They should make Collateral Damages and have Cruise face off vs Glenn Close.

Companion series is allegedly called "Fear The Walking Dead"

Missed it tonight.

Any good?

No, not really.

No, it was really pretty good. It was beautifully shot. Had some powerful scenes and dialogue. Some pretty fantastic zombie killing action as well.

happened to see this quote on my feed and that summed things up fairly well for me (it was a link to the AV Club review)

oh, and this comment made me chuckle

Picayune nonsense. Again.

It's pretty common in TV shows to jump time or locations between seasons.

you lawyers and your high-fallutin' words

trying to think of which members of The Wire they can (realistically) cast.

Cops-
McNulty has the Affair
Bunk might work but he's too fat to outrun zombies this long
Lester doesn't have much going. I think he'd be a good get.
Not sure what Herc or Kemma are doing, but either would upgrade the cast

-The Street
Marlo is obviously a great get. He's got a bit part on Person of Interest.
Avon-Stringer is obviously out, he could play either a good guy or a bad guy. Harris Wood is great
dunno what Bodie or Michael are up to. Either works
I think Chris Partlow is working, if not sign him up
the Greek's #2 already looks like Negan.


I guess they still have options.

Snoop and her nail gun would be just as good as Daryl with a crossbow.

I'm pretty sure she's still in prison? Only reason I omitted her.

oh ya, i forgot about that.

I went back and watched the "snoop buys a nail gun" scene on youtube. "The man says if you wanna shoot nails, this here's the Cadilac, man. He mean Lexus, but he don't know it"

So damn good.

Sorry, back to Walking Dead! :)

Just watched the whole series in like 2 weeks. def rewatched that scene two or three times.

Really couldn't do Cutty without laughing. Once he'd get animated he sounds like the "Alright Alright Alright" bit by Kevin Hart.

I liked the episode a lot and am looking forward to the rest of this season. I think we are going to lose 3-5 more characters by the time it's all said and done.

I think that's one of the things this show has never quite gotten a handle on. It is okay to kill off characters. but they kill off people too frequently so it loses a lot of the potential impact. folks are going to die, but if people weren't dropping left and right I might have time to grieve.

Hmm, pretty spot on.


Sad (we) lost a great developed char in Tyreese but this "show" felt like a gut punchless episode with some BS homages to characters past. Totally missed the mark, and the direction was haphazard at best.

Or if they had really properly developed those characters in the first place.

The writing on this show is really poor. My biggest issue is that a single character will basically change week to week depending upon what is needed to progress that particular episode. The only characters that have consistently felt "real" are Daryl and Carol.

But they get it right about every 3-4 episodes, which is why I've stuck with this show for so long. It's as frustrating as LOST was though. It just feels like a lot of squandered potential.

I think I'm done watching week to week. I'll check out the spin-off. Maybe I'll binge watch later on this season. People are straight garbage about this show on social media, love a feed full of spoilers.

and usually when they do spend some time with a character, it's a sure sign they are going to die. that was true with Beth and Bob. Tyreese was one of the more fleshed out characters, but as soon as he gave that speech to Noah I knew he was a goner.

as soon they start giving screen time to Tara, Sasha, Milton or Rosita, you can start the bell tolling for them

I don't think the writing is really poor, it's just uneven. I think the "hit rate" is better than every 3-4 episodes as well. I also think there is more consistency in characters than you think, but I totally agree that Daryl and Carol are the best by far.

I wonder about squandered potential. It's possible. I have read the comic since the beginning and still do, and the show is much, much better.

This is largely veridical! Veracious even!

I think it depends upon what you are comparing it against. By TV standards it's fine i'm sure, but in absolute terms I think it's very poor. It's why I watch so little TV.

We are in the Golden Age of TV. Comparing it to its companion's, then i would say it's absolutely in the bottom tier for writing. Other people have made some points about why, so I don't want to rehash all of them, but the thing that gets me is the characters changing all the time to fit the episode. ITS LAZY!!!!!

Also, Cutty being overpowered by a zombie, ya no....

He was only over powered by a zombie while he was already bit, feverish, and dying. He was far from top form at that point. They has him alone and surrounded by a good number of zombies a few times and always came out on top. So, Cutty's strength and skill were well represented.

I am not sure what else you'd compare it to. It's not really fair to compare it to film, but even if you did, on average, I'd put Walking Dead's writing over most films. Oscar nominated films? No. But there are a lotta shitty movies out there, which is why I watch so few films each year. I mean take all of January and February, look at all movies released in theaters or through other channels and tell me how many are well written. Granted, this is the dead period for film, but it's still 1/6th of the year and even in the prime months there are still more shitty films than good.

If you want to compare its writing to other films in its genre since it started its run - either horror or say, post apocalyptic/survival films - it's likely in the top 10%. Between theater and straight to DVDS releases, again, there very, very few decent movies released in either drama.

I would also argue, if you're looking at pure percentages - there percentage of TV shows with good writing equals or surpasses the number of films with good writing.

well he was also outrun by a guy with a severe limp, so...I guess the ex-NFL linebacker thing only applied to the comics

From time to time they are able to service the large group and create compelling stories. Then there will be occasions where we'll spend half an episode with people arguing in a field. All just to set up an "oh no zombie danger" type situation where someone does something stupid.

I get why it's wildly popular and as mentioned the alternatives in the horror genre are just not all that good. Also TV just hasn't done action well in a long time and this kind of stands alone in its space.

I'm still on season four but the baby? They ate the fucking baby ?!

Yeah, it was gross.

Saw the season premiere in the Sun re-run. It was okay.

The second episode is sucking so far.

I love that she was going to try to shoot open the trunk of the car before simply pulling the trunk release from the interior of the car. Even by Walking Dead standards, that is some laughable logic.

Well, she was exhausted, hungry, dehydrated, frustrated, likely mortified and shaken at what she saw in the trunk, and then angry at herself for just walking away at first. I dunno about you, but even under ideal circumstances when inanimate objects don't do what they are designed to do, I can get pretty annoyed and lash out in ways that don't make any logical sense. Put me under those conditions and give me a gun at my side? Yeah, I might easily go for that option too. I know it's not logical, but people are rarely all that logical at the best of times. It was a true moment. Solid writing.

Well he had just been bitten by a zombie. I've never been bitten by a zombie before, but I have a feeling that I'd be a little easier to take down if that happened.

FWIW, I thought this was a solid episode. I'm on record as wanting them to show more of the survival stuff, so that was a nice touch. Really liked that closing shot of the two girls with their guns drawn with the music box in the foreground

Yeah, I loved that shot. The music box itself was a bit cliche, but that shot alone was worth it. A thing of beauty.

And I would buy that if this was some mildly complex problem-solving scenario, and not an activity she would presumably have engaged in literally THOUSANDS of times at this point (searching an abandoned car).

You know how some days you can barely remember driving to work, because it's so well ingrained that you can do it without actively focusing on it? I would imagine the act of searching a car for supplies would be the equivalent after this length of time in this situation.

I know what they were going for, but the execution was poor. That is the case with 90% of this show.

While the thematic moment might have been real, the execution was trash. Par for the course.

Gah, I'm tired of all the complaints. The show is good either watch it or don't, but it seems like people really are reaching on their complaints of the show.

Eh. I totally disagree. I thought they got exactly what they were aiming for. It was done well. As is the case with, about, 75% of this show. More hits than misses, but certainly not perfect. It's definitely a step below greats like "The Wire" or "Breaking Bad" or the "Sopranos", but it's firmly in that second tier.

As for this particular moment. I dunno what you'd want. I've made toast and pop tarts literally THOUSANDS of times, but that still didn't stop me from punching my toaster one morning and denting it badly because it burned the shit out of my pop tarts and burned my fingers when I went to grab one, and I was tired, super hungry, and late for work. Was that logical at all? No. But I was tired, hungry, late, stressed and pissed and it happened.

Have you ever not reacted out of anger and frustration in some incredibly illogical and foolish way in the heat of the moment?

I disagree strongly with this. There is nothing wrong with Walking Dead, its fine. But shows that are still airing right now that I'd put in that second tier... The Americans, Justified, Hannibal, Game of Thrones, I'm sure I'm missing some... Walking Dead is a huge, huge step below that. The writing can't remotely come close to any of those shows. Hannibal and Game of Thrones look better. I'm saying this as someone who generally enjoys Walking Dead. I have no problem suspending disbelief on general realism things, whatever. But the show could be SO MUCH BETTER, but its just not, and at this point we know what we're going to get. And I'm ok with that, so I've stopped complaining so much in here and just enjoy the parts I enjoy.

Walking Dead is way better than all the procedural crap on CBS, better than any reality TV. Its better than tons of garbage all over the place. But its noooowhere near a "second tier" just behind the wire or other shows you mentioned, IMO.


Yeah I have no problem with this. If I have any concern about the scene its in the use of the gun at all, not "oh i can just go pop the trunk." You'd think "don't use bullets unnecessarily, don't make loud noises unnecessarily" would trump any sort of emotional distress. But whatever, I don't have a huge issue with this and am more than willing to ignore it for the sake of TV.

Meh, it seems like the defenders are really reaching to justify everything that happens.

Radii said it best. It's better then alot of the crap on TV, but it could be so much better then it is.

There's nothing wrong with liking the show, its just not the best piece of TV ever made. Not even close.

For the passive-aggressive inquiries as to why I still watch:

I am pot-committed on Walking Dead at this point, just as I was with Lost. It has massively squandered an interesting premise and an initially interesting cast. At the same time I've put in enough time that I'm going to see it through to the end. I wouldn't get 500 pages into a 700 page book and give up, even if I wasn't enjoying it.

It has also consistently ignored it's only fully-developed, interesting characters (Carol and Daryl) in favor of screen time with any other number of vacuums of personality (Beth).

It' also barely even looked into characters like Glenn, who seemed immediately interesting when introduced to the show.

As I've said repeatedly, they re-write these characters to be as dumb as necessary to suit a particular episode, constantly counting on viewers to be enough of amnesiacs to reconcile their behavior.

After ages on the road, these characters somehow still cannot search a house in a methodical manner or look through an empty car without forgetting how mechanisms to open them even work. But hey, some people accept that as not merely passable but "great" writing, so I guess they are succeeding.

Come again? In what universe has The Walking Dead "consistently ignored" Daryl?

I feel the characters are written pretty consistently. In Season 2, Lori kept flip flopping back and forth between almost being Lady MacBeth like in her desire for Rick to get rid of Shane and mortified at the very thought of anything happening to Shane. It was odd. Then there was that one episode after the prison where Carl was an ass and a that tub of chocolate pudding. That seemed very out of character based on where Carl had progressed during his time in the prison. Those instances stand out to me.

I'm not sure what show you're watching where Daryl is "consistently ignored". He gets as much screen time as any character on the show. It's a large assemble cast. Screen time will be limited and some characters will be more major than other. After Rick, maybe Carl, Daryl is solidly number three. I think what they've done with Carol - going from where she started to where she's at - has been on the most interesting character transformations you'll find on TV anywhere, anytime. She gets plenty. Glenn is Glenn. I think they do right by him. Would the show benefit from culling the cast down a bit? Maybe. But that's not really the show.

The other picayune (I do loves me that word) stuff you mentioned doesn't bother me. I think they do a fair enough job showing how far the group has come in terms of surviving in this world. Sure, they slip up at times because emotions get the best of them. Like you mentioned in an earlier post, at some point this stuff becomes rote. It'd be hard to be at your best at all times, methodical at all times. I assume that they do a good job of sweeping and clearing houses and searching cars off-screen. They only show us the dramatic shit, when people slip up and things go wrong.

I could see where it would be hard to stop watching "Lost", because the nature of that show. As for "The Walking Dead", I don't quite get it. As I've mentioned before one of the struggles this show - and the comic - has is that there is no real end point. No massive arc to complete. It's a story about a group of people surviving in the zombie apocalypse. That's pretty much it. Characters have individual arcs, but there's no mystery to solve, no bad guy to catch, to great villain to defeat, or no real end game other than surviving or dying. It tends to lend itself to wandering and stagnating at times.

That said, keep watching! I don't mind the dialogue. When I have the time, I'll gladly defend the show where I feel it's warranted and happily agree when I think the criticism is valid.

No one ever claimed it was the best piece of TV ever made or even close.

I don't feel like I'm really reaching to justify everything that happens. Like I said, there is a ton of criticism that's totally legit and justified. I criticize the show plenty. But where I think people are off, I'll defend the show.

It's not my fault that I'm more reasonable and objective than most! :D

I think it fits. I'm never going to rag on The Americans, Hannibal, or Game of Thrones. Those are three of my favorite shows on right now. In fact, last season of The Americans might have been my favorite show last year. It was fantastic.

That said, there are only two shows that I actually watch when they air (or close to it): Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead.

The Walking Dead may have more warts than those other shows, in fact, no doubt it does, but, second season aside, which was largely weak, I still think it fits.

I can't compare these shows to all the procedural crap on CBS, because I've never watched them. I aint got time for that!

Ok. Creepy girl just killed her sister. This show is so fucked.

Maybe but one of the better (and intense) episodes so far.

Yes. That was a very good episode.

That was an incredible episode, one of my favorites. And yeah, super creepy.

well finally figured out where I knew Noah from. My daughter is watching Let It Shine on Disney and viola! And his brother is on another Disney show she watches (Lab Rats). Probably not going to show her his work on Walking Dead for comparison

Everybody Hates Chris maybe?

I'm hoping ... if any group deserves a break for a while and some normalcy, its this group.

So I just got done binge watching the last three episodes and have a question n about the mid season premiere where tyreese dies. So during his hallucinations there were a few confusing things going on. The radio was playing either describing early chaos in the United States after the outbreak or in some third world country of groups going around burning villages. Is this was happened to the black kid with the bad legs subdivision? Also the governor kept alluding to Tyreese having some sort of past. Was he involved in something like this before he ran into the group?

Also I don't know that I would call it lazy writing because I think it is a topic that would be quite challenging if you were dealing with the zombie apocalypse but how is Rick the only one who has any trust issues after they were all in a concentration camp cattle car about to be eaten like a month ago?

I thought last night'so episode was by far the best of the second half. Curious to see what angle these two guys are playing as I'm with Rick. I don't trust these guys.

No, that was ... foreshadowing. What happened there will almost certainly be a part of future storyline.


I believe that referred to how Tyreese was pro-governor / anti-Rick initially.

The kid Patrick who starts the flu outbreak at the Prison. Played Chris' best friend in that sitcom.

Noah is Chris from that show.

The running joke to me is that Rick is always wrong anytime he is adamant about something.

So the fact that Rick is extremely skeptical makes me much more comfortable trusting to be honest. :lol:

On the other hand, everywhere they go has to go poorly, or the show gets boring.

Oh no doubt it will go badly. But not for the reasons Rick was skeptical about...that I'd be pretty certain of.

Wow. The board is abuzz after last night's episode!

I thought it was a good episode. Of course, it's going to go to shit with the other people. Starting with the douche who was tormenting the one zombie.

I liked it. I really liked seeing Carol pretend to be someone who is so weak and is being taken care of by everyone else. I assume that will pay off in a pretty awesome way. I also like the suggestion from Rick at the end that they can just take over the place if they need to. Are they going to be the bad guys this time? The potential for that is a nice twist compared to the Governor or Terminus communities.

I didn't get a great vibe off of the cute blonde mom's husband either.

Yeah, that was fun. She even pretended to be clumsy when she was unloading her guns onto the cart. Nice strategery.

I really liked that episode. Established some pretty interesting dynamics.

Carol playing possum was fantastic. Speaking of fantastic and possums, so was Darryl still carrying around the dead possum in his interview.

I thought Andrew Lincoln had some amazing moments in this ep. When he was being videotaped and interviewed, he looked downright feral and dangerous. When he was shaving the beard, I think he was surprised to remember what the person he used to be was like, and wondered if he could be that person again. I also like how he fixed his watch when he was told the time: He's returning to time, and with it, civilization...sorta. He's still ruthless as fuck, and part of him knows this is all doomed, but just as big a part of him really wants this, and Lincoln sold that well. He's even willing to take Alexandria from these little grandparents and nice gay people, he wants this so bad. When he was tearing up during the haircut I could really see the need for this to work in Rick's face.

I felt Deanna was very intelligently written (although that sorta makes her unbelievable as a congresswoman). The way she twisted Rick's words "Are you looking out for us already?" and "It sounds like I want to be part of your family" was a clever way of assimilating this feral group. She's clearly very pragmatic. Her village needs warriors, badly. I suspect that they've already encountered the "bad guys" out there, and it's just a matter of time before she says, "Oh, and by the way, there's these raiders we need you to take care of for us..."

Yeah, Jessie's husband won't be around for long I reckon.

I was glad to see Glenn get a bad ass move.

I agree with this as well, I am interested in seeing more of her and seeing where all of this goes.

Was I only the person who
a) kept seeing/hearing Kate Mulgrew as Capt Janeway during the early Deanna scenes?

and

b) failed to realize that Deanna was multiple Tony nominee Tovah Feldshuh

Me neither. I think they are going to have some conflict with he and Rick. I wonder if they will have someone killing people and Rick having to catch them or something along those lines.

Spicier. Domestic violence. Constable Rick to the rescue!

I just assumed he thought his wife was being too friendly with the new guy.

hence the reason for conflict

Yeah good episode overall. It definitely showed how far the group has come as you can see this little town of people has remained pretty insulated from the really horrific stuff.

I do wonder what type of conflict might occur within Rick's group though. I don't get the feeling Michonne would have approved of Rick's comment about taking the town. Though she might be the only one (the group conscience now I guess).

Hah! You are right!

I enjoyed the episode. Nice to see them rewarded with some normalcy and really glad his beard is gone.

Was this arc in the comic books?

it was

Reading the thread from start to finish now that I'm caught up. It is amazing so of you kept watching with how nit picky you are. I mean issues about a type of hub cap ? For real?

It would be funny if all of this was set up to turn this into a police procedural with Rick Grimes as tough as nails small town sheriff solving petty crimes.

Justified: Alexandria.

I enjoyed the episode. Carol was great with the kid.

That was so fucked up

Carol with the kid is a top 5 Walking Dead scene for me, easily. That was fucking spectacular.

She just continues to shine

In addition to Carol, really like how some of the other characters are "adapting" too, Sasha and Darryl in particular. We also got to see some edge from Deanna.

So much potential with how this can play out over the last few episodes.

Really trying to figure out where they are going.

I wonder if Darryl and the gay dude are going to be scouting a group and discover that group is coming for their community.

A lot to go over from this episode.

As mentioned, the Carol with the kid scene is awesome and so, so messed up. The look on that kid's face reminded me of that kid at the start of Jurassic Park that Sam Niell showed how a velociraptor would disembowel him with his claws.

Rick, Rick, Rick. I'm afraid of what he will do. Are we setting up a situation where he just "takes" Jessie? The moral lines have always been vague in Walking Dead but usually the "good guys" actions can be justified within the context of the situation. That survival situation doesn't really exist right here, so anything Rick does toward Jessie seems to be on really shaky grounds. As I am a fan of his character, I am hoping Rick doesn't become just another sort of bad guy. His fight between keeping his humanity and the need to survive has been one of the most compelling storylines in the entire series.

My fear with Daryl is that the bike will be a way for him to leave. He might feel ostracized and alone enough, unable to settle in, that he will just leave, become another Morgan figure (BTW, where the living heck is Morgan now??? That was back in Georgia!). Since it is my understanding that the Daryl character has really gone way off from whatever small role he had in the comic (if any, I forget, Daryl might be an entire TV show creation), they can really do anything with him. Of course, he is a a big draw for the show, so I would find it hard to believe they would have him leave. But, character-wise, it's not out of the question.

I think the community is making the team soft, though, and you see this in the gun bag scene outside, where Carol has the guns and Rick and Daryl seem uncertain of the need. I figure Carol will end up having the right of it and that the guns will be needed.

Anyone notice the gay guy is almost as good a shot with the sniper rifle as Sasha?

Still don't know what the little girl was doing in the last episode.

One of the more understated (and in my opinion, important) developments is Michonne's acceptance of her role in the community. I get the feeling she is more at home in this situation than the others, and that was after she was also countermanding some of Rick's more extreme responses in the lead up to arriving here. And she doesn't seem to be that much part of Carol and Rick's scheming. All of this makes me wonder if when shit hits the fan, what she will do.

While I'm familiar with the broad (and some specifics) of the source material, this isn't a character/situation I have any idea about so the guess I'm spoilering is purely my own

That would make a lot of sense. 3 episodes left this season, right? I see one of three things happening:

1) your suggestion, an external threat that Rick's crew saves Alexandria from.

2) Something small and mostly innocent acts as a catalyst for Rick to decide to take over Alexandria by force. He thinks he's doing the right thing, but its morally ambiguous at best, or at worst its pretty clear to us that he's the bad guy here.

3) We're about to find out something really fucked up about Alexandria that puts everyone in danger. Something to do with that W on the walker's forehead they killed outside the walls?


There are other scenarios too I guess, adjustment issues or a small rift leading to the death of someone in Rick's group (Sasha most likely) that creates drama going into next season, but that seems like more of a midseason thing, the full season will end on something much, much bigger.

This is the first season in a long while where we've gotten this far in without it starting to feel really obvious what's going to happen, I'm definitely pleased about that.

Knowing the basics of the source storyline has given me the exact opposite reaction to this half-season so far. I feel like I know, at least fairly well, what's coming not only the remainder of this season but also likely all of next season as well.

It's been the most challenging arc thus far for me to try to parse out TV vs Source universe and to make myself stick to only what's on screen in order to both judge & to emotionally respond. (The knowledge is really f'ing with me on the latter even more than the former)

Only some great individual moments (like Carol last night, Daryl's "dinner" last week, the ghosts that visited Tyrese) have really made this one work for me.

these last few episodes have been among my favorites. for a show that started off really poorly in the character development area, I feel they've gotten a lot better and it's been really interesting to see these folks in this new "foreign" environment. I've found it quite fascinating.

Oh, this seems like as a good a spot as any to mention what a fantastic job I thought they did in using that character and using it to develop Daryl's last night.

They used Aaron (right, that's his name?) to set up several moments that Reedus got just right IMO.

And the script was more subtle than TWD norms for character development -- aside from maybe the one about "the longer they're out here the closer they get to what they really are" -- in an episode that was otherwise totally lacking much subtlety.

I thought last night might very well have been the best work Reedus has done on the show so far ... but Ross Marquand had to hold up his end of the deal as Aaron in order all of that to work as well as it did.

I think I'm going to enjoy this series. Both of the lead actors are good. I do worry about the children though.

Isn't Alexandria basically the terminal stop in the comics? As in aren't all of the stories now going to be (essentially) person vs. person in a NBC Revolution type way?

I've kinda thought static type stories are generally poorly done on this show. I'm wondering what kind of long term appeal seasons 6/7 will have for most action oriented viewers.

I thought it was fairly obvious that there is another group scouting/stalking them. Didn't that lady say they had just banished a few people? Wouldn't it make sense that they may have found others and are going to try and take Alexandria for themselves?

I agree.

Maybe Jessies husband dies under suspicous circumstances during the conflict?

This adds more credence to the "Rick's group saves the day" theory. Deanna wasn't even posting lookouts. We still don't know what the deal is with the girl leaving and coming back. The zombies with the Ws of course. And no one is talking about the odd zombies cut in half from the visit to Noel's old hometown, which isn't that far away it seems.

I'm still hoping to see Morgan, too, at some point, although I am not sure how that works, since they're in Virginia now. Would he have followed all that way? Right now, it feels like all those hints on him in the first half of the season was just the showrunners screwing with us.

OK.

Remind me who Morgan is again

He's the black guy with the kid from the first episode of the entire show who couldn't shoot his zombie wife. His kid was later killed (off screen) and it appeared he went a little mad, holing up in a nearby town where Rick encountered him a couple seasons later.

He then appeared at the end of the first episode of this season to be following Rick's group after Terminus.

And then they did an extended look at him checking out the town where Bob got bit by the zombie and checking out the church, at the end of the midseason finale (or sometime around then). He found the note Abraham wrote to Rick before they had left for Washington DC (the first time).

He seemed sane again.

aha, couldn't remember his name.