Spoilers through Season 8 of 'The Walking Dead' follow.
Sunday night's episode of The Walking Dead is the perfect example of everything wrong with this ridiculous television show. Ludicrous action scenes, repetitive dialogue and a bunch of extras getting zombified all conspire to create one of the most ridiculous, stupid episodes this show has ever offered up. 'Do Not Send Us Astray' should have been called 'Kill The Extras.' Or maybe 'That Kid Henry Is Stupid As A Brick.'
Yes, it was that silly. Let me count the ways:
Kill All Extras
A whole bunch of characters died tonight, but only one was anyone we were familiar with. I had to look up his name since we haven't seen much of Carol's old fling lately. Tobin shows up just in time to die from a fever caused by the Saviors' zombified weapons. He turns and starts feasting on unsuspecting Hilltop folk, all of whom are extras we've literally never seen before.
This is so stupid and annoying. The Walking Dead introduced a handful of new characters tonight just to kill them off. One was a...doctor lady maybe? But they didn't have a doctor at Hilltop so I'm not sure who she was. She yelled at Siddiq a bunch for no reason, so that's something. Zombie Tobin snuck up on her and killed her the same way he killed his first victim, because Zombie Tobin has a special sneak-up-bite-the-neck technique.
Another extra praised Maggie's leadership (something we're getting a bunch of because the show really wants us to know how Tough Maggie is and what a Good Leader she is, so get ready for lots of exposition to that effect) and later succumbed to his wounds, also turning into a zombie. All hell breaks loose...
...and a bunch more extras we don't know and don't care about are killed. How tragic. I'm just so heartbroken that that one guy in the bed upstairs is a goner. Man I loved that guy, he was so...uh...brave and stuff. Such a decent man, hate to see him go that way. I'm gonna name him Ralph. Poor Ralph. They took you too young, Ralph.
It's a cruel universe, folks. I guess that's why you should post guards. Like, seriously AMC, your writers have concocted an entire episode built around the idea that these hardened survivors of the zombie apocalypse wouldn't even post guards and lookouts to make sure this kind of thing doesn't happen.
Speaking of posting guards, I guess in this particular episode there were also no guards posted on the prisoners, because that stupid kid Henry is able to just go up to them and demand to know who killed his brother. This kid may be the dumbest kid The Walking Dead has ever seen (and that's saying something.) Instead of standing outside the cage and demanding to know his brother's killer he opens the cage and goes in. Because one kid can absolutely stop thirty-eight fully grown men from escaping all by himself. Also, how is it that Henry has the key? Who gave him the key? Do they just leave it lying around?
I'm sorry, dear readers, I cannot wrap my brain around this level of stupidity and bad writing. This is a hack job. Lazy, pretentious and absurd. AMC is riding on this show's success and letting what was once a decent TV show go down in flames. You have to either be incredibly arrogant or just utterly sapped of talent to come up with this garbage.
The Fight
The walker feast wasn't the only bit where extras are killed en masse. Simon leads the Savior assault on the Hilltop and I literally don't understand anybody's strategy here. I swear the writers on this show make these characters do the stupidest nonsense whenever battle is concerned (and all the time, really.) I guess Simon's plan is to send his men headlong through the gate and Maggie's strategy is to let them through the gate so they can shoot at them. Simon's people have so few bullets they're using bow and arrow and melee weapons almost exclusively. Against assault rifles. Alrighty then.
Later, the survivors all go into Gregory's mansion and kill all the lights in the yard. Simon's entire force was hiding behind one bus somehow. Seriously, they all come out from behind this one bus and then walk across the open yard toward the building whistling to let the good guys know they're coming.
Shockingly, the good guys turn on some lights and shoot at the Saviors who are all bunched together in the open. It's a miracle they aren't all killed at this point, but I guess nobody can shoot to save their lives in this abomination of a TV show. This entire battle sequence was just absurd. Of course, Maggie is super upset when Simon and some others get away, but that's what you get for not posting anyone on the perimeter to intercept anyone trying to escape.
Scattered Thoughts
Other stuff happened:
- Morgan is seeing visions of Gavin for some reason. He keeps saying "You know what it is." Is this the first time we've seen Morgan with hallucinations? Why Gavin? Run, Morgan. Run for Fear the Walking Dead where you can get some decent writing for your character!
- Rick explains to Michonne and Maggie that he tried to kill Negan and failed. He leaves out all the details of why that attempt was so utterly lame and pathetic.
- Maggie sure looks serious all the time. Her referring to herself as "The Widow" is kind of arrogant, though, isn't it? She's far from the only widow in this zombie apocalypse, after all.
- Enid, man. Please just make her go away.
- Tara got shot by Dwight to save her from Simon's ax. Daryl is super mad about this because he feels emasculated by Dwight or something. He touched his crossbow and made him listen to crappy music. At least Tara is finally realizing that Dwight was just in the same situation she was in with the Governor. She was a lot less annoying this episode. Too bad they're going to have to cut off her arm now.
Suffice to say, I wasn't a fan of tonight's episode. They've had some better moments in the second half of the season, but this was not one of them. Insufferably bad writing will do that. When I wasn't scoffing at how absurd it all was I just felt bored.
The Walking Dead needs a radical overhaul to survive. I'm not holding my breath.
Let me know why I'm wrong on Twitter or Facebook, and thanks for stopping by! Check out our latest Walking Dead podcast below.
