![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Six Extra
I started watching The Walking Dead again recently. I stopped when it went into hiatus midseason after “ A Certain Doom” and didn’t remember/feel like watching it again for ages, by which time I’d forgotten that I hadn’t finished with season 10. I’m assuming folk reading this know the show; after ten seasons there’s way too much to summarise. Google it. Also don’t read this if you haven’t seen the last six episodes of season 10 and want surprises.
“A Certain Doom” felt like a season ending. After watching the “six extra” episodes, it still does.
This seems to be the point where the pandemic most impacted on our fictional apocalypse. There was that long hiatus and then things weren’t the same again for the rest of the season. When it picked up again, it made me think of Coleridge writing Kubla Khan and how different the rest of the poem is after he’s dealt with his annoying visitor from Porlock.
There are no crowded scenes. Social distancing TWD style? The episodes feature only a few characters off doing their thing in the zompoc. Only “Home Sweet Home,” the Maggie’s return ep, has more folks involved as she returns to Alexandria and gets filled in on what’s gone on, starting with the news of why Negan is free. It moves swiftly to small group dynamics with Maggie’s people, along with Daryl, being stalked by unseen enemies, The Reapers, who destroyed the settlement she’d been living in. Motives unknown. Always good story fodder.
Then “Find Me” featuring Daryl and Carol in the woods and way too many flashbacks.
“One More” was Gabriel and Aaron in a crazy survivor’s hideout.
“Splinter” was Eugene, Princess, Yumiko and Ezekiel after capture by the Stormtrooper clones we saw at the end of ‘A Certain Doom.”
“Diverged” we’re back to the Daryl and Carol show, along with Dog and a nameless rat infesting Daryl’s house.
“Here’s Negan” featured the man himself, more flashbacks and scenes with his wife Lucille. It shows that Negan, while not always a supervillain, was probably always a bit of a dickhead.
I discovered after reading episode summaries that the actress playing Yumiko had not been able to be present in “Splinter” due to COVID travel restrictions but her character’s presence was vital, so she literally ‘phoned in’ her part and remained out of sight with Princess talking to her but unable to see her. Princess was trapped in a train car (featuring a small dose of Eugene, always the best way to take Eugene). This episode is really a showcase for Princess’s mental problems, which I don’t think are anything too much out of the ordinary in the TWD world. Think of all those twitching folks without their antidepressants! [I can say that; I take them!] Princess rules, btw.
Carol had a lot of scenes just with Daryl’s dog, Dog in “Diverged” which I enjoyed but which really didn’t advance the story or the characters much. At the end of the episode, when Jerry has come to check on Carol [who needed it after nearly destroying a house trying to get rid of the rat] said rat just ambles away behind them. I was pleased about that. I stop watching when shows do nasty things to small furry creatures.
The first half of the Daryl and Carol show (the ep with all the flashbacks) was a bit confusing, trying to remember what had been going on at the time Daryl retired to the woods by himself. Then there’s the mysterious reclusive survivor. Seriously, I didn’t really like the “secret relationship” storyline there. I rather enjoyed the mystery of Daryl, who up to then had seemed possibly asexual, with his close but platonic relationship with Carol as the only one we knew about. Their quarrel, with Daryl seeming to blame Carol for Leah’s disappearance, didn’t make too much sense to me and wasn’t resolved with the second half of the D and C show, where Carol’s leading man is a dog.
Gabriel and Aaron get to play Russian Roulette courtesy of a crazy survivor. I’m surprised there’s any other kind by now but this guy possibly wasn’t too tightly wrapped before the zombies arrived. I did appreciate Aaron freaking out when he’s surprised by a captive wild boar. The guy can dispatch a flock of zombies in his stride but a bad tempered pig made him scream like a little girl; a fact immensely enjoyed by Gabriel! A priest really shouldn’t enjoy somebody’s humiliation so much!
Anyway, throughout these six episodes I had a feeling of waiting for something to happen. They aren’t mere place setters but they are more considered of pace and character-driven. Given the nature of TWD, the eventual shoe drop is going to be something dramatic, violent and probably with a high body count.
Negan has returned to the Alexandria community and is greeted by a smiling Carol saying if he stayed, Maggie would kill him. She hadn’t wanted his death on her conscience – after all, he had infiltrated the Whisperers and killed Alpha when she asked him to – but now when Maggie killed him, it would be on him.
I like Carol!
All the survivors now are true survivors, not just ordinary folks tossed into the zompoc as they were at the beginning. There has been a considerable winnowing of the unfit and unprepared. Civilisation’s filters are all off. It’s notable that few children are with their birth parents; most in the groups are being fostered by people who took them on after their parents were killed in a variety of ways. Those who tried ordinary adolescent rebellions/acting out or just tried to go outside the strictures of their communities also didn’t survive.
We still don’t know where TWD’s people will go. Where is the community that has helicopters, that took Rick to possible safety? Has the world outside North America returned to normal and just not told the USA?
Stay tuned for season 11, now screening.
Interesting
no subject
Oh yeah... I literally did not even notice this until you just pointed it out! Reading this, I'm impressed by how well they did the Yumiko/Princess stuff - also did not notice anything out of the ordinary there.
In vague, rambling response to your points:
I really loved all these rambling sort of character driven eps, even more than driving storyline.
Absolutely HATE them giving Daryl a dull het love interest. I hear that Norman Reedus hated it too. Perhaps why they have less chemistry than he has with every single other character. Really disappointing when I was jubilant at some decent ace rep.
I fully adore Princess. She's one of my favourites of the entire show now. She could have easily been annoying, too, but she's just awesome.
Daryl and Carol have some of the best relationship stuff and character progression/arcs that I've ever seen in a show. I'm seriously just so impressed with the script writing for these later seasons.
"Has the world outside North America returned to normal and just not told the USA?"
:-O oh my god, imagine.
I'm up to date (4 eps in) with S11 now and I have loved every second.