“That’s what you worry about?”
Poor Sasha. Who could have guessed that out of everyone, she’s
adapting to Alexandria the least? As in, not at all? Even Daryl, the Great
Unshowered One, is warming up to Aaron and Eric and their promise of motorcycle
parts. But Sasha can’t handle being around other people, is taking her rage out
on happy family portraits that she shoots into shards of glass and wooden
frames, and flips out at the welcome party Deanna throws for our group of
survivors, raging when a blandly nice neighbor asks Sasha what her favorite
meal is because she’s “worried” she’ll make the wrong thing.
Given that this is seconds after Sasha is bombarded by
memories of what happened to her brother Tyreese and her boyfriend Bob (rest in
peace, The Wire alumni) … maybe not the best time.
What else is going on with Rick and Co.? Although this
episode kind of felt like filler, it sets a few different characters along
unexpected paths. So let’s get to it!
+ “Luckiest damn
people I ever met … We’re here now.” For a few seasons now there has been
the (obvious, I think) suggestion that Rick and Co. aren’t necessarily the good
guys of this story, but the people who end up in already-setup societies or
structures and smash them apart. That idea has never been more clear than here
in Alexandria, I think, where it only took a day or so for Rick to decide that
the group should take the town from Deanna and her followers, by force if
necessary, and now it’s only been another day and Rick is having secret
meetings with Carol and Daryl to discuss their takeover strategy. And Rick’s
disgust at and resentment of the community is palpable, especially when he
smugly exclaims “We’re here now” as a way to justify their feeling of
superiority. It’s a long way down from up that high, Rick.
+ “Because they
believe in this. Because I’m telling them to.” As much as Rick thinks that
taking Alexandria will be a cakewalk, Deanna is putting up a very formidable
front indeed. She’s authoritative and no-nonsense (and that power suit with
those pearls!), and I’m intrigued by how she and Rick will continue to
interact. It seems like he’s waiting and taking his cues from her – notice how
he was the last one, behind Michonne and Maggie, to chime in during their
meeting with Deanna – so I wonder if he’ll rear his egotistical, survivalist
head sooner rather than later. (Also, his “People are the real threat now” is
valid, but easy to brush off, I think; he needs something more concrete to
shove in Deanna’s face than the general “the outside is evil” argument.)
+ “I’m not an expert,”
Carol says of guns, continuing her pleasant-middle-aged-women-with-nothing-to-hide
shtick. Oh, you can use applesauce instead of butter in cookies? Who knew!
Well, maybe Carol shouldn’t have made those cookies so damn delicious, because she’s
compromised when little boy Sam (younger son of the blonde Jessie), who wanted
more baked goods, followed Carol when she slipped out of Deanna’s party and saw
her raiding the armory for yes, chocolate packets, but more importantly, guns. I’ll
just excerpt Carol’s entire rebuttal of Sam below when he says he’ll tell his
mother what he saw her doing, because, never forget, she’s killed innocent
people and she may not be above killing children. Just saying.
“If you do, one
morning you’ll wake up and you won’t be in your bed; you’ll be outside the
walls. Far, far away, tied to a tree, and you’ll scream and scream because you’ll
be so afraid, but no one will come to help. Because no one will hear you. But
something will hear you. The monsters will come, the ones out there, and you
won’t be able to run away when they come for you. And they will tear you apart
and eat you up, all while you’re still alive, all while you can still feel it. And
then afterwards, no one will ever know what happened to you.
Or, you can promise
not to ever tell anyone what you saw here, and then nothing will happen. And
you’ll get cookies. Lots of cookies.
I know what I think
you should do.”
+ “We all lost
things, but we all got something back,” says Jessie to Rick at Deanna’s
party, a mentality that apparently warms him so much that he gives her an
awkward kiss on the cheek when she hands Judith back to him. WHAT ARE YOU
DOING, RICK? Thankfully, Jessie’s husband wasn’t around to see it (this is the
same guy who I think growled at Rick last week; I can’t remember if that scene
was reality or a dream, but let’s just go with it), but he is there the next
day when Jessie calls out a greeting to Rick. It’s his hand on Jessie’s back
that seems to spark something in Rick, and his entire face changes from one of
cautious warmth to one of determined anger – and notice that as he watches them
walk away, his hand goes to his waistband to finger his contraband gun (one of
the ones Carol stole from the armory after threatening Jessie’s son Sam), the
one most like his old revolver. Coveting a woman hasn’t been Rick’s style until
this point, but there’s something very off-putting about the way he’s been interacting
with Jessie lately … something worrisome.
+ “You do know the
difference between a good person and a bad person,” says Aaron to Daryl,
becoming his first friend – or, at least minimally, ally – in Alexandria. Everyone
in Alexandria seems to be using different tactics to befriend/indoctrinate Rick’s
group – Deanna by extending a hand to Maggie, Jessie by being so praising of
Rick, all those soccer moms by gabbing with Carol about recipes – and for
Aaron, he’s spinning his own otherness as a gay man to Daryl, joining him
(following him?) outside the wall and then inviting him over for spaghetti at
his and Eric’s house.
Admittedly, the death of Buttons the horse was undeniably
upsetting (“You used to be somebody’s, huh? Now you’re just yours,” Daryl says
to Buttons, recognizing a kindred spirit), and it’s probably what further pushes
Aaron and Daryl together, a closeness that’s sealed when Aaron shows Daryl a
bunch of motorcycle parts in his garage and asks if he can put a bike together
and go be a recruiter for Alexandria in Eric’s stead. “You’re good out there.
You don’t belong out there,” Aaron tells Daryl, perhaps in response to Daryl’s
earlier assertion, regarding Buttons but of course also himself, that “the
longer they’re out there, the more they become what they really are.”
We’ve known for a while now that Daryl’s weakness is a need
for inclusion and acknowledgment (which is why his relationship with Carol
seems so strong, since she’s part friend, part mother figure), and Aaron is
giving it to him in droves .. so much so that Daryl refuses to take one of the
guns Carol steals from the armory. If even Daryl is comfortable in Alexandria,
what does this mean for the power structure Rick set up of himself, Carol, and
Daryl? Is Rick’s plan for takeover already unraveling before it begins?
And finally, some
other thoughts:
+ What’s the deal with the “W” carved in that dead walker’s
head, the two laying side by side out near the cabin where Rick, Daryl, and
Carol were having their secret meeting? Those deaths looked execution-style to
me, not necessarily like a typical zombie kill. Perhaps something Deanna’s
crappy bro son Aiden did?
+ “Smart for then or smart for now?” was Rick’s question
about Deanna, and I liked Michonne’s answer of “This is now.” There is no going
back; as much as staying alive is a goal of the group, there will be no hard
reset of this world. Not ever.
+ Did everybody recognize Maggie at the table with Deanna? It
took me a second glance to understand it was her, with her hair not only washed
but also brushed and tied-back. Straight substitute-teacher style right there.
(I’ve gotten used to Carol’s wardrobe of Ann Taylor originals, but et tu,
Maggie!?)
+ Another note about Sasha: That role she volunteers for, of
being the sniper guard on the watchtower, is a role occupied in the comics by
Andrea, who is unequivocally tied with Michonne for the best female character
in that format. I’m still salty about how they treated/ruined her on the show.
+ I loved everything about Rosita and Abraham’s appearance
at Deanna’s party, from her deadpan “They have beer” to Abraham’s drunken talk
with Michonne, culminating in his “I am a large man and I have had many beers
to make up for that.” Don’t drink through their whole stock, dude!
+ Some people thought last week that Deanna spoke like she
doesn’t have a family anymore, but this week we met her husband Redge, who
designed the wall around Alexandria, and another son, Spencer, played by FORMER
ONE TREE HILL CAST MEMBER AUSTIN NICHOLS. I refuse to be embarrassed by how
excited I am about this.
+ What was more upsetting for you, Michonne hanging up her katana
or Rick almost caressing the wall as he listened to the walker on the other
side of it? Oof to both of those storytelling choices.
