Didn't we already see this episode, back when our merry band hit Negan's outposts the first time?

That was just ... I mean, talk about an hour's worth of filler. It technically didn't lack action per se -- and maybe they think will reverse the viewer erosion -- but that felt like I'd just wasted an hour of my life.

It was all right.

I found it kind of confusing. I wasn't sure what exactly everyone was doing and why.

The prolonged gun battle outside with the cars just didn't feel right. I wasn't sure what they were trying to accomplish either in general or during any specific moment. People's location was hard to follow. They seemed to be using an awful lot of bullets. It was just kind of poorly executed and choreographed.

Since when did Morgan become John Wick?

The Morales call back was interesting.

I liked Rick finding the baby room, though it's unclear as why the baby was being held in some remote location. That might be explained later, or not.

Some interesting moments, for sure, but overall not super exciting despite all of the tension and action trying to make it so.

My wife and I both thought last night's episode was dull dull dull.

Tons of action. Nothing but action. But it was a bunch of B-Cast people spraying a bunch of bullets around, with no meaning. Should I care about the bad guy who was trying to figure out the plan? Or random Kingdom / Hilltop / Alexandria people wandering through nameless hallways?

Right now I see a cast which is much too big. Maybe it worked in the comics (it did), but it doesn't work on the TV show. When you show me that many people, I don't care about any of them.

Trying to get psyched for tonight's episode. Hope its better than last week.

Any theories on Rick's flashback moments?

Eh, I guess it was okay. Lots of killing.

The Jesus and Morgan fight scene was nice. The buildup between kill'em vs let them live is interesting. Next week looks like more of the same.

I give this week higher marks than last week, so that's something I guess.

Not sure I loved some of the story elements all that much but some of the little things that worked better this week to me made some difference.

I also thought they did a better job of not making all the cuts seems quite so much of a clusterfuck.

Eh, not a great episode IMO. Three episodes pretty much the same.

-- Carol could have shot the 3 loading the machine gun no problem
-- A machine gun at close to point blank couldn't take care of a motorcycle and jeep
-- Lost alot of respect for King E. Can't take care of a nerd and then acting like a wuss for pretty much the 60 min

On the other hand, the short on the red machete looks interesting.

The death I've dreaded all season. Not sure whether that sense of dread looming over the show will help me going forward or not.

Strongly Disagree. I loved the episode. I thought it was great. Definitely showed just how great the show can and has been when they do things right. Sadly, episodes like this have been the exception, not the rule over the last season or two.

My wife said she'd have rather had the King die than the tiger. I kinda agree.

This season has been pretty "meh" so far.

Was definitely my favorite episode of the season. Definitely brought me in more emotionally that I had been in a while.

I guess they cut costs by holding off the Negan & Ganriel stuff for 3 episodes.

The show episodes feel like its entirely about big moment ep1, filler, filler, filler, setup finale, finale.

And maybe thats essentially what this show, and most shows for that matter, really are at the end of the day when you boil them down. But I felt like we got some good revelations and new interesting things happening in those filler episodes. I haven't felt that way the past 3 episodes though. Yes, the tiger died saving King E...but I really didn't care by that point. The episode had so many cliche moments like the over the top guy that took him hostage, Carol pulling ninja stuff even though she clearly isn't physically able to make a dive roll behind the car. It just didn't matter to me by that point.

I was just hoping the episode would end. Such a boring waste of time. Negan has been great, but the rest of the last season or two has been awful.

Yeah, that guy was channeling Jim Carrey big time.

Also, a guy with a .50 cal machine gun spraying in full automatic fire at a car should be able to hit it, even if it is slowly moving from side to side on a straight road.

Did the backstage people completely change over between last season and this season? This show has been very good up until now, and all of a sudden it is just terrible. I want it to be good. I loved the comics. But maybe for the first time, the material that made the comics good isn't conveying over to the screen.

I'm not looking forward to another 40 minutes next week of random people that I don't care about, spraying 1,000 bullets at other people that i don't care about. It's very sad that I'm just hoping for people to die, so that I don't see their characters again. They need to cut the cast into about 25% of what it is, and make us care again. So GO ZOMBIES GO!!!!

I dunno, this cast -- oversized from a practical standpoint as it is -- feels more watchable than the steady stream of "just fucking DIE already" characters that we had (Laurie, the annoying a.f. blonde chick Andrea).

They're somewhat generic at times, but at least not specifically annoying to me by their very presence.

Yup, this is how I feel for the past 3 episodes.

Looking forward to Negan and Gabriel next week to break the random people spraying bullets.

At least with characters like Laurie, time was invested and they meant something to the storyline other than being fodder.

I had a similar issue with the .50 cal chase scene. Not only did him missing that much make any sense, they actually had him hit Rick's jeep, only to have the .50 cal bullets ricochet off it. No. That bullet would punch right through that jeep and kill it. It's a massive gun.

The one thing I liked about this episode, over the prior two, that it wasn't largely about random people spraying bullets at each other. It was pretty much contained to Carol, Ezekiel, and Jerry, with Rick and Darryl at the end. That made the episode work for me. I thought the guy playing Ezekiel did a fantastic job with the whole thing and I really enjoyed the emotional impact of the character's arc. Unlike the prior two episodes, which was a bunch of sound and fury signifying nothing (other than, apparently, they don't need to worry about ammo anymore and whoever choreographs their fights scenes doesn't know what they are doing), this episode had some solid emotional heft and impact to me, at least.

I really quite like both the actor and character of Ezekiel. He matters to me. Jerry is fucking sweet, too. Deuces! Also, I don't mind Carol being a bad ass ninja. She's Carol. She deserves it and has earned it. Still one of the most impressive character arcs ever in the history of TV.

They had an entire episode last year focused on making ONE bullet. I know they got guns and ammo from the Women's Compound, but how much ammo could they possibly have? Apparently, all of it. All of the ammo, because even after giving away half of it to the Garbage Weirdos, they still gots more than plenty to spare.

Andrea was awful. Some of the episode with her and the Governor were some of the worst in the series. The most egregious being the one where he stalked her throw the woods and into some abandon factory or something like some stupid villain in a cheap, rate slasher flick.

While I think the show has, in large part, been superior to the comic in pretty much ever way, the character of Andrea is not one of those ways.

Her work in that whole season w/Guv was just horrible. I don't think I can ever watch her in anything again it was so bad.

They did the character no favors by making the changes to it for TV. From what I know of the comic, she was probably more one-dimensional there but at least she served a purpose beyond simply being incredibly f'n annoying.

Much better episode last night. Enjoyed the Negan-Gabriel interaction and also the alpha males fight scene.

I thought Gabriel should have taken one for the team and just held open the door and let zombies pour in before Negan used the zombie smell trick.

Pretty easily the best episode of the (half) season to me.

Funny how that works, put your best character & best actor on screen a fair bit, the quality goes up.

Nah, just shoot him.

Rick trying to negotiate with the weirdos is pretty strange (how can he ever trust them again?). I would take care of Negan and then get my vengeance on those rats.

I loved that episode.

It even showed some humanity for Negan. A tinge of why he became like that, but mostly why he is like that. And you see that the Saviors without Negan would not have lasted long at all, it was going to fall apart really quickly.

In this case, I would say that 1,000 words beat 1,000 bullets quite easily.

Oh any theories on the helicopter? I don't remember it in the comics (but have stopped reading them a while now).

All in all it's been a 2 star season.

Best part this week was Carol's choice between helping E and shooting bad guys. It felt like a throwback to the game. A real choice, where both outcomes are bad end up with a bad thing happening. Of course, after they made it happen, while I was reveling in the moment, they blew it with the dumb as fuck chase scene.

Negan and Gabriel was probably the best part, and you guys are right, there's been so much wasted time with fighting, stupid tactics and god, remember when firing a gun was a really bad thing?

It draws bad guys, and zombies. Now they can't seem to stop. Have unlimited ammo, and fire at will without worry of any of the repercussions that they set up in earlier seasons.

It's still just a live action comic strip. A lot of the realism was stripped away seasons ago. We can't expect complete adherence to realism when it's based on comics.

Nice episode. Lots of things happening, no longer mindless shootings.

Like Carl and Siddiq, looking forward to see how that evolves.

Rocket launcher was a little too much.

Rick being stupid.

The Hilltop situation is not that hard. Kill the "leaders" first, then kill anyone else that doesn't look cowed (e.g. like most of them).

King E still being a wuss.

Good to see Carol and the gang (other than for Rick) being focused.

Gotta think that helicopter is involved in the character crossover that was revealed on Talking Dead.

Good thought but still can't figure out how they will do it. It is a crossover from the East to West coast.

I liked the last 2 episodes. More focus on the individual characters.

I really dislike Ezekiel in this show. Hopefully whatever they are doing to him will make him less cartoony, whatever it is about him it just doesn't work on the TV show.

Nice to see Carl, and good to see the character growing up. Also Michonne used to be a favorite of mine, hopefully they will go back to what made her great.

Pretty good episode tonight (other than for the Rick filler, waste of time).

I liked the focus on Eugene.

Mid-season finale thoughts:

- They fell back into one of the most annoying plot devices the show has put forth to date - the all-powerful and all-knowing Saviors. They pulled this stunt during the Fifth(?) season finale when the Saviors put up all of those roadblocks, managed to corral Rick and his entire group into that forest, surround them and capture them. They pulled off very similar feats last night - managing to take over The Kingdom (not too hard given all of their warriors were wiped out), take over Alexandria, and set up a road block to blackmail The Hilltop into turning around and going back.

They did this with a ton of people, plenty of cars, and a significant amount of guns and ammunition. This all despite the fact that, they had all of their outposts taken out where many Saviors were killed, had 30+ people captured at Hilltop, and had the Sanctuary surrounded by a horde. Apparently all of that didn't put a dent into the Saviors man power, guns, ammo, etc.

It's irritating.

- That said, there were some solid moments last night. I liked the Ezekiel stuff and Maggie was great.

- Poor Carl.

Yeah, I was hoping they'd wrap up the Negan storyline and they just undid the whole season in the finale. Saviors miraculously get out of it and regain power and they didn't even show how.

Every parent in the world couldnt believe Michonne left that toddler by herself playing next to the creek unsupervised.

YES!

Wasn't a great episode IMO.

I did like the Carl surprise and the deviation from the comics (the kid has gotta go to college), Eugene's self-recrimination, and Maggie the executioner.

Not a big fan of the Negan arc (too much) and the past season and this half-season mostly sucked. The plot lines and pacing just seems off to me.

I can't believe Chandler Riggs' dad is going off on AMC and the show runners for killing off Carl. He should be bending over backwards to thank them for allowing his not-very-talented kid star on one of the most popular shows on TV over the last several years. The kid lucked out big time. It was a good run. It's over. Move on.

Finally got through the mid season. This season has had a few good moments, but otherwise, it's been uneven and really struggles to have any continuity. I just didn't feel very engaged in the episode. As someone said, they undid a lot of the season, rolled out old tropes with the Saviors. They have so many story lines going on that it's just too hard to really keep track of who is where and what each of them are doing, thinking, etc.

This season is a great big meh so far. Entertaining, but it continues to trend down.

I must have not been paying attention, is Carl dead? He was in the sewer and looked like he had some shrapnel wound or something (I assume that's what it was since he was next to the explosions)...

Looked like bite marks

Yeah he's been bit. It happened earlier in the season and he's been keeping it a secret. Scott Gimple said in Talking Dead that they were sure that everyone figured it out when it happened. The Mrs, actually said something about it when it did (earlier episode) because it was handled so nebulously.

Last week's Carl episode was great. Sorry to see him go (and who needs college anyway, he's probably already set for life). The montage of him enjoying life when he knew he was going to die was really well done.

Tonight's was eh, not much going on but did enjoy the last scene with Rick (why are you always so "greasy" when Michone isn't?) and Negan on the telephone.

The gap between Negan's scenes & almost everything else for the past year is just remarkable.

At this point, he's starting to look like Lenny James next to the FTWD cast.

Primarily a Father Gabriel and Tara & Dwight episode.

The Gabriel stuff just seemed "off" to me and how they ended it meant I wasted my time. After all this, no need to justify or prove to me about the loss in faith. Now if it was to redeem his faith, that would have been cool.

Not a great episode.

For the umpteenth time, ready for this Negan arc to end (e.g. first half of season wasted with senseless shooting, wasted opportunities, and bizarre Rick w/dumpster folks).

I did like the reunion at the end, thought that was well done.

Problem is, once it does, about all that's left is waiting for Darryl to be killed off.

Yeah, read up on some recent TWD comics and the Negan character is still around.

Maybe time for them to make a big break with Carl's death and do something (not in the comics) imaginative and streamline the cast - is Enid needed anymore, leave Maggie behind at the Hilltop while the gang goes gallivanting, kill of Gabriel and Jadis etc.?

Finally caught up. As others have said kind of choatic and all over the place. At least there is action, some of the previous seasons have really dragged in the middle episodes. I think I only stick with it because of my committment but it still entertains me enough.

Few thoughts/questions...
1) Was it my imagination or was there a helicopter in one of the scenes earlier in the year? (It possible I am confusing this show with Fear) If so the helipad at the dumpster is somewhat intriguing. Otherwise why waste so much time on the dumpster people? There has to be some payoff right?

2) So Negan is going to blast guts at them? Didn't they cover themselves in guts for like the first 4 seasons to walk among the dead? Has this virus gotten stronger?

There was a helicopter sighting in TWD. Not sure about how it ties to Jadis/Dumpster folks but one theory is this how Morgan gets to the Fear (west coast) with the helicopter.

They did cover themselves with gunk previously so they can walk undetected among the zombies. However, they show how Gabriel got some infection from doing that (I think) and so it can be 'weaponized' also.

Perhaps it's just that the continuity is getting weaker ;)

The role of the walker guts in the comic seems to have been somewhat more specific than the "let's just fling 'em over the wall" version that Negan gave on TV.

Decent episode.

I like the introduction of the new group and looking forward to see how that develops. Re: the "knowledge" its not as if they couldn't go to an abandoned library/bookstore to find the same thing.

Maggie vs Michonne and the right thing to do was pretty cool. Glad it turned out well vs Maggie going downhill.

Rick and Negan fighting was a yawner (kinda knew neither one was going to die) and why did they have to reintroduce you know who.

Simon and Dwight was a nice setup for something.

I liked last night's episode. More of Maggie's growing leadership skills and creds. The Hilltop walkers breaking free and roaming around was well done (the slumber party/massacre was nice). Good action that wasn't just mindless, filler shootups. I think Simon is going to get his soon.

I would have liked to see a Negan and Jardis scene to get a hint on out what was going on there. The kid that let the imprisoned Saviors free was just stupid (where were the guards)?

Not crazy about some of the stories they've chosen to tell, but I thought tonight did a reasonably good job of telling them (if that makes sense)

Not bad episode but definitely better than avg episode from 1H of the season.

I liked how Jadis-Negan was resolved and the setup for the future but getting there was just weird and didn't like it. More mysteries with Jadis re: helicopter and her nice digs, really wish she would go away already.

Morgan and Rick was pretty cool. Somehow though, you would think Rick's anger would be directed against the main group in Sanctuary vs the prisoners but liked the fight scenes.

I like how Carol is struggling to reclaim her humanity (?) but TBH wouldn't mind her being the Rambo she once was (seems as if there are too many internal conflict/struggles threads already). Could have done without finding the kid, I think he is a goner.

Solid episode except for the weird Aaron scene.

I would have like to see how Eugene played out, him being brought back to the compound but think the bad bullets is a foreshadowing of something next week, so its an interesting angle.

Never really liked Simon so glad he is gone. Poor Dwight. TBH, they have plenty of chances to cap Negan with a gun so their fault.

Regardless of the last scene with Negan, hoping there will be a "peaceful" resolution which will setup next season for truly rebuilding vs mindless shooting (which I think is played out and pretty boring now).

The first 30 mins or so felt very dragged out to me. And I'm sure the return of Aaron & that angle (which I don't care about) played a part in that.

I find the would-be Amazonian enclave about as interesting as the Klingon trash people and just another bit of annoying filler.

I'd say the trash people look more Romulan than Klingon. ;)

I hope they kill off Eugene. Sick of him. In general, I'm thinking I might punch out after the season ends.

One of the problems for me at this point is that I feel weary with a number of characters. Eugene, Aaron, this season's fairly neutered Jesus, Maggie, and almost anyone that seems conflicted about how to survive. I'm over Tara, I'm over almost everybody.

I mean, hell, Gregory has been little more than an annoying character since he was introduced but his outburst last night might have been one of the most eyecatching 60-90 seconds stretches of this entire half-season.

It was on of the better episodes this season, which says more about the season than it does about this episode.

I am very much over Tara and Darryl debating about Dwight. No one cares about Dwight. Stop trying to make Dwight happen. Thankfully, this particular plot line seems like it will be resolved next episode.

Rick has become officially more evil than Negan. Though, what I suppose they are setting up, is that Rick is so moved by Carl's note that he stops his psychopathic ways (maybe just for an episode) and Negan does not to restore the balance of evil.

Aaron is pretty scrappy, but I have no idea what his plan was. Just hang around the outskirts, yelling at them whenever he crosses paths, and then hoping, eventually, they'll come around to his point? Solid plan, Aaron!

I'll miss Simon. He was usually pretty entertaining.

Looking forward to Fear & Morgan joining the team.

The first season with the Johnny Depp wannabe sucked but I thought last season was pretty good.

So how is Morgan joining the Fear team? I saw the bumper ad on ESPN and it made no sense.

Still a mystery (presumably one solved tonight) as to his method of travel.

Hiking? Helicopter? Abducted by aliens? All still in play.

An okay episode but somewhat underwhelming for a finale.

A little too much deus machina for me.

Typical TWD where there are some glaring "they wouldn't have done that".

Unfortunately, they didn't let Negan die. I don't need another season (or two) of him.

Without him, they don't have much that's interesting enough to put on screen left at this point.

Okay, Jerry & Ezekiel should be paired in a buddy sitcom, but other than them they've pretty well written the interesting (and in some cases even the tolerable) out of almost everyone. A few might be salvageable but that about it.

Maybe they should have taken this opportunity to make a clear break with the comics.

Kill of Negan, split the party up ala Morgan, bring in fresh characters and scenarios.

TBH, tired of seeing Rick's greasy hair and with Carl dead, it would have been perfect to see him go.

I've seen that notion from several quarters, but honestly I lean in the other direction. I simply have more faith in the original material to be watchable than I have in whatever the TV creatives come up with.

Right now the one thing that seems to get the most agreement is that what they're doing isn't working nearly as well as it should/could be.

I really enjoyed the season finale. And it was pretty damn close to the comics. When Negan got what was coming to him, my wife reeled in surprise, it was great to see!

My biggest problem with this season is that no one looked strong. Being under Negan's thumb for two complete seasons has really damaged a lot of characters. Remember Michonne and the machete? Remember Carol kicking ass whenever they needed it? None of that has happened for two years. It's been scene after scene of them looking sad. It's not why I watch. Hopefully in the next season, they can get back to what made the strong characters strong.

Anyways, I do hope that that the horde is exactly what we all think it will be, and that they stick to the comics there as well.

I don't know how they'll pull it off since Carl is a major player in the next storyline though, but I am looking forward to it!

As someone who hasn't read the comic, but is interested in what your thoughts are, can you {spoiler} it so I can have an idea?

I both _don't_ want to deal with that storyline and feel like they're nuts if they don't do it.

I'm in the camp that says that they're going to skip it, at least for S9.

I don't know if I can tell you anything without ruining it though. But it should help bring walkers back into the storyline as a threat, which is a good thing since they were basically just set decorations this past season.

fwiw, I did my first podcast on Anchor about the season finale. I mean, yeah, I'm kinda hyping the existence of that with this post I guess but it IS relevant to the topic in this case.

https://anchor.fm/jonsthreecents/epi...-Finale-e1bapc

Just binged the 2nd half of the season. I dunno, I was never in love with the show from a writing perspective, but at least the characters had some charm to them. I'm not sure if there's any character I care about right now outside of Neegan. JDM is just so damn charismatic that he overshadows EVERYONE else currently on the canvas. Problem is there really isn't any redemption for his character given what he did, at least one that I would buy.

Also, if I see another scene where one person decides to do something and another person says they'll come with, only for a long melodrama to break out over staying or going, I'm going to shoot myself. And I'm not even infected.

Yeah, I'm in the "Neegan is the only interesting character" camp.

Frankly, the large cast of characters confuses the heck out of me as they pick up plot lines that haven't been touched for weeks at a time. Having Neegan in a scene draws much more interest from me than the countless, "oh yeah, she's the girl who wears the hat" type of character.

I agree with you about the cast. Look at Carl's story. It defines the 2nd half of the season, and possibly seasons to come. However, he barely had any screentime at all during the first half of the season.

There has definitely been way too much "yeah she's the one that did something 2 seasons ago", and have absolutely no role in the show now other than taking up screen time once every 3-4 episodes.

I'm okay with it. The stupidity was pissing me off

So i have to say, the news that broke today seems a bit surprising, coming out before the season starts.

Kinda saw it coming, whether for $ reasons or simply actor reasons. I was already on the fence about whether to watch the next half season, this just shoves me farther along that fence.

That's not so much any sort of character/actor loyalty or love, it's just that the more deviation from the source material, the weaker the show has become IMO.

Whew, no more greasy hair Rick with his stupid decision making. The series has been in a decline but maybe freeing away from Rick will allow the show to grow in other more interesting ways.

I don't believe they have the writing talent for that to happen. The show is dead, but the body was so robust that it'll take it another 2-3 seasons to stop twitching.

I like the dead body metaphor! Quite appropriate for a zombie series.

I do have hope. I think Fear of the Walking Dead has gotten better with each season.

It woulda had to lol.

First season was quite possibly the worst acting I've ever seen on television. Removing nearly all of the original cast was a mercy killing.

Catching up on this season and just finished watching episode 1.

A somewhat boring episode but I still surprisingly enjoyed it. It was good to watch an episode on rebuilding and internal politics vs shooting/war all the time. It still had decent zombie kills too.

Carol & the King doesn't seem right. Gregory's punishment was also off, a bullet would have been better. Maggie becoming more hardass fits.

Rick's mace makes a lot of sense vs Michonne's katana (sharpening it must be a bitch).

Dropped by the local B&N, got a cup of coffee and read through TWD vol 30.

I like the new (presumed) antagonists and how its setting up class warfare.

Episode 2 was pretty good also. Enjoyed the increasing tension between leftover Negan Saviors and the rest, Maggie's introspection. Some good zombie skull crushing. Carol seems to be mellowing out but we know, deep down, the "look at the flowers" killer is still in here.

The only thing that was off was the trash lady and the priest.

.

Under the new (alleged) showrunner, this is rapidly becoming unwatchable.

It's not The Walking Dead, it's (Post)Modern Family or some other shit.

Episode 3 was okay. Not a lot of zombie killing though.

I guess they are trying to give Rick a nice send off. More scenes with Michonne and daughter, talking about rebuilding, kumbaya with everyone/Saviors etc.

The Saviors vs others conclusion was pretty good. I like how Maggie & Daryl just walked away (and the setup for next week).

I get Rick wanting to save some of the redeemable, peripheral Savior workers but there are clearly some Saviors that just deserve to die. Stupid risk to keep them around, just bump them off.

Stupid shit - Maggie taking unnecessary risks in approaching the cabin. More Jadis BS (tired of her).

Better than the shoot-shoot-mindless shooting-more shooting-stupid Rick decisions-more shooting ...

I'm willing to give them a little more room. Rick is gone in 2 more episodes so there's hope it'll shake things up for the better (or not).

At this point I can only assume Rick's manner of departure will lead to everyone inanely sitting around a campfire holding hands.

Angela Kang is worse than useless & couldn't run a hot knife through butter, much less helm a (once) hit show.

Who becomes the star of the show once Rick is gone?

I can see Maggie, but I also heard that she is leaving by the end of this season.

While I do like Carol, Darryl and Michonne, I"m not sure if they can elevate into "main character" status.

I am enjoying this season so far, it's different at least. And as Edward64 said, the mindless repetitive shooting is done for now, that was boring as hell last year. I'd rather get to know the characters on the show, and then when they die it means a lot more.

The cast is so large right now, they desperately need a culling. And that could very well be coming what I considered to be the most shocking moment in Walking Dead comics.

YMMV, but the first three episodes of this season have been much better than almost anything the prior two seasons had to offer. Any low ratings for this show are a result of general fatigue and the largely poor to mediocre run that was the last two years or so.

Yeah, my mileage definitely varies.

I was pretty (closer to very) lukewarm about the start of this season already. The first three episodes combined probably didn't have an hour I would call watchable, certainly not a total hour I'd call enjoyable.

While I enjoyed this week perhaps the least of the three so far, I'll give them credit for the Oceanside twist. Never mind the bad performances (Cindy/Cyndi/Syndi/Whatever reminds me of a high school kid told to 'emote') the twist itself I didn't see coming & that was good.

Overall The writing has gotten downright painful and in some instances the acting isn't helping. (Maggie in particular, who appears to be losing her ability to hit the accent & looks like she's almost phoning her work in now)

I'm fine with the culling that is to come, not sure if that can fix things though.

This episode is going down quickly.

Way too much philosophical discussions and psychological mind games in the first 30 min.

I'll give 'em (some) credit -- stupid setup aside -- Andrew Lincoln handled the scene with Darryl in the pit well.

But the difference, at this point, in JDM speaking and pretty much anyone else on the show speaking is stark.

Not a great episode IMO.

Trash woman and Gabriel was senseless and waste of time. The showdown between Carol and Survivors seem too short to really matter in the show.

Team work between Rick and Darryl was good -- "take my hand brother" was cool.

It seems like it largely existed to put the horse into play (that is where it came from, right?)

Oh, and I asked my FB this but I'll ask here too.

If someone has the ep DVR'ed would you check to see if I really saw something or if I just imagined it?

Right after R & D exit the pit, they're attacked by two walkers (one each). Rick dispatches his & then Darryl quickly puts another one down, it's Darryl's that I want someone to look at: was it my imagination or was it wearing a Freddy Kruger (style) sweater?

That just feels like a completely easter egg thing that they'd do

This has been the best stretch of episodes in a long while.

This show is on a respirator right now.

We don't agree all that often, so I have to make note of this.

The first really 5 hours I guess (with overruns) have produced less than an hour
of entertaining television with the rest being an exercise in tedium.

I've come to hate Angela Kang so fucking bad that I couldn't even watch TD with JDM & Michael Rooker because they had that talentless #$@$ on the couch.