Shaking off our Thanksgiving torpor, the PCS bounces back with a double-helping of Walking Dead. Episode 6 took us on a detour away from the prison gang in order to catch us up with all the hijinx The Governor had gotten into since murdering his entire raiding party, setting fire to Woodbury, and taking off for parts unknown. The results left the nanobots a little underwhelmed. Let’s check back in and see what wacky adventures that silly Governor has gotten himself into this week!
- Oh good, a cold open full of more chess metaphors and on-the-nose dialogue. We definitely didn’t get enough of that last episode. = -4pts
- Oh, shit, that’s the tank from the comics. Never mind, you guys. Everything is going to be okay! = +6pts
- Call us cynical, but we have a sneaking suspicion that a lone dude showing up in a predominantly male camp with two women of child-bearing age would probably end up more like the end of 28 Days Later than this. = -2pts
- Hey, The Governor, just a free piece of advice: If you’re really so desperate to avoid the pressures of leadership, then murdering your camp’s de facto leader is probably a bad way to go about that. = -10pts
- Image of a bunch of zombies sunken to the waist in the middle of a muddy road is pretty badass. = +5pts (No joke here; it’s a good visual.)
- So, after a whole episode-and-a-half of sort of trying to be a good guy, and then kind of trying to escape from the camp, The Governor throws in the towel and returns to his douche-baggy ways. = -9pts (For wasting two weeks of our time.)
- Kind of digging his new aquarium, though. = +6pts
Season Score = +79pts
These last two episodes felt like a really long walk to just get us back to where things were before the back half of Season 3 crapped the bed. The Governor is evil again, he’s got another makeshift army, and once again he’s poised to rain hell on Rick and the prison crew. With just one more episode before the mid-season break, let’s hope that the showrunners deliver a little harder than they did last time.
- The Governor’s love interest may seem like an improbably pure and good-intentioned pillar of virtue, but what you don’t see is that when her character is off-camera, she says really racist things about Puerto Ricans. = -6pts
- Dammit, D’Angelo Barksdale, just accept gratitude from Tyrese’s sister. She can find out that you almost got her brother and everyone else killed over a bottle of hooch later. = -1pt
- Hershel and Michonne running the old “good hostage/bad hostage” routine. = +2pts
- The Governor and Rick may never have been able to live together in the same prison structure in this world, but it sure gave us a great idea for a sitcom. = +14pts
- That look of paternal pride that Hershel gives Rick right before things go sideways. = +11pts
- A major character just died and… What is this? What’s happening? Are we actually feeling something here? Did this show finally make us feel something?!? = +20pts
- In her zeal to defend the prison, Carol’s little blond psychopath abandons an infant in a car seat to be devoured by walkers. = +4pts (For nailing the headshot.)
- The Governor: Dead. The prison: Destroyed. Rick’s crew: Disbanded. Rick’s baby: Probably eaten. Yes. This is exactly what we want, creators of The Walking Dead. Good job. = +25pts
Season Score = +148pts
If this wasn’t the best episode of Walking Dead, then it’s definitely on the short list. God knows what they’re going to do for the second half of the season, but no matter what the show got us here, and for that, we are eternally grateful.
Score Technician: Joe Hemmerling
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