s why they had to do the whole zombie goo thing in the first season. Also, what the crap is with the Eisenstein zombie that can open and enter the RV? The rest seem to have a hard time navigating curbs. That being said, this whole act plays out rather perfectly. It’s gory, its panicky (the RV scene with Andrea and the zombie trying to break in to the washroom… tense, but I made my wife shoot beer out her nose when I said “ocupado” hey, these MST3k colors run deep.) We get the set up to this weeks episode. Sophia, the daughter of Carol and her abusive and now nicely dead husband is chased off into the woods by zombies.
Let me back up for a second. In the Winnebago, the pulse pounding scene with a bathroom locked Andrea and a very aggressive zombie, after she went Tim “the tool man” Taylor on his face with a screwdriver, she caught a zombie blood facial… that can’t be good, right? I am still trying to figure out the pathology of zombiism in The Walking Dead.
Back to little Sophia. So two walkers and Rick in hot pursuit, and Rick gets to her first, good. Now Rick hides her along the creek bed, and tells her “if I don’t make it back, head back to the highway”, left sun, shoulder, yadda yadda ya. The kid waits, what.., two minutes before she bolts? What the hell. The good news is, we get Rick Grimes going all “The Most Dangerous Game” on the two zombies and it’s boulder face time, baby!
For me, this is where the episode really picked up namely by making Daryl, the redneck hick, quickly my favorite character. I seriously hated the dude in season one, but now? He’s quickly becoming top of my list for who I want on my side when this shit goes down. He kills and guts a zombie, he tracks, he is a crossbow master! I am really starting to enjoy him. While we are on the topic of characters I hated last season, Shane is finally shining through as someone that shouldn’t die soon. He’s shedding off the ‘wannabe Rick’ he was in season one, I found myself hating him less. To jump a head a little, the chance of Shane and Andrea forging off on their own is very interesting to me.
So, with Sophia lost, the group decides to fragment more and search for her. A search that leads them to tent with a dead dude in a tent (if you are wondering, the buttons says “No Excuse For Domestic Violence”, my wore out pause button knew you’d want to know) and then to a small southern Baptist Church (of the undead.) I’ll be honest, at this point the show just seemed to be going through the paces for me. Yes we saw some clear character development for Shane and Andrea, not to mention Carol’s confessional that is just a heart breaker. Rick’s confessional, I assume the writers raison d’etre for this scene location, really seems they are trying to fast track a few things the comic took months/years to establish. He’s starting to crack.
The episode closes with a heart felt, beauty in all this chaos moment. Rick, Shane and, Carl come across at a young buck in the woods. As the majestic deer crosses through the foliage, the characters see that there is still good and beauty in the world.
Then an off screen gun shot goes through the deer and Carl.
In the credits, we see whats coming. Rick rushes the wounded Carl to a ranch of uninfected. Our survivors fracture more. Zombies, guns, motorcycles, more guns, more zombies! Helicopters, bloody skulls and drama. Oh yea, and Johnny Cash.
I am very happy you are back, Walking Dead. I look forward to what lies ahead.
Last week we were left clinging to a few plot threads. The daughter of Carol and her now zombie chow abusive husband, Sophia, had been lost alone in the woods. Carl, son of the de facto leader of this band of survivors and the shows main protagonist Rick Grimes and his wife Lori, had just had his guts ventilated it what is most like the first hunting accident post zombie apocalypse. It was a bad day to be a kid.
Great day if you are an AMC exec though. We’ve already talked about how the season premiere was a ratings bonanza for the network, so how does episode two hold up? Meh, it was alright. ”Bloodletting” seems to be a solid 42 minutes meant to show us who these people are with tedious conversations. While it was light on zombies, it was big on characters talking. A lot. The cold opening starts the pace for the episode, its a talker. Luckly we get some action towards the end and yes, another cliffhanger ending.
Lets sink our teeth in and rip this baby apart. Spoilers start after the jump.
The episode kicks off with a cold opening flashback of Lori talking to a friend about a fight her and Rick had. The very same fight Rick was talking to Shane about in the series pilot. If you recall, he was then shot and sent into a coma that allowed him to skip the whole end of days. Anyway, we get the other side of the fight. Lori hates Rick for being quiet, yadda yadda ya. Is it wrong that I just don’t like Lori? Besides the whole ‘my husband is in a coma and the dead have risen to eat the living, guess I’ll start banging his best friend/partner’ indiscretions, besides the fact that she is mostly characterized as the ‘mean mom’ of the group. I just don’t like her. Was the cold opening the writers way of trying to give her a little more dimension? Make her a little more likable or at the very least understandable? Maybe, or maybe it was just the writers weakly trying to add in a little more back story for the sake of drama. It wasn’t particularly insightful, didn’t add anything to the story or the characters (Lori literally word for word reiterated what Rick said in the pilot.) Luckily the opening credits roll and take us back to what we’ve been waiting for.
We quickly get to meet a whole new set of characters. It turns out the man that was on the other end of the gun that shot Carl is with a group that luckily has a rather nice set up close by. Otis, played by Pruitt Taylor Vince, is the hunter in question and is also most likely the fattest man alive. Seriously, as a chubbier fellow myself, just watching him run made me worry about my chances when the dead walk. I’ve got to start going back to the gym. So Otis, with all his chins a waggling, leads Rick, Shane and the wounded Carl to a farmhouse of Herchel Greene (played by Scott Wilson). A man that can save the boys life. Welcome to the majority of the episode, folks. Will the boy die? Of course not, but that’s what we get for the next 42 minutes.
Back with the rest of the group in the woods, they are still on the search for little whatshername, apparently she’s is still lost or something. Back at the RV Dale and T-Dog are still scavenging the abandoned vehicles for parts. It turns out that Ice Cubes cut arm from the season opener is getting infected and without medical attention we might end up losing Dr. Dre for good. Oh noes. DearWalking Dead writers, if you are are looking for a character to develop a bit more, My vote is for the one that IronE Singleton plays. Please give him a little more to work with that ‘urban black guy’, at times I find the characterization almost insulting to the viewers intelligence. Stop doing that.
Now to the farmhouse again. Herchel Greene, the classic small town medical man, works on saving Carls life. Rick gives a staggering amount of blood to save his son (and give the episode a title.) This is the lion’s share of the episode. Rick gives blood, freaks out, Carl Clings to life, Rick Freaks out, gives blood. Interspersed with the characters trading heart to heart conversations, Andrea almost becoming a zombie chew toy, Lori arriving at the farmhouse and being the mean mom to them too, finding out that Herchel is actually a veterinarian (lady, it’s the post zombie apocalyptic world, I don’t care if the dude is a chiropractor, if he can stitch up a wound he’s good to have around) and oh yea, and Daryl rocks the crossbow.
To save Carl’s life, much needed medical equipment is, well needed. FEMA had a station set up at the local high school and Otis will lead Shane to it. They arrive quickly, get more than enough medical supplies and make it back to an already full recovered Carl. Just kidding. The school is overrun by zombies that just happen to have surrounded the very trailer the guys need to get into. This is the only real tension/action in the whole episode. Meanwhile, back at the farmhouse, the stock conversations filled with stock emotions about guilt and fear continue. Back the RV however, its stock conversations about fear and guilt (nice of them to change that up.) The whole episode really feels tedious and made up of filler. In it’s defense, we get to know the characters a little more, but not much more. I like the new faces, mainly Otis but Herchel Greene works too. His ‘I’m just a small town Doctor’ mannerism do something for me, as did his overly optimistic rundown on the zombie plague. I hope the new blood is around for a little while. As a whole though, the episode just came across as adequate to me.
For just the second episode in to the season, the characters just seem to be reacting to the world around them and it feels a little phoned in. Sure we got a little cringe from a bullet removal scene, but for the most part the episode was just the characters reacting and over reacting. Statement, screaming, end scene. As I said before the only tense suspenseful moment I got from the whole episode was at the end. Watching a fat man run from zombies… gah, its like a personal nightmare brought to light.
Next week: ”Save the Last One” – We’ll get to see how Shane and the Fatman make it out of tight jam and maybe something about the missing girl, maybe…
The Walking Dead: Save the Last One
The Walking Dead: Cherokee Rose
Last week, the Walking Dead was heavy on talk and light on action (save for the cliff hanger ending). I’ll be honest, it was probably the weakest episode the series had so far. It seemed to be devoid of tension, the character interaction was wooden and felt a little forced. This week? All is forgiven. This episode was one you’ll feel in your gut, the whole way through. It’s title ‘Save the Last One’ is a reference, a piece of advice even, to save your last bullet for yourself. If everything goes bad, you can end it all on your own terms. Is living after the undead rise really living, or are you just waiting to join them. Man, I still feel this episode in the pit of my stomach.
Little Sophia is still lost, Carl is still in a coma, Shane and Otis are trapped with the life saving supplies. The survivors are all faced with choices, grim choices, and questions about if its all really worth it.
Let’s begin.
If there is one thing that TV and movies taught me, it’s that when people snap, they shave their heads. The episodes cold opening is Shane going all Taxi Driver, crazy eyes in the mirror and all. Obviously he got out of the zombie dead end from last week, but how? Well, when you find out, you see just how dark things are getting, but lets not get to far ahead of ourselves.
With Sophia still lost in the woods and Carl still in a coma have the accidental shooting by Otis, we get a grim juxtaposition about the value of life after the zombies start walking. Let’s deal with Sophia first, the search continues but for how long? The gang back at the RV work through some issues, Andrea is starting to seem less suicidal and things start to smooth over with her and Dale. Daryl is still the best defense they have against the undead, on a late night walk he and Andrea have a heart to heart that makes you like him more. They come across a zombie pinata and the conversation changes to the question of why go on.
Back at the farmhouse, Carl is still in a coma and Dr. Herschel is still waiting for Shane and Otis to return. When the question comes up to go ahead without out the need equipment, Lori sales off the deep end. Is it worth saving Carls life so that he can continue to live in a world where walking worm farms want to make you lunch? It is an ugly scene that weaves throughout the episode one made worse when the boy wakes up only to have a violent seizure. In a show filled with gory images of rotting corpses with gnashy gore filled teeth, the image of a young boy on the cusp of life and death stands out as haunting.
Glen gets a lot more screen time this episode, the most he’s had this season. The writers don’t seem to know what to do with him, even though he is clearly the most relatable character. He enters into a debate about God with Maggie (one of the farmhouse dwellers) that roundabout connects to the episodes theme of living with a bleak future. Personally, I think it was a waste of what Glen has to offer. While Rick and Lori continue their debate, Rick gives a rather classic ‘live and persevere’ speech. The internal conflict the character has with trying to keep it all together is slowly bubbling to the top.
For action this episode, it had a lot. As we flash back to Shane and Otis trying to escape the zombie meat grinder that the FEMA/high school camp has become. Lots of tension, lots zombie kills, and one big ass sacrifice. You know the cliched scene where an injured character cries out ‘leave me here, save yourself’ but they take him anyway and save the day? This is not that scene. After a long struggle to make it out alive with the medical equipment, both Shane and Otis are down to their last bullet. I find myself still internally debating Shane’s motivation for what he did. Did he do it to save Carl’s life? Make it back with the surgical gear? Was it just to save his own? He is clearly the most mercenary of the survivors. I assume we will see, as Shane is clearly starting down a cracked path. He shoots Otis in the leg with his last bullet, hobbling him and making him zombie chow so he can escape.
As we saw at the episodes beginning, Shane is shaving his head. To hide the clump of hair a panicked and soon to be gnawed upon Otis tore out, either from the others, or more likely himself. He has a cover story, one of a self-sacrificing Otis. Whether it was intentional or just a matter of him not needing them anymore, Shane is given Otis’s clothes to change into. We can start the countdown to Shane fully snapping now.
It looks as though Carl will pull through. The survivors are slowly moving together and working on the main task at hand. Surviving. The show still has a lot to take care of. What did Jenner whisper to Rick at the end of last season? Where is brother Merle? Or Morgan and Duane for the matter? I hope as we get deeper into this season, the philosophical debates decrease a little and we start to learn more about the world of The Walking Dead. This episode nicely contained a base debate that would arise with the undead, what is the point in going on, without slapping an answer at the end. Let us debate that, but also let us in on the world you are creating for us.
We’ve all been there. You kill a man in cold blood, pop a bullet in his leg so he becomes zombie chow and you get away. After the obligatory ‘crazy eyes in the mirror head shaving’ you find yourself wearing his fat clothes and looking like you are one banjo away from a Deliverance reboot. Then you end up having to eulogize him (and set up your half assed alibi) in front of his girlfriend? Mondays, am I right? That’s where we find Shane in this weeks cold opening. Now I thought this was setting up an episode dealing with Shane’s obvious near breaking point and eventual departure from the group with Andrea in tow, but what we get is possibly the seasons strongest episode to date.
‘Cherokee Rose’ is light on the philisophical debate (it’s there, but kept to a minute or two thankfully) but heavy on everything else we’ve been missing. So far season 2 seems to be taking a cue from the comic book, that is moving insanely and inanely slow. While the pace is still creeping along (little Sophia is still missing, I believe she’s in her mid 30′s by now) we are finally treated to more of the post-zombie lives of the other characters. Yes, we finally get to see Glen in action, in more ways the one.
Let’s chow down on this one, shall we?
The rest of our band of survivors finally arrive at Hershel’s farm right in the middle of dear sweet buttery Otis’ funeral. The formerly hospitable small town vet, Mr. Greene is starting to show his reservations about Grimes and crew setting up on his land. Hershel outlaws guns (other than Dale as a look out), and you see the wall slowly start to rise. Later he will tell Rick their time on the farm is limited. Lori and Shane exchange a terse little exchange and Andrea and Shane continue to bond over being the outsiders in this group of outcasts. A collection of dialogues that continue threads we’ve seen in the previous 3 episodes but they seem more solid now. The ever evolving dynamic between the characters continues. Daryl walks off to search for Sophia, T-Dog and Dale fetch a pail of water and, Glen gets sent on a pharmacy run with the increasingly attractive Maggie.
Let’s deal with Dale and T-Dog first. From last weeks teaser we know what they find, a very Sam Rami-esque deadite looking zombie at the bottom of the well. I am sure many of you were like me, giddy at some good old fashioned of the wall zombie action, zombie action with a lesson. See, if you ever have a plagued flesheater doing the doggie paddle in your water supply, obviously you have to get him out mostly intact, no need to let any more zombiism ooze into a much needed resource. Old water guts didn’t go for the canned ham as bait, so they send down the Asian. It was nice to see Glen in all his hapless hero glory. The rope breaks, tension is had by all, and in a classic Glen way, he still manages to get the job done. The writers really need to start using him more, he has the potential to be a great counter balance to Daryl. While the lovable hick gets s#!t done cause he’s a bad ass, Glen pulls of the whole underdog deal and your want to cheer when he succeeds. Speaking of success, I also want to thank the writers for having the whole de-zombieing of the water supply go bad. We all knew the waterlogged brain gobbler was going to come apart, spilling guts and go back into the well, and it was gratifying when it happened. Even the zombie looked happy with the outcome.
With the Greene’s survey map of the county, a plan has been set to systematically search and find Sophia. Rick and Hershel are out near the river, out in nature discussing things when you see the philosophical debate set in. I won’t fault the writers on this one. It was far less ham handed than last week. It’s faith verses reason round two has the two of them joust in the existential. Rick, with the weight of all that has happen and Hershel with long standing values and beliefs. They seem to end on common ground (again) and a chance for Rick and the rest to stay on the farm comes up. How many times do we need to see this? On the other side, Andrea and Shane continue to shoot things and bond. Shane, while talking about the difficulty in taking down perps and being a cop, cracks a little and ice queen Andrea actually shows a little empathy. Two very different scenes that, while good, didn’t bring much more for any of the characters concerned. I know he sort of hinted at it, but I wanted to see Shane snap and let the cat out of the bag a little more about Otis.
Now, more Glen. On the trail to the pharmacy, Glen get’s all glenny on Maggie and awkwardly talks himself up. It was amusing and endearing, again how can you not love Glen. When they get inside a very empty small town pharmacy with its quaint sign about taking ‘what you need’ (looting, small town style), Glen breaks off on his super secret what could it be mission to find Lori something to pee on. He fumbles, he stumbles, he gets the girl. Classic Glen, classic. Chalk another up to the underdog. It’s testament to the treatment of the A list characters (the Rick Shane Lori triangle), I get excited about seeing more of the others because at least they are still interesting, they are stuck on the same plots with the same crutches. We need more Glen being Glen, damn it.
Meanwhile, Daryl is up crossbowing his badassed self through the woodlands. In a small way I hope Merle never shows up again. The absence of his ‘Son’s of Anarchy‘ bad guy ways with his ‘Breaking Bad‘ meth addictions (damn you AMC and your cross promotion) let’s Daryl grow. Sure, he’s a hick, but a hick that kicks ass and still has a heart. His search takes him to an abandoned farm house, one that correct me if I am wrong we are led to believe Sophia might actually have stayed at? Regardless, when Daryl returns to the RV, he gives Carol a Cherokee rose and tells her the significance of the flower. It is a symbol meant to give strength to grieving mothers and then closes with giving Carol more hope and support in the search for the missing Sophia. Bam, waterworks. Sure there was other heartfelt moments, Rick and Lori seem to slowly be moving back into a unhealthy disfunctional functional couple, Rick and Carl share a touching father/son heart to heart, but once again the secondary characters shine through. To me, the talk ofKirkman’s divergence from the source material is moot. He’s exploring a similar character set in a similar setting in a whole new way. I enjoy it, and hell if he wants to drop Lori and Rick and Shane and make this just about Daryl and Glen? Hell, I’d love that. Have them drive a classic muscle car, give the show a guitar heavy theme song and a wise talking urban guy like T-Dog. It’d be sweet ass spin off, at least.
The episode wraps on Lori heading off to the woods armed with a pocket knife. Now, I don’t want to spoil the ending, but that secret thing that she got Glen to get so she could pee on it? It was a pregnancy test. Shocker, it’s positive! Buckle in folks, I sense another long drawn out thread coming. Is it Rick’s? Is it Shane’s? Is it right to raise a baby in the post-zombie apocalypse? I don’t care about or for Lori and I fear a lot of screen time is going to be chewed up with this melodrama.
As we continue to look forward, they need to resolve the missing Sophia thing pronto. At first it looked like a cheap emotional ploy played on the audience, then like a plot diversion and, now? It doesn’t even really matter. They could find her off camera and cheaply write her back in at this point and I’d barely notice. The sense of direction needs to return to the show too, sitting on Hershel’s farm just makes it feel stalled out. They aren’t trying to rebuild, they’re not trying to make it to some other location, they are just comfortably resting at a farm dealing with plot lines that we’ve had since the start of the season. It’s starting to feel a little stale. I worry that we are going to be stuck on that farm for the lion share of this second season, even though it is clearly within a church that has a small herd of zombies surrounding it that is a fat man’s jog away, RIP dear sweet buttery Otis.
The Walking Dead: Chupacabra
So, where were we? The country style kill machine Daryl gave Carol a Cherokee rose, little Sophia was still missing, the Rick/Lori/Shane triangle was still chugging a long and Glen, the wonderful and amazing Asian gave Maggie, the farmers daughter the best damn 45 seconds of her life! We saw last weeks teaser, we know that Merle is back in some way shape or form and the title of the episode isChupacabra. What can we expect? The search party finally finds little Sophia but she is pinned in the middle of a zombie vs goat sucker blood bath? Nope, but we do get another cold intro flashback, wa-hoo.
Ready to talk about this weeks The Walking Dead?
The cold opening flashback seems a little tacked on. Personally, and maybe I am in the minority here, I enjoyed not knowing about what lead up to the zombie infested world we see each week. I kind of liked being in Rick Grimes perspective of being dropped into it and just moving forward. We learn that Carol’s abusive husband/Sophia’s useless now dead dad was apparently always useless and abusive, and was also into hoarding food and being a dick. Thank you for expanding on a dead character with stuff we pretty much knew already. We also learn that on the way to Atlanta ‘they’ stopped broadcasting the emergency signal moments before going all Apocalypse Now on the city. Not really the most important thing to add to the story, however it was pretty neat.
Back to now and back on the farm, Dale is cheerful, Lori is pregnant, and Carol wants to cook a meal for Herschel and the clan as a way of saying thanks. The search for the eternally missing Sophia continues, a little more focused now thanks to Daryl discovering the farm house where the little girl may have been and probably ate cat food. At this point, Shane decides to tell Rick what we’ve all been yelling at the screen the past few weeks. Maybe it is time to call of the search. Of course it is hard to gauge how long she has been missing as a view, they don’t really let us know just how long its been, but come on. It’s starting to drag the show down. The only purpose it seems to serve now is to cause friction between Rick and Herschel over Daryl’s commandeering of a horse, one of farm dwellers going out to search without the consent of Dr. Greene and to have Daryl once more venture off alone into the woods to give us some good old fashioned hillbilly anti-zombie fun.
If you are a zombie or a squirrel, be warned. Daryl has a crossbow bolt with your name on it. Ok, he only has one so it probably just says ‘you’ on it, regardless. This is about the point where I start to wonder why Daryl is even slumming around with the rest of the survivors. While everyone else is talking about their emotions or questioning a higher power, he’s the only one getting s#!t done. Along the river, he finds the second chunk of evidence that little Sophia might still be in the land of the living. A not close enough to infringe on copyrights Raggedy Anne doll. This is also where the above mentioned arrow turns on its master. A snake spooks the horse, throws Daryl off and into the river, with his one arrow puncturing his side.
This is also where we get the episodes title and welcome back Merle, sorta. Daryl apparently once saw a Chupacabra, and as the imaginary Merle tells us, he was on ‘shrooms at the time. Yes, the imaginary Merle, big brother pops back in this episode as Daryl’s subconscious, brought on by the pain of his injuries. I actually really liked this plot device, going so far as to say I prefer it over the character coming back in the flesh, alive or undead. Don’t worry, Merle is still an insufferable ass in his imaginary form. Daryl’s visions of him reveal far more about their relationship, makes you love Daryl more as he defies his abusive older brother. He awakes to a zombie with a taste for shoe leather, takes him and his zombie traveling partner out and keeps their ears as souvenirs.
Back at the farm, we finally see some plot lines progress. Glen and Dale exchange a dialogue about the ladies that reveals a couple of things, Glen has an amateurish and dangerous understanding of a woman’s, um, cycle and that while everyone is content on playing house, things are starting to break down a little. Herschel’s distrust of Rick and the survivors is growing as they continue to wear out their welcome. Lori’s pregnancy is still a secret shared with just her and Glen and you can see the question as to who the father is hangs heavy on her. Andrea, who was starting to almost seem less insane flips back to her aggressive and unsettling ways, wanting to take a more active approach to the defensive of the farm, with very unfortunate results.
She shoots Daryl.
When our favorite redneck zombie kill machine finally makes his way back to the farm, he is bloody, muddy, and somewhat in Andrea’s defense, sort of did look like a walker from a distance. What I found very interesting is how Rick, trying to keep the survivors somewhat in Hershel’s good books, calls out to not shoot because the small town vet wants to handle them himself, why? What for? How? Doesn’t really matter because as soon as Rick, Shane, T-Dog and, Glen get close enough to see that its Daryl, she shoots anyways. The classic just grazed head shot knock out plot device, somewhere an old western writer is smiling.
To be honest, this episode still has the same jerky start and stop cadence that has plagued the whole second season thus far. As a handful of dangling plot pieces are tied up with dialogue towards the end, we just see a few things repeated. Rick and Shane disagree, Hershel distrust is growing, Lori is moving towards a mental break down.
When we finally get to the planned meal from the start of the episode, we also see Maggie in an act of rebellion. Hershel advised her to not be so ‘friendly’ with Glen, which leads to a mid meal not passing to plan a late night rendezvous and Glen, a classic casanova, opts for a romp in the hay.
How the HELL did no one ever notice the barn doors shake and moan? Wait, let me back up, the barn was a rockin long before Glen came a knockin. See, old man Hershel has been penning up walkers in there, Maggie wasn’t able to stop Glen before he climbed in and found it all out. This really bugs me, sure Doc Greene forbade anyone from going near the barn, but come on… Are we to believe the zombies have stayed quiet? I’m not familiar with zombies exercising this much restraint, especially when humans are coexisting on the same property.
Why is Hershel keeping a small zombie herd? Well, this is the set up for next weeks obviously titled Secrets:
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