The Walking Dead, Season 8, Episode 11: Dead or Alive
This episode feels more of a check-in with the other characters, another one of those episodes where things happen to characters, but really nothing of major consequence is achieved. Let's break down the disparate storylines, yeah? The first part has Father Gabriel (who's delirious from infection and is losing his eyesight) and Dr. Carson going on their little trip to attempt to reach Hilltop, with the delirious Gabriel insistent that everything happens for a reason, and God will provide. And, of course, even though his insane luck leads them to a house, antibiotics, a working car, and even allows him with his limited eyesight to save Carson from zombies, it runs out as a group of Saviours arrive, grab and bag the two of them, and Carson ends up being killed thanks to the newfound optimism that Gabriel instills in him. Of course bad things are going to happen. It's Walking Dead. Still, this storyline and the neat bit of scripting and acting is by far more interesting than the actual 'war' scenes or plotline of this season and the previous one, as depressing as it is. At the end of the episode, Gabriel gets put to work in Eugene's bullet factory.
Eugene, meanwhile, tries his best to cover up the fact that he helps Gabriel escape, and tries to badly lie to Negan. Gabriel covers for him, at least, although in Eugene's bullshittery about using trebuchets to launch corpse parts, he inadvertently gives Negan the idea to infect their enemies with the plague, by layering their weapons in zombie guts.
Meanwhile, Daryl, Rosita and Tara go through a zombie-infested swamp -- which gives for some real cool visuals for sure... and as much as Daryl hates their prisoner Dwight, Tara really, really wants to kill Dwight, because Dwight killed her girlfriend Denise so many episodes ago. And while Dwight and Rosita cleared the swamp, Tara ends up wanting to execute Dwight which... really just screams sort of stupid. At the end of this arc, Dwight gets dragged on by a Saviour group, and has to act up and talk about how he's helping out in investigating the swamp and everything, leading the Saviours away from Team Daryl. Actor Austin Amelio really does a great job at selling Dwight's resigned regret, and how he knows that either Daryl or Tara or someone from the Alexandria squad's going to have to kill him at the end of all this. Dwight's resignation to a violent end versus his helping out possibly leading to something peaceful is, by and by, a far more belivable and viable 'war-vs-peace' story than anything Rick and Negan has.
There are other scenes like Maggie showing the slightest bit of leeway towards Gregory and the other prisoners, or Carol, Morgan and little Henry watching over the prisoners... but I don't think there's really that much to talk about. We've got the wordless scene of Daryl informing the Hilltop crew of Carl's death, and Enid crying (they had a thing, didn't they? I completely forgot) but ultimately it's just sort of check-ins. Again, it is a huge breath of fresh air than exasperated, half-mad Rick snarling at Negan or Negan's looney-psycho hammy villain act. It's a nice selection of shorter stories, but honestly? Not a particularly interesting one. Still, Eugene and Negan hint at the possibility of zombie-gut catapults, which at least would be awesome to see if nothing else.
No comments:
Post a Comment