The Walking Dead: Season 4 (3 Viewers)

[joshEH]

Best episode of the season. Actions had consequences. Two sides of a confrontation both had a logic behind them. A character had a big character-arc without getting eaten at the end of it.

I thought for sure they were setting up Carol to die, too, so this was kind of refreshing. Hopefully they keep her around (I guess she pretty much has to meet up with The Governor, or else show up on the spinoff-series).

She's become one of the more interesting characters, and I'm actually looking forward to Daryl's reaction to her banishment, so the show must be doing something right.

 

[joshEH]

Small nitpick: When Rick and Carol were rummaging though the houses/neighborhood...did all the lawns look like they had been recently cut?

It's been over a year since all this shit went down; the cities and suburbs should all start looking like overgrown jungles by now.

 

[TravisR]

It's been over a year since all this shit went down; the cities and suburbs should all start looking like overgrown jungles by now.

That's what I liked about the gas station (?) that Daryl and company had found. It was overgrown with vines since no one had been around for so long.

 

[Greg_S_H]

I thought the vines were a little much, but what do I know? I also thought the staging of the discovery of hippie girl was a little clumsy. Her leg is just perfectly cut off and she's all the way across the street? I know they wanted to emphasize that it was her with all the focus on her leg, but it seemed they could have found a better way.

As to the killer being someone else (spoilers are not based on any knowledge on my part):

Spoiler

If it's the little girl, I'd have to guess that Carol is the one who dragged and burned the bodies. That makes sense. More than the little girl being able to do it, and that's when Carol became part of the coverup.

If Carol did it, I completely side with Rick. Carol certainly can't be trusted with the sick ward. If the medicine doesn't work, Carol was somewhat right (though her solution did no good). But you think, "If Carl gets it, this psycho will knife him before he has a chance." Of course, if she is covering up for someone and Rick thinks he removed the danger, and the real killer is still a danger to the group, that was a really shit move on Carol's part.

 

[joshEH]

I wish Sam and Ana had lived, if only because they seemed to be a hilarious combination of "completely useless" and "inappropriately-upbeat" for a zombie apocalypse scenario. Really wanted to see them interact with others in the prison, especially Tyreese.

Speaking of Ty, did the show forget that they already have one unstable, angry black dude in Morgan? And Bob has an alcohol problem! It's like the show is going out of its way to piss on the Romero tradition of cool, sane, capable black men. We didn't know how good we had it with T-Dawg.

(Also, Talking Dead was really good last night. I would totally watch a "Regis & Kelly"-type show staring Chris Jericho and Gillian Jacobs.)

 

[Sam Posten]

Am I missing something? Carol admitting killing and burning 2 episodes ago...

 

[Greg_S_H]

Some think she's covering up for someone. I don't follow any outside talk about this show, so I don't know if there's a basis for it.

 

[TravisR]

(Also, Talking Dead was really good last night. I would totally watch a "Regis & Kelly"-type show staring Chris Jericho and Gillian Jacobs.)

It shows my prejudices but I expected Chris Jericho to be a dope and he proved me totally wrong by making interesting points, knowing the show and was just a fun guest. Marilyn Manson was much more interesting guest since he was in outer space the whole time.

 

[mattCR]

I think her exit was timed for the planned spinoff

 

[Walter Kittel]

Kind of hate to see the show losing (at least for now) one of its strongest characters. I do wonder (and Chris Jericho brought this up on Talking Dead, along with some other very salient points) if they are pulling a 'Han Solo' with Carol where she disappears until everything hits the fan and comes to the rescue.

FWIW, I'm leaning towards being okay with Carol's actions. Ethics in the Zombie Apocalypse is one of the more interesting topics and themes of the show, for me. After so many terrible things have happened, I'm beginning to think that a hard-edged 'ends justify the means' approach might be necessary in their situation. (Not our world, theirs. )

The coldness of the show at times still shocks me, surprisingly so. Carol's 'tough crap' attitude towards pretty much everything for instance, and her casual dismissal of Ana's death.

- Walter.

 

[Greg_S_H]

It didn't do any good and will be pretty bad if everyone she didn't kill ends up cured.

 

[Charlie Campisi]

FWIW, I'm leaning towards being okay with Carol's actions. Ethics in the Zombie Apocalypse is one of the more interesting topics and themes of the show, for me. After so many terrible things have happened, I'm beginning to think that a hard-edged 'ends justify the means' approach might be necessary in their situation. (Not our world, theirs. )

As you said one very interesting theme in the show is ethics in their world, but I would emphasize the question slightly differently as 'which rules still apply?' I think the one obligatory answer to that question, however, is that if you agree to follow a certain set of rules then they apply to you. Carol is on the council. I think it's perfectly reasonable that she was obligated to bring up her extreme solution to the council before acting. If a member of the council can murder two people on her own idea, the council has no authority and the community has no rules. We might say that Rick has now done the same thing in banishing her, but even though he is no longer 'the leader,' the community still trusts him with determining who should be accepted into the group.

 

[Sam Posten]

It shows my prejudices but I expected Chris Jericho to be a dope and he proved me totally wrong by making interesting points, knowing the show and was just a fun guest. Marilyn Manson was much more interesting guest since he was in outer space the whole time.

This. I am constantly amazed at just how radically different celebrities are from the personas they create on stage and screen. The first to REALLY blow my mind was Katt Williams when we met him at a HTF meet a few years back. Watching Sacha Baron Cohen talk about his characters is fascinating too, he is whip smart.And Jericho was a LOT more conversational and deep than I expected (to be fair I have never seen him wrestle so no idea what his stage persona is) and actually looked no bigger than any joe off the street in that interview. Very impressed.

 

[Kevin Hewell]

I thought the vines were a little much, but what do I know?

It looked like kudzu and that shit grows FAST.

 

[Patrick Sun]

That's what the Talking Dead factoid this week said it was, as they have a green house growing stuff so they can use them to show how plant life has gone wild during the zombie apocalypse.

 

[Greg_S_H]

That's a pretty cool idea. I've driven through the south and seen kudzu, so it does makes sense.

 

[Jeffery_H]

Kind of hate to see the show losing (at least for now) one of its strongest characters. I do wonder (and Chris Jericho brought this up on Talking Dead, along with some other very salient points) if they are pulling a 'Han Solo' with Carol where she disappears until everything hits the fan and comes to the rescue.

FWIW, I'm leaning towards being okay with Carol's actions. Ethics in the Zombie Apocalypse is one of the more interesting topics and themes of the show, for me. After so many terrible things have happened, I'm beginning to think that a hard-edged 'ends justify the means' approach might be necessary in their situation. (Not our world, theirs. )

The coldness of the show at times still shocks me, surprisingly so. Carol's 'tough crap' attitude towards pretty much everything for instance, and her casual dismissal of Ana's death.

- Walter.

The show has NOT lost Carol as I had posted earlier. I won't post any spoilers, but she even said in an interview it's not the last of her character and there is some twists coming. She will return and I'm pretty sure I know the situation if anything like the comics or close there to it.

 

[Jeffery_H]

I think her exit was timed for the planned spinoff

No, that's not the case, at least not yet for her character. See my post prior if you want to know more, but that's not what is going on here. Yes, there may be a spin-off coming with at least one major character from this show, but there's more to wrap up here first so we WILL see her return. Most are saying fairly soon or around the mid-season break.

 

[Charlie Campisi]

Jeffery, your definition of a spoiler is different from mine. I always took it to mean anything not from within the confines of an aired episode, east coast time. Usually, the most controversial area is the previews of shows or trying to protect our west coast members. Anything the actress may have said about her return in an interview is pretty clearly a spoiler to my way of thinking. No worries for me. I'm not upset about it as I don't think it's a big revelation. I was just putting on my spoiler police hat to raise the issue in case your definition conflicted again down the road on something more weighty.

 

[Quentin]

I definitely don't think Carol killed the two...but, I think it is likely she pulled them out and burned them to cover the evidence.

I'm sure she will be back...the only question for me is what the circumstances will be.