And we’re back with episode seven from Season Four of AMC’s The Walking Dead; or as I choose to call it, “episode the second of a former Governor’s story”. As anyone who’s been following this season knows, the show has taken a bit of a detour ever since the Governor was reintroduced at the end of episode 5. Basically, they’ve chosen to double back to cover everything that happened since he snapped and went AWOL from the show.
Beginning last week with a romp in the wilderness followed by some coupling with a new family, things have since picked up with the discovery that the Governor’s former henchman, Caesar Martinez, went off and created a community of his own after leaving him alone in the wilderness to die. With that the Governor and his new family now in their care, the stage seemed set for some interesting developments.
All of which took place in this week’s episode known as…
Dead Weight:
The episode begins where the last left off, with Martinez and the Governor in a stand off after finding each other in the woods. After a few tense minutes, Martinez agrees to take them in, provided they understand that a) he is in charge, and b) that everyone contributes or is cast out, no exceptions – i.e. no “dead weight”.
In between, he get scenes of “Brian” and Meghan playing chess and admitting that they both had abusive fathers. Meghan also asks Brian is she is good, and he assures her that they are going to be okay, though he doesn’t seem so sure of that. We then get a shot of their new digs, a camper that is parked next to an abandoned M60 tank.
The Governor begin contributing by going out on a supply run while Lilly establishes a nurses station. They come across a body tied to a tree with a sign that says “Liar” on it. As the move on, they find more bodies, one with a sign that reads “Rapist” and another inside a cabin who shot himself and has a sign that reads “Murderer”. Each are wearing military uniforms.
When they move inside the cabin to look for supplies and hear something bumping around. A Walker attacks their group and find the heads of the decapitated men still alive on the floor. The Governor manages to take them all out and saves one Martinez’s people (Pete) in the process. They make camp for the night, collect the supplies, and talk about how things have changed for all of them.
Apparently, all of Martinez’s people were once army, hence their weapons and vehicles. Back at camp, Lilly and the others begin to meet with the rest of the camp – which includes the army soldier Alisha, whom Tara takes a shine to. When the Governor and Martinez return home, they share a meal with Lilly and her family, and the subject of their old camp (Woodbury) comes up again.
Afterwards, Martinez and him play a round of camper rooftop golf. He tells the Governor that Shumpert, another one of his former henchmen, never came back after Woodbury and died. Martinez talks about sharing responsibility for keeping the place safe. The Governor responds by hitting him in the head with a golf club and tossing him into one of the Walker pits.
The next day, the camp is told of Martinez’s death, and it is assumed that it was an accident. Pete assumes command for the time being, though the camp demands a vote. Pete invites the Governor out on a hunting run and asks for his help. They come upon another camp in the woods. Mitch recommends they take their supplies but Pete disagrees.
After finding very little, they double back and find the camp was overrun and their supplies gone. One survivor remains, and Mitch stabs him in the head. They return, and Brian tells Lilly that it isn’t safe there anymore and they have to leave. On the road that night, they come a herd of Walkers stuck waist deep in the mud. With the road out, they return to the camp.
In the morning, the Governor murders Pete and holds Mitch at gunpoint in his camper. He tells Mitch that he was right about the other camp, that he is running things now, and offers him the chance to join him. Henceforth, he says, no one will worry about doing the right thing, because they will be doing “the only thing”. Mitch agrees, and they cover up Pete’s death by telling people he died heroically.
In the coming days, everything appears to be running smoothly now that the Governor is in charge. But of course, things get dicey as Meghan runs into a Walker inside the camp while playing hide and seek and the Governor narrowly. He then goes off to stare at the pond and reflect, and in the water, the reanimated corpse of Pete is shown chained to the bottom and reaching up at him. The old Governor is back!
He then drives off to the prison and watches Rick and Carl from the tree line. He contemplates shooting the, but instead walks a distance and spots Hershel and Michonne talking by the side of a dirt road. He takes aim right before the credits roll!
Summary:
Well, suffice to say, some things have been made abundantly clear now, things I myself have been wondering about for some time. Now that the two episode detour is over and we are back to the main plot, it is clear that the way Season Three ended was more of a temporary detour from the original plot rather than a major divergence.
Between what happened in this week’s episode and what has been previewed for next week’s midseason finale, it looks like the show really is following the comic after all, albeit in their usual, prolonged way. And I have to say, I suspected as much when I saw that big tank in this episode and heard all that talk about how Martinez’s new community was made up of several former army people.
Somehow, the scene in Volume 8: Made to Suffer where the Governor arrives at the prison in force popped into my head and made me think. It was at that point that I considered that maybe the abortive assault on the prison at the end of Season Three was meant to allude to the way the Governor’s initial attack in the comics failed, followed by the heavier, deadlier one.
And it was a pleasant surprise to see that this is indeed the way are doing things. From what was shown in the preview, the Governor now plans to return to his new community, tell them about the prison, and mobilize them to assault it. And apparently, some people are going to die. In short, we’re in for a mid-season climax that actually resembles what happened in the comic.
If I have any complaints, they would be that this week’s episode was predictable. Even before it aired, I was of the mind that everything would revolve around the Governor going back to his old ways and taking control of the camp (most likely over Martinez’s body) before he rediscovered the prison and began screwing with them again.
But since all that led to a setup directly from the original comic, those sentiments are fighting uphill against genuine anticipation. As we head into “the Governor versus the Prison crew, Part Two”, I can honestly say that from here on out, I will likely be watching out of genuine interest rather than a sense of obligation or mild curiosity.
Congratulations, AMC’s The Walking Dead, you just became interesting to me again! And while I anticipate that the second half of the season is also going to drag on like the previous ones, I remain pleased that they are finally back on track with the plot. The REAL plot!
To recap a little first, I would reiterate that last season’s finale was a big letdown to me. Myself and many fans lamented the fact that after many episodes of building up to a climactic clash between Woodbury and the prison camp, the final battle was quite the fizzle. Not only were the Governor’s people routed rather easily from the prison, but the Governor himself then went batsh*t crazy, shot everybody, and then ran off into the wilderness.
The season opens with a look at a seriously changed prison, which has been augmented with new buildings in the courtyard to accommodate the new people. The new arrivals appear to have been integrated, teams comb the fence to kill Walkers, and Daryl is getting ready to make another run to town for supplies. He is joined by Glenn, Tyreese, Sasha, a young man named Zack and a former army medic named Bob.
After Bob causes some shelves to fall over and pin him down, Walkers hear them inside and begin converging on a weak spot in the roof. They then begin to fall through, and Daryl in the others are forced to fight them off while trying to free Bob from where he was pinned. Zack (Beth’s boyfriend) is bitten, but the rest manage to escape before the wreckage of the chopper falls through the roof and causes the building to collapse.
When they arrive at her camp, she tries to kill Rick but fails. He realizes her husband is now a Walker and she was simply luring him back so she could feed him something living. She then begs Rick not to kill once she’s turned, and stabs herself in the stomach. She dies saying that “you can’t come back from the things you’ve done”, and Rick leaves her and her Walker husband behind.
Rick returns and talks to Hershel about the woman he encountered, and how she reminded him of how far he came to losing it as she did. Hershel assures him that “you do get to come back”, and reminds him of how and Carl have. In the prison showers, one of the new arrivals – a boy named Patrick – succumbs to an illness that’s been effecting the livestock and comes back as a Walker.
The episode opens with Karen (a new arrival) and Tyreese having a romantic evening, before she decides to head back to her room. Patrick, now a Walker, follows her from the shower room to D block. He hears a man coughing from another cell, enters his room and kills him in his sleep. The man then turns, and begins stalking the Block with Patrick and attacking others.
Afterward, they examine Patrick’s body with the help of Dr. Subramanian and notice that he died of an illness that causes bleeding from the eyes. Having seen this before, with Walkers along the fenceline as well as pigs and birds in and around the camp, they reason that it is a flu strain that it is transmitted from swine and birds, and that it’s loose in the prison.
Meanwhile, the commotion caused by the outbreak draws more Walkers to the wall and a section begins to give. Sasha noticed that someone has been leaving bait in that section to lure the Walkers to it. The wall nearly collapses, and Rick and Daryl drive out and drop all the pigs in the field to lure the Walkers away. This gives them the time they need to reinforce the wall, and disposes of the pigs which may have brought the flu.
Rick, Daryl and Carol join Tyreese in the courtyard where he found the charred remains of Karen and David. He demands the Rick find out who did it and then let him deal with them personally, and he and Rick get into a terrible fight. Afterward, Rick is tended to by Hershel who tells him that they’ve lost 12 people from the flu, plus the two who were burned, and an outbreak may be likely.
Rick apologizes to Tyreese after the latter if finished burying Karen and David, and they agree to bury the hatchet. Tyreese once again reiterates that Rick needs to find the guilty party, and decides to look on his own since Rick appears to be dragging his heels on it. Carl joins the other kids in the sequestered area, and Glenn realizes he’s been infected too.
Rick begins investigating Karen and David’s deaths and determines they were still alive when they were burnt. Carol discovers that their water lines have become clogged and defies Rick to go out and clear them. In time, her activities draw the attention of Walkers and Rick runs out to help her. She narrowly makes it back and Rick asks her if she killed Karen and David, to which she says yes.
What’s more, there’s the issue of who they’ve chosen to kill off versus keep alive. I can understand the decision to pad the cast with extras so they can be killed off and the core characters kept alive, but that’s not even what’s happening here. At this point in the comic’s story, Andrea and Dale were still alive, but in season two and three of the show, they were both killed off.
Some things they did manage to get right about Tyreese though. The way he fought off an entire herd of Walkers using only his hammer is reminiscent of the scene from Volume Four: The Heart’s Desire where he cleared the entire prison gymnasium by himself. And the way he and Rick fought in the same episode echoes what happened later in that same volume.
But all in all, I think its pretty obvious where things are going this season. Soon enough, the entire Woodbury crew, minus a few people – like Bob, who they seem intent on developing – are going to die off, they will find a traitor in their midst (possibly the Governor himself sneaking in at night), the prison is going to start falling apart, and they are going to have to relocate.
Stories by Williams 