This week on The Walking Dead, Carol's self doubt grows and Denise goes for a walk with Daryl and Rosita. My thoughts on the episode are after the jump.
I thoroughly have enjoyed this back half of season 6. These episodes have been exciting and action-packed without having to skip out on interesting character and plot developments. The tone has been improved and balanced in a way that has made the show a lot more fun and easier to process while still delivering the shocking drama we come to Walking Dead for. This week found the show going back to some of its old habits as far as pacing is concerned but still had a few stand out moments. Despite the moments, this episode was rather messy and not in the blood-spattery way, though we had some of that too.
The episode's opening showed us how things have calmed down a bit in Alexandria through some clever use of dream-like transitions between days. It was a nice way to show how the days have become routine and have began to blend with each other. However, I could not shake the feeling that the show was treading water this week before what is sure to be a packed final two episodes. There were some thoughtful ideas in a few scenes, but it was nothing new to the show. If anything, Carol's decline in confidence is familiar territory and somewhat outside of what her character has become. This doubt sort of came out of nowhere in the past few episodes and I thought she was past that. Her exit at the end of the episode felt unearned and was a bit frustrating. We have seen her leave before and to have her do it again in an episode where she was only featured for a few minutes was disappointing. Last time this happened, she came back to save the group's sorry butts in Terminus and my best guess is that she will do that again when Negan retaliates for the slaughter of his people over the past two weeks. By the way, why have we not seen him yet? There was a big deal made of his casting and this episode went by with hardly any plot progression. I feel like time is being wasted here when we need a fresh presence like a new villain to get things going.
Adding to this episode's theme of everyone's place in the group when violence is so essential to survival, this episode seemed to have a focus on our resident awkward characters Eugene and Denise. Eugene's trip into the city with Abraham was a sort of non-starter for me. Eugene and Abraham have slowly become my least favorite characters on the show due to their over the top stilted dialogue, notably Eugene's weird formal nerd dialect that is completely silly and fake. Abraham has the same kind of stilted dialogue, except with more poop metaphors. He could not make it through one episode without one poop metaphor during a dramatic situation. I am sort of over it. It was hilarious, in a bad way, during his break up with Rosita but now it is just getting irritating. Can this show write different kinds of characters like these without resorting to weird cartoon character traits?
Denise wanting to go on a run with Daryl and Rosita led to a nice sequence. Albeit annoying at times because of her at times overwhelming naivety, I have always liked Denise and the actress playing her. So with that said, she will be missed. Her death was completely unexpected and was well done. Her attempting to continue her monologue even with an arrow through her head was a good touch in her performance and it legitimately sad to see her laying on the ground alone after the skirmish with the Saviors. Just to think that she almost made it home to give Tara that damn orange Crush soda. I hope we get a scene with Tara after this to show her reaction to Denise's death.
Speaking of that skirmish, that was a nice injection of energy into a more ponderous and wandering episode. Eugene has a moment to redeem himself with his nice handling of the hostage crisis he was in by showing us how his intelligence can lend to the survival of his group. He also bit a guy's crotch. Talk about taking one for the team.
The Saviors are shaping up to be quite a wimpy group. Their bark is worse than their bite. They keep showing up acting all threatening only to immediately be outsmarted and slaughtered by our Alexandrians. This is another reason why we need to get Negan featured on the show sooner rather than later. We need a threat that won't just limp away or straight up die every episode. It's getting tedious now.
I definitely had problems with this episode, but there were still effecting moments like Denise seeing the room with the walker and the cradle and her eventual shocker of a death that redeemed this week in part. I am still unsure of Carol's sudden departure and I wish Daryl had more to do or a bit more depth to reveal while talking to his troubled companions this week. The show flirted with making its characters more human and the action more exciting over the past few weeks so I am hoping that it does not regress back after this week. Let's get back on track with our penultimate episode next week.
Grade: C+.
The Walking Dead airs every Sunday on AMC.
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