Hey there trash bags! Love you guys. We got a pretty decent episode this week, mostly because there was no Carl. Let’s jump right in and check it out.
The cold open features a Carol montage. An upbeat jam plays as she murders a zomb while foraging for acorns, dons her best paisley print shirt/cardigan combo, bakes a bunch of cookies, and passes them out to the Alexandrians. She’s so cute. She gives some cookies to Tobin and he gives her props on her baking skills. Carol comes across Morgan and he asks her why she didn’t tell Rick about him keeping the Wolf dude locked up. He suggests that by keeping it secret, she is “a part of it”. She disses him and tells him to go away. I LOVE HER. Then, she leaves a cookie at Sam’s grave. Awwww.
THIS is why she didn’t tell Rick. OBVIOUSLY.
Rick has everyone assemble at the church to sermonize about the Negan situation. Which seems kinda pointless, considering that they already told the Hilltoppers they would do it and took their food. Rick tells the town that they need to make a preemptive strike against the Saviors. He claims, rightfully, that the Saviors would have found Alexandria eventually and would have attacked. Rick asks if anybody objects to the plan, and Morgan stands up. Sigh. Morgan thinks they should talk to Negan first, give them a choice, all life is precious, blah, blah, blah. Um, Morgan? Shut up. Rick asks the group if anyone else agrees with Morgan and of course they don’t. Rick is right, but also he’s a psycho and people who don’t agree with him usually die. Rick says they are going to kill them all and if anyone doesn’t like it, they can kick rocks.
WE KILL THEM ALL!!!! Peace be with you.
That night, Care Bear can’t sleep. She breaks out her dream journal and turns to a page with her kill list on it. She adds 7 Wolves to the ever growing list of people that she has forced to “look at the flowers”, bringing her total to 18. She seems sad about this even though basically everyone on the list was a dick. I’m talking to you Lizzie.
I guess Candle Woman was pregnant with triplets when she died
Maggie and Glenn are at their house, discussing the attack on the Saviors. She says that since she is the one who made the deal, she should come along on the Kill Them All campaign. Incredulously, Glenn allows this because contrivance. Baby Rhee is LIVID right now.
Really, dad?
Carol is walking around having a smoke, because nothing prepares you for a mass slaughter like smoking a months old cigarette. She finds Tobin on his porch and shares her cig. He tells her that he is worried about her going to face the Saviors the next day. She calls him an asshole and he calls her terrifying and a mom and they start frenching. It really came out of nowhere. I don’t understand how everyone on this show is getting play but Daryl. It’s…..upsetting.
We now get the Abe/Rosita breakup scene. He is packing up his things and he tells her that he is leaving. She asks him why. He responds “Why are dingleberries brown? It’s just the way shit is”. Not the time, Abe. Rosita demands an answer so he tells her that when he first met her, he thought she was the last woman on Earth, but she’s not. DAMNNNN! That was a third degree BURN right there. Besides, we all know he’s breaking up with her because of the necklace, right?
Bitch, don’t make me beat you with a canned good
Abe leaves Rosita standing there crying. Eugene comes in wearing a Virginia is for Lovers tee shirt and tries to make small talk with her. Heh. She slams the door in his face. I found Eugene almost tolerable in that scene. SEND HELP.
Tara and Denise are also nervous about the next day. Tara is joining in on the killing spree, and she tells Denise she loves her. I’m sorry, but we need to talk about that giant plate. The actress who plays Tara is OBVIOUSLY pregnant, so they thought they would try to hide it behind a huge plate.
You’re not fooling anybody, plate
When we were kids, my sister and I told our little brother that we were witches. We said that we could cast spells and make potions, the whole bit. We kept this going for months. Eventually, we told him that we would turn him into a warlock by making a potion for him to drink. The “potion” included shampoo, ketchup, orange pop, and other magical shit. He drank it, and shockingly DID NOT DIE. He was pretty disappointed when the potion failed to work, but we told him that he just wasn’t magical enough. (Love you, Jer). The point of this story is that even my charmingly naïve little brother would not fall for this shit, plate.
ANYWAY, the Hilltopper that is helping them, Andy (thanks closed captioning), is drawing them a terrible map of Negan’s compound. Even with the shittily rendered map, they still don’t know where the armory is or if they even have one. Rick’s plan is to kill them all while they are SLEEPING, Freddy Krueger style. Yes! He says they won’t have to break the door in because they are going to bring the Saviors Gregory’s head. PLEASE kill Gregory. PLEASE RICK.
Sigh. They don’t kill Gregory. Instead, they go out to find a Gregory doppelganger zombie.
Rosita confronts Carol about keeping Morgan’s secret. He pissed her off with his pacifist bullshit in the church. Carol keeps her in check though because Carol>Rosita. Carol says that if they tattle on Morgan everyone will find out about Denise. Um, did I miss something here? Find out WHAT about Denise? Is she the one who got Tara pregnant or something? Please explain this to me.
Glenn and Heath kill a zomb that vaguely resembles Gregory. Glenn says that if they cut the hair and trim the beard AND it’s dark, they might pass it off.
So zombies are getting haircuts now? Meanwhile, Carl is rocking the Dawson Leery? Okay.
Glenn and Heath discuss the fact that they are nervous about killing people because neither of them have ever done it. They’re not about that life, bro. Um, then maybe don’t go? Just a thought. The convo is as heavy-handed as we’ve come to expect from this show.
Which is to say, it’s about as subtle as Heath’s wig.
Rick goes over the plan AGAIN, mostly for our benefit. Cause we’re dumb. Hey Rick, you’re a pretty good recapper. You wanna finish this for me because all of this dialogue is putting me to sleep. Carol speaks for us all when she asks Rick why Maggie came along. He says it’s her choice, but I’m pretty sure I see Contrivance hiding behind on of those trees over there. Carol decides that she will stay on the perimeter with Maggie so they can both be useless.
Rick checks out the “Gregory” head. The nose isn’t quite right. Naturally, Rick picks up the head and punches it in the face multiple times. AS YOU DO. He really cracks my shit up, I’m telling ya.
Can you blame Michonne for loving him? Dude is hilarious.
Rick says that they will claim that Gregory fought back when they were fake murdering him. Jesus says “I guess there’s no reason to be subtle about it”, basically summing up the entire philosophy of this show’s writers. Andy says that the Saviors are scary but they ain’t got nothing on Rick. Hahahaha! Word.
That night, Andy rolls up to Negan’s compound with “Gregory”’s head. He announces himself as Eddie, so I don’t know what the fuck his name is. I’m sticking with Andy for now. Anyway, the 2 guards come out and inspect the head. The whole time they are berating Andy and calling him names. I’m sad they have to die. They are pretty funny.
THIS Gregory is much more attractive than the real Gregory
The guards buy it, and one of them heads inside to get the Hilltop hostage. While he is gone, my babe Daryl pops out of nowhere and slits the other guard’s throat. Get em D! When the other guard returns with the hostage, Michonne katanas him in the stomach. The gang sends Andy and the hostage back to Hilltop to ensure the deal stays on.
The Grimes Gang heads inside. They break into groups to better search for the armory. Then, we get a pretty awesome sequence in which the gang goes around killing people while they sleep. Also, the music in this sequence is pretty good. First, Rick silently stabs a dude in his head while Daryl and Michonne keep watch. Next, Glenn and Heath enter a room with 2 sleeping Saviors in it. Glenn quietly creeps on one and readies his knife. He hesitates for a while before stabbing the dude. After he stabs the dude, he cries silently.
Hey, just because you are on a mass murdering spree in the zombie apocalypse doesn’t mean you don’t have time for some self-reflection.
Now it’s Heath’s turn to kill. He clearly does not want to do it. Once again, I must ask WHY DID YOU COME? Glenn steps in and does it for him because Glenn is a giver. The camera pans to some photos on the wall of people with their heads bashed in, in case you forgot that the dudes getting murdered were psycho. I feel that this is a terrible directorial decision and that it is much more interesting to portray the Grimes gang as silent killers. Sure, these dudes are BAD, but did Rick and the gang even know to what extent before killing them all? No. It’s better to make the audience explore feelings of ambiguity towards the gang. Let us see the gray areas of their moralism play out without beating us over the head with the idea that they are the “good guys”. But then again, they have the most watched show on television and I just write recaps.
Anyway, we now cut to the car where Jesus, Gabe, and Tara are doing nothing. Tara asks Fr. Gabe if he’s still a priest and he says he is. Which we could infer from the fact that he’s still wearing his clerical collar, but let’s not strain our little brains too hard. Tara tells Gabe that she told Denise she loved her because she was scared of never seeing her again. Cool story, bro.
Just because I’m a priest doesn’t mean I want to hear your inane confessions, Tara. I WAS ON THE WIRE!
Back inside, Abe and Sasha are creeping around on what I guess is their first date. One of the Saviors comes out of a room and stabs Abe. Sasha grabs the dude and stabs him in the stomach. Unfortunately, she doesn’t kill him before he pulls the alarm.
From outside, Maggie and Carol hear the alarm sound. Maggie starts running inside to help, with absolutely no regard for her unborn fetus. Carol stops her because Carol is actually smart.
Maggie is the poster child for post-apocalyptic feminism
The alarm alerts the Saviors to the intruders and they all come running out, ready to fight. Rick is blasting them away with his machine gun. Aaron gets trapped in a room with one of the Saviors and he has to stab him and kill him. As Aaron kills the dude he says “If it wasn’t you, it was gonna be us”. Thanks for letting him know that Aaron. I’m sure he took great comfort in those words as he was being eviscerated. But more importantly, do you guys GET IT? It was the Saviors or them. GOT THAT? Okay.
We get another cool action sequence in which the Grimes Gang fucks the Saviors UP, as per ush. Tara is even outside shooting dudes as they run out. Get it girl, with your pregnant self. Heath is blasting dudes away left and right so I guess he got over those moral qualms he had 2 SECONDS AGO. Oh, its okay now because these dudes are awake? Oh. Okay.
They seem totally cool with this
Father Gabe walks up on a Savior that is lying hurt in the field. He recites a prayer and then shoots the dude. Yes, the prayer thing is totally derivative but at least Father Gabe is being interesting now. I’m gonna let that one slide.
The next morning, the gang comes outside, completely unscathed and feeling pretty self-satisfied. The music kicks in and it’s Hozier, who is amazing and also hot, but I don’t particularly understand this music choice. Heath and Tara say their goodbyes and head out on some 2 week supply run. Can I come, guys? We cut to Morgan, back in Alexandria, welding something. I couldn’t tell what it was, but it’s sure to be annoying. Michonne asks Rick “Which one is Negan?”. Like it was gonna be that easy, girl. Some dude comes driving out on Daryl’s motorcycle, trying to escape but Rosita shoots him in the chest.
I hid all night but I thought now was a good time to escape
Daryl kicks the dude’s ass and Rick gets ready to shoot him in the head. Right then, a woman’s voice comes over the dude’s walkie and tells the gang that they have Maggie and Carol. Oh snap!
Well, that’s it for this week kids. I know it doesn’t seem like it but I liked this episode, especially the stealth murders. What did you all think? Hit me up in the comments and let’s chat. Love you guys. But you knew that.
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