Original Air Date: March 18, 2012
A Few Things: [SPOILERS]
1. Great first 30 minutes! – That first 30 minutes of the show during the zombie attack was tense and exciting as hell. What I enjoyed the most was how disorganized everything was. By the time our characters knew what was going on, the zombie herd was upon them and people were running (and driving) everywhere! I even kinda liked “The Plan” to drive around and get the zombies to follow them off the farm, and how that plan slowly went awry as each group of characters realized that the farm was lost and that they had to run for it– they just had to trust that their loved ones were going to be okay. I almost expected that episode would end with everyone scattered in twos and threes, so it was a nice emotional high when they all found each on the old highway. Now, it wasn’t a perfect bit of TV. Unless these folks have achieved Delta Force-level proficiency with their firearms, no one is making headshots like that from a bouncing car. And, you’d think that if you’re trying to get them to follow you off the farm, you’d just drive slowly while honking your horn off the property and do less driving around in circles. And I thought there was some hollowness when they tried to make us feel a) Herschel’s tremendous loss of his farm (wouldn’t he be amped and happy to not be eaten?) and b) the dramatic irony over everyone regathering where they’d left supplies for Sophia. “Do You Get It!?! It’s IRONIC that they are meeting where they wanted Sophia to come back to! Now it’s them running and scared! Do you GET IT?!? Let’s show you the pile of supplies AGAIN to make sure that you GET IT!” So, it wasn’t perfect, but it was pretty good.
2. That’s where herds come from. – It had a kinda March of the Penguins aspect to it, right? It’s hard for me to evaluate since I’m soaked in zombie-lore, but were audiences really curious about where zombie herds originated from? Would message boards have lit up with, “Where did those hundreds of zombies come from? They were in a rural area with a low population density, dammit!” And, while I enjoyed seeing the helicopter from Episode 1 of the series, I’m not sure everything needs to tie that closely together. Little did Rick know, but the helicopter in the sky was causing a herd that he would meet again, months down the road. It’s a little too Butterfly Effect. I think I’d have rather seen an explanation for the helicopter than a tutorial on how to create a zombie herd.
3. Not as bloody as I’d expected. – If you gambled money on Beth surviving, you win! I really thought we’d lose more characters, but instead we only got rid of Jimmy and one of the blond ladies. I actually said to my wife at one point, “Is that Otis’ wife getting eaten?” Now, there is hope because clearly new showrunner Marazza triaged these characters and decided he could do something useful with all of them. On the other hand, we’re going to gain some characters and this group might just get oversized really fast. Still, it was pretty surprising to see T-Dogg make it to the final credits.
4. The show struggles as soon as the actors talk. – I think Andrew Lincoln is a BIG problem for this show going forward. He does well when he’s asked to be the “steely man of few words” but the writers keep giving him these long speeches that just don’t work (like his “this isn’t a democracy speech” at the end…Ugh!). And, every time Carl talks… Double Ugh! They could do such good stuff with this kid, but they need to SHOW us, not have Carl TELL us. Who can manage more than 2 sentences of dialog in a row: Herschel definitely, Darryl probably, Andrea/Glenn/Maggie maybe… Certainly not Carl, Lori, Rick, T-Dogg, Beth, Carol, et al.
5. Could Lori suck any more? – I wonder if this show is making it hard for girls named Lori to get dates? I mean, what a useless bitch! Also, what piss-poor writing. Didn’t she spend a few episodes jacking Rick up to kill Shane? “He’s dangerous. He thinks the baby is his. You have to do something!” Now that Rick admits killing him, he gets the cold shoulder because he was calculating about it? WTF?! And, the group’s reaction didn’t really make sense either. Why would any of them care that Shane was gone or that Rick killed him? Aside from Andrea (who wasn’t present for this “scene”), they all hated Shane.
6. Andrea kicks ass! – Comic fans know that Andrea kicks ass, so it was nice to see TV-Andrea becoming kinda the same character. True, she’s a little chippier on the show, but that might just be how Laurie Holden acts (I can’t really see her being as warm as comics-Andrea). But, I just loved her last second save of Carol and then her terrifying run through the woods. Really enjoy Laurie Holden and the Andrea character (although my wife oddly hates her).
7. We’re all infected. – Why was this a big deal? Why did the other characters feel that Rick had kept some big secret? You could buy this if “you’re all infected” meant that they all have cancer or something, but it isn’t clear how being infected in this way changes a character’s day-to-day life. Right? Well, perhaps they would have treated Beth a little differently while she was all suicidal to avoid a scene like the little girl in Night of the Living Dead. I can’t help but wonder if Jenner’s whispered secret was always left vague and the shows creators just chose NOW to fill in that blank. Why would Jenner feel the need to be all secretive about THAT when he had just told the whole group that everyone on Earth was dead? I’ll still bet that original intent was that Jenner whisper about Lori’s pregnancy.
8. Two BIG reveals give hope for tomorrow. – Season 2 has been really piss poor, but the little ray of hope was the change in creative team. So, I’ve been looking for reasons to think that new showrunner Marazza “gets it.” Somehow he had to find a path out of the quicksand in which Frank Darabont has immersed the series (the hunt for Sophia and keeping Shane alive) and get the show moving. Bringing Michonne into the action was brilliant. I didn’t see THAT coming at all and I like that they didn’t show her face. That can cause Summer 2012 to be, “Who IS that person with the chained up zombies?” And, hopefully that question will cause more people to go buy the comics this summer and if that happens perhaps it’ll give the writers more reason to stay truer to the comic story. Of course, seeing the prison in the final scene was a big reason for hope too. The story of how the survivors made the prison their home is still the creative high-point for the comic series. I even liked how Marazza addressed the Glenn/Maggie relationship, which had been my only reason to doubt him. Just stick with the comic story! Your writers have fumbled badly when they’ve gone off script! Plus, the comics are a damn good source for story.
Conclusion: A wonderfully exciting finale with some big reveals that make me optimistic for this show’s future. However, the show still has a very soft underbelly given that the star trio of Rick/Lori/Carl can’t act very well.
Grade: B
-Dean Stell
Follow Dean on Twitter.
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