The Walking Dead, Season 5, Episode 10: Them
See, I think one of the biggest problems with the Walking Dead sometimes is its 40-minute format. Stretching out a 'our main characters are depressed, but need to get over it' plot is necessary after losing two major members of their group consecutively -- three if you count Bob several more episodes back -- but the 40-minute length is just a tad too long for something that, yes, while needed addressing, also didn't need to last for that long. Season five (and at least two-thirds of season four) has been remarkably great at keeping the show interesting from episode to episode, which is a far cry from the mind-numbingly boring second-season, or the extremely uneven third season.
A formula that they've adapted in the second part of the fourth season was to focus on small groups of characters at a time, which tend to be the catalyst for stronger stories. This is not always the case, of course, but focus is a wonderful thing when writing an episode. Not really for this one. It's basically what it says on the tin: our characters are depressed. They need hope. Daryl, Maggie and especially poor Sasha, who in the space of half a season lost her lover and her brother are all depressed. Daryl goes off near a tree to burn himself with a cigarette and cry. Gabriel burns his priest collar. Sasha does stupid, aggressive things and is a total jackass to everyone. Everyone's either hungry, tired, half-cooked by the sun, they have no cars, minimal water, no food
So, uh, of course the lesson to keep up hope ends up getting immediately answered. Hungry? Hey, a bunch of wild dogs show up for you to shoot. Thirsty and wondering whether the bunch of water bottles 'from a friend' is safe? No problem, have some rain. Storm's coming in? What luck, Daryl discovered a barn. A gigantic herd of zombies show up (how did they track the barn down? It's not like they're especially noisy in the thunderstorm)? No problem, the thunderstorm knocked down giant trees that impale and crush the zombies but spare the barn.
In fact, the zombie attack seemed to almost be an answer to Daryl's insistence that "we're not them", because the assembled cast sans baby Judith pushing against the door against a swarm of zombies is very much the assurance everyone needs that they're different from the zombies. It's honestly all very eye-rolling. Honestly, I expected some baby formula to miraculously show up out of nowhere, because there's no way li'l Ass-kicker ate that dog meat.
Oh, and apparently Maggie straight-up thought Beth was dead all throughout the back end of season four... so, um, why the shit did you hold up hope for Glenn, then? There's no real indication for Maggie to think Glenn survived and Beth didn't, instead of thinking they're both dead, or they're both alive. Blah.
Rick name-drops the title of the show, noting that "we're the walking dead" which I guess is pretty cool and suitable to the whole theme this episode has to them doing nothing but being depressed and surviving from one point to the next. But take it from this episode -- it ain't fun watching some people who are basically walking corpses do nothing but be miserable. At least they got over it, and the presence of Random Dude Who Knows Rick is going to lead to something. Still, this is definitely one of the weaker parts of this episode that's filled with miserable people and contrived coincidences -- literally nothing here is anything we haven't already seen before. And yes, I get it, it's a depressing time for everyone, but I dunno, there really should've been a way to introduce some conflict, some actual character development beyond "Daryl, Sasha and Maggie are being aggressive to everyone but they bond over holding up the door barn against some zombies killed by the wrath of nature."
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