Season 2, Episode 8
“We bury the ones we love, and burn the rest.”
In the formless, motionless mass that was the first half of The Walking Dead's second season, there was a lot of disappointment of unrealized potential, and what made “Pretty Much Dead Already” such a standout among a season of bland was that it's final minutes seemed to provide a new way forward, an antidote to the fairly rudderless hours that had come before it. The problem with creating big emotional cliffhangers however, especially on a show like TWD which is usually defined by how little occurs, is that it becomes hard to steer through these curves and come out the other side as both the show you were before and still affected by the latest blowout. “Nebraska” tries to have it both ways, of course, but it really just falls back on past beats, and that's a problem.
Let's do a little mental exercise to get things started: what went through your brain when Zombie Sophia walked out of the barn, and then Rick shot her in the face? I'm sure all of you thought, “Holy shit, Sophia's a zombie!”, but I'm not sure how many you shared my next thought, “Shit, Rick shooting Sophia was a dark moment that will probably disrupt the group dynamic”. If we're being honest, it was the darkness that I was looking for in this mid-season premiere, so that we would see a change in Rick, or a change in the group, or something that would be more than the character talking and not doing anything about what they say.
Instead, the show went with showing the group in various forms of grief over their loss, and while it wasn't the compelling television that I was looking for, it's hard for me to fault the show for taking the plot to a logical place. Of course the group would be torn up about the loss, and this is a move that at least tries to have the show do some character work in addition to showing us some zombies. The show is at least trying to play a long game and not just be about the thrills, and I have to respect them for that goal. However, they're still not taking these moments to interesting places, mostly because they still have yet to draw these characters beyond the archetypes they were introduced as back in season one.
But since that's old news, let's focus on something a bit more immediate and troubling: the Zombie Rules. I've mentioned in passing before that the show has yet to lay down clear defined rules about what does and does not turn a character into a zombie, and even breaking some of the rules that were introduced as fact earlier. (“No touching zombie blood”, anyone?) And even though there was a whole lot of zombie touching going on this episode, that's not even what bothered me the most. Before we left the show in the fall, we were supposed to believe that Herschel was stupid for treating his zombie relatives as people instead of putting them down, and yet we spent a good deal of time this episode watching the characters treat Sophia like a human and giving her a burial. In fact they give a burial to a couple of Herschel's relatives as well, and while this isn't on the same level as Herschel actively keeping zombies alive, it does seem to goes against their stated believes to chastise him for treating his relatives as if they were still alive, and then turning around and doing a human thing for a zombie Sophia. Is a little consistency too much to ask for?
Now maybe the show is trying to show that the group are a bunch of hypocrites, and that's a perfectly statement for the writers to make. People are flawed, and show's should take advantage of that. (Before you ask, no, this does not make up for how stupid the characters act a lot of the time.) In fact, one of the promising developments about this hour is how Sophia's death seemed to cause a group-wide fallout amongst all the members, as her death seemed to force individual to realize what they want out of this post-apocalyptic world, and how that often is countered the the wants of the others. So we saw several different pairing across the hour, as many different beefs were ignited or restarted, and the many levels going on here seemed to indicate that the back half of this season would certainly be more eventful than the first.
Of course, it's not going to stay that way if secrets keep getting spilled all over the place. Glen admits to Rick that he knew about Lori's pregnancy, making him practically the last person Glen spills the secret to, and Rick all super-diplomatic about it and just let's it go. Similarly, Dale sharing his belief that Shane killed with Otis didn't seem to create as big a fuss as one might imagine, all though given that he also shared words with Shane, this is probably some story with some build to it. (Likewise, I don't particularly care about Glen sharing “I love you”'s with Maggie, so can we just drop that plot, please?)
What's interesting about this episode was that they're were only two scenes that really interested me: the opening, where we see the direct fallout of Rick shooting Sophia, and the closing scene, which featured Rick, Herschel, and Glen meeting two other survivors. This scene has a lot going for it, starting with Michael Raymond-James showing up and doing a lot of good work with a little material about one survivor's desperation to live. (The biggest drawback to this scene? Reminding me A) the Terriers is still canceled, and B) that Raymond-James doesn't get level of work that deserves.) But really this scene wasn't about their desperation (though it is an interesting idea) so much is it's about the length that Rick and Co. will go to in order to protect their current state of existence. And him shooting the two of them – even if it was in self-defense – would seem to indicate once again a change is coming over Rick.
Of course, that's probably not going to happen, even though it or something like it needs to. For whatever reason (I'm assuming both laziness on the part of the writers and the limited budget), the writers aren't to interested in shaking up the show's status quo all that often, and that makes for boring television. There were a lot of good ideas here in this episode, but none of them were executed in a strong enough way to peak my interest. What this show needs right now is a strong kick in the pants to get in going in a different, and hopefully more even-filled direction.
Getting everybody off of that farm seems like a good place to start. And I bet I know a place where they can go....
Quotes and Other Thoughts:
Instead, the show went with showing the group in various forms of grief over their loss, and while it wasn't the compelling television that I was looking for, it's hard for me to fault the show for taking the plot to a logical place. Of course the group would be torn up about the loss, and this is a move that at least tries to have the show do some character work in addition to showing us some zombies. The show is at least trying to play a long game and not just be about the thrills, and I have to respect them for that goal. However, they're still not taking these moments to interesting places, mostly because they still have yet to draw these characters beyond the archetypes they were introduced as back in season one.
But since that's old news, let's focus on something a bit more immediate and troubling: the Zombie Rules. I've mentioned in passing before that the show has yet to lay down clear defined rules about what does and does not turn a character into a zombie, and even breaking some of the rules that were introduced as fact earlier. (“No touching zombie blood”, anyone?) And even though there was a whole lot of zombie touching going on this episode, that's not even what bothered me the most. Before we left the show in the fall, we were supposed to believe that Herschel was stupid for treating his zombie relatives as people instead of putting them down, and yet we spent a good deal of time this episode watching the characters treat Sophia like a human and giving her a burial. In fact they give a burial to a couple of Herschel's relatives as well, and while this isn't on the same level as Herschel actively keeping zombies alive, it does seem to goes against their stated believes to chastise him for treating his relatives as if they were still alive, and then turning around and doing a human thing for a zombie Sophia. Is a little consistency too much to ask for?
Now maybe the show is trying to show that the group are a bunch of hypocrites, and that's a perfectly statement for the writers to make. People are flawed, and show's should take advantage of that. (Before you ask, no, this does not make up for how stupid the characters act a lot of the time.) In fact, one of the promising developments about this hour is how Sophia's death seemed to cause a group-wide fallout amongst all the members, as her death seemed to force individual to realize what they want out of this post-apocalyptic world, and how that often is countered the the wants of the others. So we saw several different pairing across the hour, as many different beefs were ignited or restarted, and the many levels going on here seemed to indicate that the back half of this season would certainly be more eventful than the first.
Of course, it's not going to stay that way if secrets keep getting spilled all over the place. Glen admits to Rick that he knew about Lori's pregnancy, making him practically the last person Glen spills the secret to, and Rick all super-diplomatic about it and just let's it go. Similarly, Dale sharing his belief that Shane killed with Otis didn't seem to create as big a fuss as one might imagine, all though given that he also shared words with Shane, this is probably some story with some build to it. (Likewise, I don't particularly care about Glen sharing “I love you”'s with Maggie, so can we just drop that plot, please?)
What's interesting about this episode was that they're were only two scenes that really interested me: the opening, where we see the direct fallout of Rick shooting Sophia, and the closing scene, which featured Rick, Herschel, and Glen meeting two other survivors. This scene has a lot going for it, starting with Michael Raymond-James showing up and doing a lot of good work with a little material about one survivor's desperation to live. (The biggest drawback to this scene? Reminding me A) the Terriers is still canceled, and B) that Raymond-James doesn't get level of work that deserves.) But really this scene wasn't about their desperation (though it is an interesting idea) so much is it's about the length that Rick and Co. will go to in order to protect their current state of existence. And him shooting the two of them – even if it was in self-defense – would seem to indicate once again a change is coming over Rick.
Of course, that's probably not going to happen, even though it or something like it needs to. For whatever reason (I'm assuming both laziness on the part of the writers and the limited budget), the writers aren't to interested in shaking up the show's status quo all that often, and that makes for boring television. There were a lot of good ideas here in this episode, but none of them were executed in a strong enough way to peak my interest. What this show needs right now is a strong kick in the pants to get in going in a different, and hopefully more even-filled direction.
Getting everybody off of that farm seems like a good place to start. And I bet I know a place where they can go....
Quotes and Other Thoughts:
You know, those Mad Men promos may have been elegantly simple, but there's no way they're going to hook any new viewers. Which is ironic, given that show's subject matter.
Thanks to some poorly-advised sharing of casting news, it has now gotten out that a certain cast member will not be on this show next season, which given the premise probably means that they're going to die. You can find out who here. But, you know, SPOILER ALERT.
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