The Hudgens Art Center, With Guest Laura Ballance

Alright so here we are not long after the last season we see the group on the beach training, looking like spartan warriors with makeshift shields, bows and arrows, spears, and swords. They are training to fight the Whispers or dead heads as I call them…

Again I can't help but ask the question again, where's all the guns? What happened to the armory that Alexandria and the others had built up to defeat Negan?

Why isn't Ugene making bullets? Oh there's a simple answer to this.

One, The writers think you’re stupid and wont remember the infinite ammo cheat code they unlocked with all their fully automatic weapons when they fought Negan and his army. Because they knew the war with Negan would be far too “Boring” if they group actually had to think about how to tactfully take out or commedere resources from Negans outposts to aid in their fight against Sanctuary.

So instead we will just have big explosions and lots and lots and lots and lots of gunfire…. But don't worry none of your favorite characters will get it..

Sorry I digress..

Two, the writers know that the whisperers would be a pretty easy foe with the colonies having all their firepower so instead they wrote them back to the 8th century..

Now don’t get me wrong I thought it was pretty cool that they were able to build these shields and adopt this tactic of fighting, especially against the Dead. But its still laughable because again, They have a bullet maker.

Suddenly out of nowhere a satellite comes crashing down to earth creating a massive forest fire that Oceanside and the others will have to cross into Alphas territory to deal with.

They manage to work through the night into the next day and put the fire out and Ugene sees an opportunity to grab some hard to find parts off the wreckage.

So we get a little back story on how Alpha and Beta met, further showing us just how insane Alpha is and Beta seems to maybe been a resident at the funny farm she stumbled into? That's what I got from it. If not him, certainly some one he cared about because she takes him out as a walker.

We get introduced to a new dead head, her sister was the one with the baby in the last season at hilltop. Needless to say, losing her kid drove her nuts, (more nuts than you already have to be a part of Alphas group).

I mean honestly what rational person would stumble upon that group and think to themselves, yup this is the life for me! Walking around smelling the dead all day eating worms. SURE!

I hate this enemy, because they’re just too ridiculous… but yet they seem to be far more interesting than the war with Negan, and that's sad.

So she ends up killing her sister to gain favor with Alpha… something she will later regret.

Back at Alexandria they are getting pounded by hordes of walkers, one after another. They fight all day and night, exhausted to fend them off. They are all very sure this is Alphas doing. And Gamma shows up telling them Alpha wants to meet.

We get a little more Negan time as he fights off walkers with a very resentful Aaron. Meanwhile Carol starts having hallucinations from the lack of sleep and the pills she's taking.

This episode was strange… but whatever, felt like filler.

Back at the hilltop a wall collapses and a tree falls on a building trapping people inside. Folks from Alexandria head off to go and help them.

Lidia encounters a bit of bullying from some alexandria folks, that escalates into them jumping her at night and almost killing her. Negan magically comes out of nowhere to save her and accidentally kills one of the bullies.

Oh well.. And the others have the audacity to get upset and blame Lidia and Negan…. Idk, maybe next time don't try to kill the girl and one of yours won't accidentally die in the process… Regardless, the two boys are punks and very unlikeable.. They are after all the ones that got Henry in trouble.

Needless to say, Negans in trouble, where half the community wants his head, and the other half understands he saved Lidia, yet they really don't care if Negan dies because no one likes him.

So somehow Negan escapes prison and leaves alexandria. We know someone let him out but not who.

We get as an audience what we want, well at least what I want. Which is more focus on Negan.

See Negan is the only really interesting character left on this show, he's funny too because he is a smart ass. But he lives by his own moral code, much like an Anti-hero.

He’s now wandering the woods in search of food and shelter. Where he stumbles across an obsessed fan boy named brandon.

Brandon reveals that he has Negans original leather jacket, so for a moment we think hmm, maybe the old Negan is coming back.

They stumble across a woman in a bus screaming as shes being attacked by walkers. Negan saves her and finds a boy with her as well.

For whatever reason Brandon seems to think Negan would want to kill them, because that's something he used to do. Negan calmly tells him that he doesn't kill Women and kids and that people are a resource.

Brandon doesn't get it, so Negan tells him basically to leave and never come back around.

We get a nice moment where Negan and a little boy are bonding together, Negan tells him he's gonna take them to Hilltop where it's safe. He sets off to gather firewood and when he comes back he sadly finds them both dead.

Brandon killed them. Thinking Negan was playing mind games and actually did want him to do that he took it upon himself to kill the woman and boy.

Here we get to see a bit of Negan's own Moral code. Obviously this doesn't sit well, and he picks up a rock and kills Brandon…

All in all a sad scene really, that poor woman and boy didn't deserve that and Negan knew it.

That's when we see Negan press on into the dark and misty woods where we hear his little catch phrase “little pigs little pigs!” calling out to the dead.

Ah, it's good to have Negan back. Not soon after he's captured by the Whisperers and tells them he can help them with Alexandria.

Oh my, is Negan turning against the colonies!? What's going on here?

Now I knew he had not, I knew there was something at play here. He was gonna try to do something to earn favor with Alexandria. So time would tell…

So from here we get Carol heading off into the woods and Daryl following, she says shes going to find Negan but really is going after Alpha…

Negan is tested by the dead heads and actually survives it… Pissing off Beta.

Meanwhile back in Alexandria there's an awful stomach bug plaguing the community. Now earlier in the season we saw Gamma dumping zombie guts into the stream so we know its that. But they should be boiling or filtering their water so that's what I didn't understand..

However we later find out that the water filter system was messed with and one of the handles was bent to make it look like it was in the right direction.

Sadiq eventually figures out it was Dante who sabotaged the water supply system but unfortunately is taken out by Dante.

Rosita catches him and fights him off and Dante is thrown in jail.

We find out that Dante was a whisperer all along and was sent in to recon and sabotage the community.

Gabriel by the way is losing his mind more and more as the show progresses. This often can happen to weak men. He may be gaining his ability to stand up but it leads to irrational behavior or thoughts if not kept in line.

He’s found his inner monster, good on him but he's allowing that monster to dictate who he is, and in some ways I think its challenging his faith.

And so Gabriel goes to visit Dante and basically kills him as revenge for Sadiq and what he did to Alexandria.

Gabriel is going dark… and you only see that get worse. You also see that his patience becomes almost non-existent. You must be a monster, but you must control that monster. In other words, control your emotions. Gabriel can't do that.

Meanwhile Ugene is living his best life, he's managed to make a stronger radio with the satellite parts and begins to search for another group somewhere. And suddenly a mysterious woman comes over the coms.

A man shows up at oceanside causing a fight, they capture him but back at Alexandria the group sets off on a high stake mission.

That's when Carol spots Alpha and goes after her, The group chases after Carol and they all end up trapped in a cave full of walkers. It ends up being Alphas' herd.

They have to narrowly escape the caverns and yes pun intended.

This episode actually gave me the willys with all the tight quarters and the few stranglers of zombies that would follow through the tight spaces.

This was a well shot episode, because it was loaded with tension the entire time.

Carol has just gone off the reservation and is not thinking clearly anymore. I actually am not a fan of this because it's way off character for her. She became very strong and clever, and right now she's making silly decisions and being more emotional and irrational than she normally would.

The group stuck in the cave finds an old mine shaft and possibly a way out. There happens to be an old box of TNT nearby, and Carol gets a wild hair to go and blow up Alphas Horde.

Darol stops her but unfortunately the TNT falls and explodes trapping Magna and Connie inside.

Negan is working his way up the ranks and ends up giving up Gamma to Alpha as the snitch. This earns him favor with Alpha and we get the most cringe scene in all of cinema history…. Negan and Alpha Bumping uglies in the woods. Alpha also leaves her mask on too, which by the way is supposed to be real skin.

Gross…

Beta apparently has a network of tunnels that allow him to travel and enter into Alexandria undetected… which is strange. Because if they had this ability why toy with Alexandria, just sneak in and take them all out?

Anyway,

Gamma is locked up in Alexandria too because she now regrets killing her sister, and realizes Alpha is a liar… I don't know why it took seeing Lidia to convince her that Alpha was a liar, but whatever… LIke you dont think there can be civilization anymore? Really?

So Beta breaks in, starts killing Alexandrians and turning them into walkers…

Daryl runs into Alpha in the woods and attacks her, killing her men and getting a decent jump on her. They both end up in a repair shop bleeding out though. Lidia comes around and turns her back on Alpha and saves Daryl.

Needless to say this triggers war… Again I am not sure why Alpha was toying with hilltop and Alexandria. But Whatever.

Ugene makes a breakthrough with the woman on the radio, Steph. She sets a meeting with him but unfortunately those communications would be cut off because hilltop would soon be under attack.

Hilltop stays and fights and they try their little spartan phalanx but it doesn't work for very long when the dead heads cover them in tree sap and light them on fire.

Hilltop is fully engulfed as the survivors fight their way to escape. Eventually the entire colony is destroyed and those that are left are on the run.

Its worth mentioning that Negan assisted in the destruction of Hilltop, you would think at this point that he is in full cahoots with Alpha, but he mentions an old tactic of his. One that would spare the community and allow Alpha to use them as a resource. If you pick up on this you may think its just old Negan, but really hes trying to stop Alpha from killing all of them and Destroying Hilltop.

IT doesn't work…

Now the group is on the run, held up in an old hospital as Beta searches for them with his horde.

Now at this point in all reality, the group should of been able to escape and get the hell out of there because Beta and the walkers move at a snail's ass pace… another reason why this is an ineffective tactic, you are far too slow moving and it would take you forever to move your army anywhere.

The reality is they should have been long gone off to oceanside before Beta ever found them.. But oh well the writing is stupid at times…

Negan finds Lidia wandering in the woods after the attack and quickly snatches her up. This part is weird because I really don't think he had to do this to trick Alpha. Then it makes you kind of wonder why he didn't trick Alpha like this sooner? He had already earned strong favor with her prior to the attack on Hilltop. He could have lured her away before…

Either way he didn't and it ends up being a trap and Negan cuts Alphas throat and kills her. Taking her head into a sack and presenting it to Carol. Oh it was Carol that let Negan out all this time?

Really?

Then why did she go after Alpha and get her and her friends trapped? Why didn't she just let Negan do his work?

Why did she even recruit Negan in the first place? Why not do it yourself? Or better tell the community the plan to send Negan into the group as an assassin? Instead you don't tell them and it gets the community and others in serious danger.

Again not a typical Carol move.

By the way there's a lot of hallucinating in this season… you can tell the writers aren't really that creative anymore.

We find the children with the blacksmith man, unfortunately he's bit and tries to take his own life with a rail spike, that doesn't work. And Judith has to put him down. Daryl and the others end up finding the kids and moving on to the hospital to hide out.

And then in good ol Walking dead fashion the following episode has nothing to do at all with what is happening at Hilltop.. Instead we get an entire episode dedicated to Michonne tripping balls and seeing an alternate life for her if she had not saved Andria.

This episode is weird.. First off the dude has locked up some people for what appears to be a very long time and now she's locked up but manages to get out and free the others. And naturally they want to kill this guy but Michonne talks them out of it…

They find a boat that they manage to jerry rig and fix up to work and get back to the oceanside.

But somehow Michonne finds Rick's Boots and an old phone with Judith etched on it. She freaks out and begins to wonder if Rick is still alive. And reaches out to Judith to tell her that she needs to go off and find him. Leaving Judith behind now with no parents! So that's smart…

I hate this episode, it makes little sense, adds nothing to the story at all or helps it move along. It felt pointless and out of place. Sure they needed to find a way to write off Michonne but they could have written this in with the Hilltop story and not dedicated an entire show to it. It was just poorly written and dumb and unnecessary.

Goodbye for now Michonne, don't come back until you find Rick.

Ugene ends up taking a few folks with him to set off to meet steph in hopes of finding a new community after the fall of hilltop.

They end up running into a strange woman in the middle of an empty city. She happens to be another weird, spaz of a character who goes by the name of princess.

I dont hate this character, she's crazy because she's basically been alone for a very long time and it shows. I do like that she totes around an M249 Saw machine gun like a badass….

So needless to say she scares off their horses and tells them that she has wheels for them, she kind of dicks around with all of them, leading the group into a minefield… but they escape of course and all is well.

They end up getting those wheels, and they're bicycles…. Ugene is not pleased because they are losing time.

Either way they make do and set off to find Step… where eventually they get to the train yard and are quickly surrounded by imperial stormtroopers… I mean dudes dressed in armor or something. And The episode ends, and we won't get to see anything about this for a very long time because the writers think they are clever but really it's just annoying… I really hate this theme with The Walking dead… never ending cliffhangers aren't cute. Especially when you show us things that are not at all interesting or help the narrative in any way.

Meanwhile back near the colonies Beta breaches Alexandria with ease, it seems that they abandoned it so that Beta would not destroy it.

Beta sets off to find them with his army of dead. We get a little back story on Beta when he finds Alphas head. He takes her to some old hang out where apparently we find out Beta was a famous singer before all this. It isn't all that clear but anyway he mumbles a lot and groans about what he sees and blah blah blah and turns alphas face into a new mask….

So now he has his army and they're off to find the people of Alexandria and any survivors of hilltop.

He manages to track them down at the hospital where Daryl and the others make a final stand. They have a plan to pump music and distract the horde away but first they have to walk through the horde of walkers and whisperers to get to the truck.

Its a pretty tense scene as they walk through and with out too many movements kill whisperers as they go through. Sadly not all of them make it but they eventually get though and begin to lead the dead away.

However others are still inside the building and about to breach and Gabriel makes a last stand to keep them off while the others escape.

Gabriel fights hard but wouldn't you know it! In the knick of time and out of nowhere Maggie appears to save the day.

How did Maggie know where to find them? Don't know….

How did she manage to sneak past all the dead and enter the building to save the day just in time? Don't know….

But that's how it was written….

Maggie hasn't encountered the whisperers yet and knows how to get through the horde and handle them with ease… like she's been there all along.

Whatever show…

Needless to say the group is saved! Hooray Maggie.

The others off leading the horde away but the Whisperers break through the ranks and eventually make it to the sound truck and destroy it.

Darol and the others scatter to the woods and see that the horde is returning back toward the hospital.

So they have no choice but to engage the Whisperers. Of course this should be damn near suicidal to walk into that horde and engage with them but they seem to do it with ease. Taking each Whisperer out without a problem.

Damn man if it was this easy why bother leading the horde away in the first place? Why not just beat them at their own game like you just did.. Even Beta wasn't much to take out as Negan and Daryl easily kill him off.

No major battle, no real struggle, just bam dead… and we see Beta get pulled into the horde and finished off. Negan recognizes him too which is interesting. But its short lived….

This was a massive fail. You had all this build up, you even had a decent fight between DAryl and Beta in the last season and this is how you kill him off? Pretty uneventful if you ask me. Especially with what's to come in the rest of the season. You could have made this more suspenseful and interesting. Instead it felt rushed, like the writers just wanted to end the conflict with whisperers and move on.

Maybe they realized that this enemy is actually pretty stupid and worthless and wanted to point that out… or maybe that's just what happened inadvertently.

So the whisperers are no more… The battle is won and Carol elects to lead the dead off a nearby cliff… sacrificing herself because she won't be able to turn back once she gets there. But wouldn't you know it, just before she goes over Lidia saves the day… and the two hide in a hole while the dead mindlessly walk off the cliff….

No one significant is allowed to die on this show….

I am actually glad Carol didn't die though, There's more to be done with her character and Daryl in my opinion.

So thats it right! Episode sixteen, whisperers are conquered.. End of the season right? Nope! Theres actually a lot more… and well its not very good.

There's a random hunter in the woods killing survivors from Maggie's old community and Herschel is among them lost in the woods… needless to say they get the guy and find herschel. That about sums up this episode. It was random and pointless. I guess maybe to show Maggie is a bit of a bad ass now but we always knew that. It was obvious that neither her or Daryl would be killed here, one because she just came back to the show, Two they have a bunch of new characters that we never met and those are the ones you take out…. Its just so obvious.

That was the first random and out of place episode followed up with another random one with Daryl and Carol setting off and finding an old cabin where Daryl apparently met a woman, had a romantic relationship with her and then walked away never to see her again. Dont worry this one random episode is actually to help set up things for the next season which is still four episodes of season ten away…. And also the long break of shooting season 11 in between. So good job show! Maybe next time find a way to write that sub plot closer to season 11.

This episode wasnt the worst one though, actually not that bad to be honest. Just felt a little random when it happened. Like ok, This is interesting but I really wanna know what happened to Eugine and the others.. So lets get back to that no?

Nope… instead we get another random episode with Aaron and Gabriel searching for food with a map from Maggie… This episode literally adds nothing to the show, does not help build the characters or the narrative, and just feels entirely like filler. Ya they meet a crazy guy and blah blah blah but honestly we get it, the new world is filled with psychopaths. We don't need an entire episode to tell us this. Again much like the Michonne episode, this should have been a sub plot of the episode not an entire episode on its own. Especially when you have much more interesting stories going on, LIKE EUGINES!!!

I just dont understand this… you extended the season and instead of giving us quality content it feels like many of these episodes were last minute ideas and just filler.. Like hey we got green lit for 22 episode season guys!

Writers sip coffee, bags under eyes, lack of sleep and no motivation… really? But we only wrote this season for 16 episodes…

I mean even episode 17 felt like it was unnecessary, like crap what do we do here? How do we drag this out?

Much of the episodes after 16 felt out of place and made little sense, some will contribute a little to season 11 but not much and not enough to justify an entire episode.

Well shit finally after that stupid episode with Aaron and Gabriel we get to see what happens to Eugine… Unfortunately it focuses more on the princess and her really messed up past and we dont get much else other than that.

It ends up being an entire episode of Princess hallucinating.. So.. there ya go. Thanks walking dead. Thanks a lot.

I found out that these last six episodes are actually covid episodes and that explains why they seem to only highlight one character on each episode and it also explains why the episodes mostly suck.

Covid no doubt ruined hollywood more than it helped. And the production staff wanted to keep the show going and not put it on hold. Personally I think it was a mistake. Id rather you waited for the restrictions to be lifted and produce a quality program than this drivel.

But Alas they gotta make their money! Cant stay shut down. If only they would of just told Dr. Fauci to F-off and not follow the ridiculous mandates…. No, rather comply and make crap.

Sorry…. Got off topic there for a moment.

So that episode was dumb, pointless, and didnt do much in answering who Eugene and the others just encountered. But It did get the development of Princess out of the way if you want to call it that…

Now on to an even worse episode…

I really don't want to spend much time on this one. Its by far the worst episode of the season, close to the last one with the princess. This was bad. Carol was acting way out of character, and strangely. The riff between her and Daryl just felt unnatural and forced. Like why are they doing this? Makes little sense at all… There's not much to say here really because there wasn't much going on in this episode. It was forty minutes of Carol trying to make soup… literally.

It was awful, and I wasn't alone on this. When I set off to do my notes I saw that the episode got the lowest rank in TWD I have seen at 4 out of 10 stars. No one liked this one.

But just when The Walking dead gives us that complete and utter garbage… they give us the final episode of season 10. Negan’s Backstory.

First of all this episode is great because Negan is the only character left on the Walking dead that is interesting. Hes not annoying like many of them and has not hit his character arch yet like Daryl and the other older cast members.

Frankly he could get his own spinoff show and it would do better than what we are getting now.

We see that Negan was a flawed man before the fall, lost his job and was actively looking for others but in the meantime playing video games and buying leather jackets.

He was not attentive to his wife like he should have been but that was because he was having an affair with his wifes friend.

One that he ended right after he found out she had cancer. That's when Negan grows up, becomes a man and starts to take care of his shit. Then the pandemic happens and Negan is forced to try and cure his wife's cancer with Chemo Treatments himself.

Unfortunately the power goes out while he's asleep and the Chemo bags get too warm… His wife says to stay and be with her but he does not want to give up so he sets off to find some doctors nearby with supplies.

He finds them but unfortunately gets snagged up by a motorcycle club on the way back, stalling him from getting to his wife. Eventually he is set free and he sets off to home where sadly he finds his wife turned. Dead from cancer.

This is an emotional moment as Negan looks on like a failure. He knows he has not been the best husband and wanted to do everything he could to make it up to her but failed in the end.

Was it his fault? No… but it changes him and you see him tap into that inner monster. One he always had, he used it in the bar to defend his wife.. And now he's gonna use it to kill the bikers and save the doctor.

We get a great glance into who Negan is and it really humanizes him. The reality is Negan could have been Rick and Rick could have been Negan at any moment… Both men are admirable people who lost everything to the new world and it changed them. For better or worse.

Negan went down a darker path, extorting people, and controlling them like a mob boss where Rick earned the respect of his people. But it could of easily went the other way at any time for any of them,

I left that episode liking Negan and his character even more. A flawed man, upset with himself and his choices now coping and trying to exist in a very dark world. It pulls him into a bad place, but part of him remains from the new world and I think you will see that part come back in season 11. As he burns Lucile in the fire, that represents him moving on from not so distant self, letting go of his wife and moving forward toward redemption.

This Character is by far the best right now and deserves more of the spotlight moving forward.

Wrap up.

The Rant with David King

enMarch 29, 2023

Just the News, Ohio Suing Norfolk southern, SVB bank, and much more

https://justthenews.com/government/white-house/oversight-committee-chair-reveals-biden-family-members-received-payments

https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/finance/major-banks-bail-out-first-republic-amid-industry-turmoil

https://justthenews.com/government/courts-law/ohio-sues-norfolk-southern-over-east-palestine-train-derailment

Intro/outro

Big Rock License

Big Rock by Kevin MacLeod

Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/3436-big-rock

License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Rant with David King

enMarch 18, 2023

The Walking Dead Special Part 9

Intro:

A lot happened this season, so we have a lot to get into.

The season kicks off long after the War with Neagan. We see Rick, the hilltop and the Kingdom working together to gather necessary items to help them farm and continue to survive.

We see that they must have finally run out of gas (only been more than nine years) as they have made makeshift horses and buggies out of cars.

This is actually clever and well done, and believable. Frankly I would think things like this would happen much sooner as Gas would be scarce and going bad within the first four years or so of the apocalypse.

All three communities seem to be thriving at this point, and the group has set off to gather key items at an old history museum in downtown DC.

There's some action and drama as we see King Eziekle almost fall into a pit of zombies when the glass floor breaks. We also get to see that Carol and the King have a relationship and the King is interested in her hand in marriage.

To be honest I don't have much feeling about the King and Carol hooking up. I personally would rather see a relationship further develop between Darol and Carol as I have always felt like there was some fire there and a deeper love and caring for each other.

After all they have been together surviving from the first episode and Darol was the one who risked his life looking for Sophia and in that transformed into a mature and stronger character, who was loyal to the group but able to think for himself instead of living in his brother shadow.

Carol played witness to all of this and in many ways Carol's new inner strength and being a badass in some part is because of Darol, and Darol becoming the reliable person he is now is Carols doing too.

These two are very much connected and in that you would expect something romantic to form from it. Darol certainly cares for Carol probably more than anyone else, maybe Rick is a close second.

Time will tell on this, I feel like there's still time for those two to walk off into the sunset together, live in the woods and start a family far away from the threats of the living and the dead.

So that episode one in a nutshell really, it lays out the foundation for whats to come over the next couple of episodes and sets a the time table.

We know it's months after the war because Maggie has had her baby, Herschell. Maggie is still dealing with the problems of the past though.

Gregory decided at some point, arrogantly thinking that he would win, that the hilltop should hold an election for its leader. The Election was him against Maggie.

He naturally lost, by a landslide. Gregory is a weasel and he only gets worse this season.

Unfortunately the group ends up getting attacked while returning with supplies and one of the young men from the hilltop is bitten by a zombie trying to save horses.

This naturally upsets the parents of this young man, they seem to air their grievances with Maggie and we get a little insight into how the locals are all feeling about the saviors hanging around and their people making what they perceive as unnecessary risks.

Needless to say Gregory uses this moment to manipulate the father of the dead boy. Greggory knows that he had a drinking problem and offers him a glass of Tequila. They get drunk together and Gregory conspires with him to take out Maggie for the better of the community.

Needless to say that plan fails, Maggie stops both of them.

And now Maggie is left with a hard decision. Afterall she knows that this father was in mourning, drunk, and is otherwise a good man. He also happens to be the only blacksmith who is building plows for the fields.

Remember kids, make yourself unfireable in whatever job you take… and in life. Be so important that people can't cancel or fire you. That's what this guy has going for him. If he wasn't the only blacksmith, he would be in the gallows right next to Gregory.

And that leads me to the scene, dead of night, Gregory sits on horseback with a rope around his neck.

Maggie has had enough of him. And with good reason. This man has tasted her and the others far too many times, and turned his back on them far too many times. With this last time being an attempt on her life.

There's no better message to send to any group that if you break the rules you will die. Hmm, who does that sound a little bit like? (Negan)

Maggie is 100% Negan in this scene, but it does not make her wrong. The community is far too young, and too fragile to deal with behavior like this in any manner that we would see in modern day society.

For attempted murder, its to gallows.

Negan showed us this when a man attempted to rape Sasha. It was an immediate death sentence.

There's no time for that behavior right now, or ever really…. And they dont have the infrastructure for trials by jury.

The show ends with Gregory dying. I was glad, that character was annoying and I was always worried he would try to hurt one of them, and he did…

The next couple of episodes focus on all the communities coming together, including the sanctuary to build a bridge that went out during a storm. This bridge would cut the travel time in half to the kingdom and sanctuary. And Rick felt it was really important.

The bridge is really just a metaphor. It's to show the status of all the communities. Right now they're all coming together and so a bridge is being built that will connect them all.

Unfortunately for Rick that bridge build starts to go sideways when Saviors start to come up missing.

It starts to turn the camp against each other as all of them accuse one another of wrongdoing.

We later find out when Maggie and Darol stumble upon the oceanside group at an old hold out. They have one of the saviors captured on her knees and they are about to execute her.

This is when we learn that Oceanside was taking the saviors and killing them. They explain to Maggie and Darol that these are the people that killed all the men and boys and that they must have justice.

So Maggie, being the stone cold badass that she is, agrees and walks away.

Oceanside takes out the last person responsible for killing their men.

The first three or four episodes really dive deep into this struggle between the four communities trying to work with the saviors.

I found it really interesting and actually enjoyed all of them greatly. I felt it was an honest and real take into what It would be like trying to live and work with people you were once fighting.

And while I don't disagree with Rick keeping Negan alive and trying to get the people to work together it isn't realistic in any way to believe that it would be possible. And I think the show really highlights that well.

These people did ugly, and terrible things. Now most of the people that did the ugly and terrible things to Hilltop, Alexandria and Kingdom all died during the war. But the People that committed the atrocities against Oceanside were alive and walking around among them.

Imagine if you would, that a group of people shows up to your family reunion, and murders almost all of your family in cold blood, acting like they enjoyed every second of it. Only later to see they didn't get charged, never sent to jail, but told that all you must get along now and work together.

That isn't possible, There's no way anyone could do that. At best you would leave and go far away from those people, and at worst you would get your justice on them. It's not revenge, it's holding them accountable for their actions.

And that's what Oceanside was doing.

Letting the people who murdered you husbands, brothers, and sons walk freely was a bridge too far for oceanside, and yes pun intended.

This was Rick's biggest mistake. He locked up Negan, and fair enough. But what about the others that committed war crimes? They must be held accountable. Much like at the end of world war 2 when the Nazi’s faced trials for what they did. Ya you got Hitler, but those other people must be held accountable too.

By not charging Negan's lieutenants In what I would have called a regional court held among the four communities created undue tensions. The surviving saviors who were not responsible could have witnessed those people being charged, justice being served and that all the communities could move forward now.

Instead, you get Oceanside going behind everyones back to dish out the justice and it turns everyone against each other.

Needless to say the bridge does not get built, and the Saviors walk off and go their separate ways.

Things fall apart further as Rick's lookouts and Darol conspire against him. Maggie is headed off to kill Negan and get her justice.

Rick thinks Darol is gonna take him to Alexandria to stop her but he doesn't, instead he leads them away where they get into a scuffle and fall into a pit.

It's interesting to note that Darol and Rick really haven't had a scuffle like this since season one.

They eventually crawl out of there and Rick sees a massive horde of walkers heading toward the bridge and Alexandria.

Rick tells Darol to head on as he will lead the walkers away.

This is where things go bad for Rick.

He ends up coming to a four way, and there's a horde behind him and to the left all descending on him. The Horse decides to freak out and buck him off, keep in mind this horse never freaks out or bucks again later on….

Rick falls and lands on rebar, piercing his side.

Now I am no expert, but that looked pretty close to his kidneys, and a puncture like that is usually a death sentence if you don't get that wound closed up quickly. You will bleed out pretty fast.

Rick manages to yank himself off that rebar, and get away where we are treated to a bunch of hallucinations. We get to see past characters like Shane and Hershcel interacting with Rick as if it's happening in real time.

This scene made me miss these characters a lot. I really liked Shane's character and how he was always playing opposite Rick and testing him. They bounced off each other so well that it always added an interesting tension to the show. I always felt like he was killed off maybe a little too soon.

And Herschel was always the angel on Rick's shoulder, being his moral compass. Making Rick see things differently and keeping him on the straight and narrow path. If it wasn't for Herschel, Rick likely could have become Shane but worse.

All of this comes to an end with Rick at the Bridge and the Walkers coming down on him. There isn't much he can do and he knows he has to stop them. The others look on as he fires a single shot at some explosives taking out the bridge and as we think at the moment killing Rick.

It was a pretty emotional scene as we see Darol look on in sorrow, losing his best friend and Michonne screams out for him… as she watches the man she loves and respects die.

I am not sure I felt the same emotions but I also already saw this scene.

In fact this is where I ended my journey with The Walking Dead and stopped watching the show. So from this point on after this episode I had no idea what to expect or what was going to happen.

I am not really sure anyone really felt shocked or emotional too much. Seeing as we all knew this season would be Andrew Lincoln's last. We all knew this character was going to be written off and that sadly kind of ruined it all.

But Ricks is gone, or so you think?

Later on Jadis just so happens to be nearby when she sees the explosion and finds Rick on a river bank.

We still have absolutely no idea who Jadis is communicating with; we know they have a helicopter, medical, and are searching for certain types of people but that is all. And Sadly this season we will get no answers on any of this.

I don't know if we will later, but the fact that a 16 episode season pays no mention to the disappearance of Jadis or that helicopter makes me think we won't get any information on it and that was just a convenient way to write Rick off without killing him.

Again I have no idea what happens after this. But I will say I actually am enjoying this season up to this point and it sparked a bit of interest in the show again. so I was looking forward to the next episode and the rest of the season.

That is until I watched that episode….

Suddenly we are flashed forward in time, a decent amount of time at that as we see a much older Judith rescue a group of people being attacked by walkers.

Judith is probably close to ten years old at this point, It's hard to know. But she is old enough to start carrying her own weight and she certainly does.

She somehow manages to carry and use Rick's old Python 357 magnum. The sentiment isnt lost on me here, as she's dawning the sheriff hat and wielding her dads magnum. But the reality is that thing would be pretty heavy for her to hold out and shoot and the recoil on that thing would kick back in her face if not just fly out of her hands.

I actually like this version of Judith. She's not over the top like most child characters are today. Young Leia in Kenobi comes to mind.

She's smart but not smarter than her age would allow, and she has spunk but is respectful to her elders. She's brave and adventurous which you would expect her to be, since she's grown up in this new world. But she's also very vulnerable as you would expect a child to be. She's capable of helping herself to a point but relies heavily on the adults around her.

She's just the spitting image of Shane…hahahaha

And so here we are as Judith introduces herself to these new people and takes them back to safety.

We see and learn all kinds of new things in this episode. Like Carol has long and gray hair now, Michonne looks the exact same age but just shaved a little of her hair off on one side. She also has a major chip on her shoulder toward everybody.

This part is strange because the show does not explain why for a while, almost toward the end of the show. None of the three communities are talking to each other, or at least not very much.

And there isn't really an explanation as to why. Ever..

I mean I get Michonnes chip on her shoulder because an old friend betrayed her and almost got her killed. But why the beef with the other communities? Why wasn't her and Maggie talking? Where the hell did Maggie go? And why did she go?

None of these things are told to us.

Instead they wrote off Maggie and just said she took Herschel and went off to another community…

But why? She was the leader of Hilltop and damn good one at that. She had everything she needed there, why would she suddenly leave? don't know…

Erggh Whatever show.

Darol is living in the woods alone and has made a companion in a dog, named dog. The most Darol move ever on this show.

He has been out searching for Rick's body but of course has not found him.

He gives up and heads back to Hilltop at Carol's request to look after her boy while he apprentices to be a black smith.

Needless to say that kid won't be doing much blacksmithing as he ends up in jail after getting drunk and sneaking out with some other kids.

So Michonne is wrangling whether or not this new group can be trusted but settles to take them to Hillside, something that made really no sense to me. IF you don't trust them, why give them to your friends? And if you do trust them, why not let them stay at Alexandria?

I guess the show needed an excuse to get Michonne back at Hilltop to learn Maggie is gone and Jesus is in charge and reunite everyone. Again why she was avoiding Maggie and the Hilltop makes no sense. And it annoys me that it's not explained.

Anyway…

Jesus is out hanging with Aarron eating lunch and training how to fight. I guess they are developing a sort of relationship but we never really see anything more than them just sparring and eating a meal. They chat about their communities but eventually they stumble across Rositta. She's basically passed out so they rush her back to Hilltop and find out that Ugene is still out there.

They send out a rescue party to find him and that’s when the show goes from pretty damn good to what in the absolute hell am I seeing?

We heard voices talking when Rositta and Ugene were hiding from the walkers, well that's ominous.

But suddenly the rescue group finds Ugene and he tells them that these walkers have evolved. They can talk and they can track. And they have been following him up until this point.

Evolved zombies? For the love of goodness no!

Needless to say those evolved zombies are outside the barn they’re all in. And its time to move.

They try the usual distraction tactics to pull the herd away from Ugene, Jesus, and Aaron. But it doesn't work and that's when Darol realizes something is up.

They get chased into a foggy cemetery where they make a stand against the zombies. They manage to fight most of them off and get a gate open to escape. Jesus tells them to go while he covers them and we see a slow mo action scene where Jesus is kung-fu kicking his way through the herd.

Until one the zombies suddenly stabs him and kills him.

OH MY they are not evolved zombies at all… they're… people dressed up like the dead?

What the hell!!

What is this nonsense?

Who the hell approved this? Probably the same guy that approved a CGI tiger…

Let me start by saying this new enemy is the dumbest and worst of all the enemies that Rick's group has faced.

Just when this season was turning out to be really good they go and pull this crap on me…

Its just too much, too impractical

So, how do you eat?

Do you just walk around with the dead all day?

Does your back start to hurt after being hunched over like that?

Do you enjoy the smell of these dead people's faces when you're wearing them? What in the Hannibal Lecter shit am I watching?

I remember going on a long winded rant to my wife after this episode about how this is impractical from a tactical and survival situation.

First off, you look like and act like the very thing every living person is actively killing. If you stumble across anyone with firearms…you're dead. If you break character for even a second the actual dead that you're walking with will turn on you and eat you.

It's dumb, it's too much and its way over the top and in no way is believable.

EXPLAIN THE BELIEVABILITY OF THE WALKING DEAD***

The show actually makes my point later on when Darol and Michonne trap them on a bridge. Instead of head shooting them Darol just hits them in the leg with his crossbow. Naturally he finds a living one and he screams immediately being eaten by the dead next to him.

Epic fail…

They end up killing all the dead except one who's living and falls to their knees and gives up. Turns out to be a young woman.

So they haul her back to Hilltop to interrogate her and hold her.

They don't get much of any truth.

We get a little back story on the girl and how the group started. Turns out her mother is an evil abusive person, and was that way long before the dead started walking.

So needless to say this girl has some heavy baggage… but for some reason Henry just loves her.

Take it from me kid, you don't want to date the emo girls… it never works out well in the end..

Eventually they get some of the truth out of her, but wouldn't you know it! Look who shows up the girl's mother and her little army of pretend dead people.

At first you might be thinking they will say trick or treat but no, they make some threats toward the hilltop which is laughable… considering these dead heads have no fire power.

Instead of just blowing them away and ending this Darol decides to make the trade because there's a baby amongst the dead heads? Whatever…

And by the way what happened to all the guns? Did the just disappear? What happened to the infinite ammo cheat code they had unlocked? Did that die with Rick?

I mean Eugene is a bullet maker, these people should be armed to the teeth with that many years of peace and time to make ammo.

But nope… just bows and arrows.

I guess the script needed that since they would make pretty quick work of these pretend zombies if they still had all their guns.

Judith still has a gun tho… still has bullets too….

I love that this show conveniently brings in ammo, gas, and a timely turn rate when the plot needs it to move along.

Carol gets the award for the longest turn rate of five or six days. Check that kid's blood, maybe he has some antibodies or some shit. Call Doctor Fauci and pfizer..

Anyway, this entire scene is stupid as even without guns they have walls, and arrows and numbers…

There's no reason to negotiate with these idiots.

But they give the daughter back for the other two captors. And all go on their merry way.

Henry isn't having it though, He loves this girl and by golly hes gonna go after and save her.

Henry is about as useless as he was when he was a kid. Making the same damn irrational decisions like last season and is useless with his stick.

Morgan whooped ass with his stick, taking down full size men. Henry… nah he just gets beat up.

Well now he's captured and Daryl has to go out and find him

Because Darol is the smartest character in this story, he takes a page out of the deadheads book and dawns a zombie mask, sneaks in and takes the two love birds away.

Darol and the others have to stage a last stand sort of fight in a building where he is met by Beta, a giant man played by none other than Ryan Hurst.

If you don't know who Ryan Hurst is, he's a damn good actor. Too good for this role in my opinion. He's starred as Opie in Sons of Anarchy and movies like Remember the Titans.

He's actually a really big dude and he shows that in this show. He plays a pretty strong and powerful character and it was fun to watch him and Daryl fight.

But Darol gets the best of him and shoves him down an elevator shaft. Now he should be dead, because that's what happens when you fall that far… but He managed to now only live but get up and walk away like all is fine.

Ergh whatever.

Stop doing this! Stop putting your characters in unrealistic and inescapable situations. If Beta is not to die, then don't have him pushed down an elevator shaft.

So they all get away, and flash forward now to the fair.

All the communities have come together to celebrate and do trade. All is going well except somehow alpha from the dead heads managed to sneak in disguised as a normal person.

She does recon on the place and eventually finds her daughter later on in the movie theater. Her daughter basically tells her to screw off, and they mother tells her she's weak and leaves.

Now we think this all that happens but turns out she captured a bunch of people from the hilltop who were on their way back from the fair.

Darol, Carol and some others go out looking for them but are quickly captured by the stupid pretend dressed up people. The woods were dead quiet until the walkers were right up on them.. Go figure

Needless to say Alpha takes Daryl away to show him a very large horde of zombies that she has under her control. And tells Daryl that if his people cross into their territory she will unleash them toward his people.

Daryl is let go and meets back up with Carol and the others in a field where they see the markers for the boundary line.

Its a bunch of steaks in the ground and sitting upon them are the heads of the captured hilltop people.

Sadly we see many characters but then we see Tara’s and Enids head. Then Henrys..

See what happens when you fall for women with so much baggage!?

Needless to say I was not expecting that. Especially not Tara or Enid.

IT was a pretty shocking and sad ending to that episode and yet there was still one more episode left.

The Kingdom has fallen apart, and is now beyond repair. I like this because its realistic, most of our buildings would not last for very long without general maintenance. And sadly they dont have the supplies or knowhow to do it.

Carol and the King are clearly in disarray after losing Henry and it would seem their marriage is now shaky. The King even asks Daryl to disappear for a while after they get to Hilltop so he can spend time with Carol and try to piece things back together. It would seem the King might be suspicious of Carol and Daryls relationship.

So The King and everyone set off for the Hilltop but are cut off by a nasty blizzard and must seek shelter nearby at the abandoned sanctuary.

This episode marks the first time in the series, that snow has been present. Chief Content Officer, Scott Gimple, expressed his excitement about this, as it is something that he has wanted for years. Back in season 2's "18 Miles Out", Shane and Rick shares a short conversation about how they should prepare for the winter, where it was asked on Talking Dead after if there would ever be snow in the show. Special Effects Supervisor Greg Nicotero explained that he would very much like to include a winter theme in the show, but it would be too complicated to create in terms of using sets with snow and to create frozen and icy walkers.

However they can't stay there long and risk being snowed in with little food or water. So they must make the hard decision to trek across Alphas territory to get home faster. Since Ricks bridge is gone they wont be able to take the usual long way.

Luckily they never encounter Alpha and her people. But they do encounter some frozen zombies. But nonetheless make it to the hilltop.

Alexandria meanwhile is batting down the hatches and trying to survive the blizzard too as the snow has shut down the solar panels and there is no power.

Negan ends up rescuing Judith when she runs off to save Dog. And this earns him favor with Michonne, to a degree.

Now In the last season I said they were going to get Negan back into the fold and some how working with Ricks people.

I said I wasn't sure about this working because Negan did some pretty messed up things and in my mind is irredeemable.

But the show cleverly has made him pay his dues, hes sat in a jail cell since the end of the war, Likely at least five or more years.

He's still the protagonist at times, egging people on (which is funny) but he appears to be a changed man.

Now look, does this mean that he should be walking free? No…

Afterall he should be dead, but the show realized quickly with Andrew Lincoln gone they don't have a main character to center on. Could it be that Negan takes that roll?

Normally I would protest but I like Negan’s character so much I would rather watch him screw with Father Gabriel than anything else. And I will be curious to see his reaction to the stupid dress up dead people.

The show knows that Negan is a slam dunk character and the only one that really is interesting anymore in this series. Daryl is always fun to watch but hes hit his arch. And unless he gets serious with Caryl or some one else there is not much more to explore there.

That's not to say Daryl is a bad character now, not at all. He's quite reliable, and we can trust to know how he will act or what he will do in a situation. This is fine, but it's not that interesting after a while.

Michonne, Eugene, Rosita, Gabriel, the King, and Carol have all hit their character arcs and now are essentially on auto pilot. There's very little left that you can do with the characters at this point. They have all grown up. Now that's not to say they can't be in interesting circumstances.

But what makes a show interesting is watching the characters grow and change with their environment. We have seen this with everyone.

Negan is the last interesting character in this situation. And that's why I'm giving this show a pass on this one.

It will be interesting to see how he acts and moves about if he gains his freedom. And how will the others react around him.

Overall this was actually a pretty good season, far better than the last one. And heading in a much better direction than I would have thought.

The first four or five episodes were my favorite as I found that all the communities trying to work together was a new and interesting story.

I am in no way a fan of these whisperers or whatever they're called. I think its cheesy, over the top and stupid.

The communities should make quick work of them in theory but I have a feeling that the show's writers will make a way for them to struggle against them. It probably won't make sense and seem way too convenient at times but that's what happens when you create villains that in any real world situation would not be hard to take out.

We will see, maybe it will end up being good. The season overall was much better than I was expecting and lone and behold rated higher than last season too.

I find it interesting that the show's writers were so quick to kill off so many main characters this season. Especially when it seemed like everyone was invincible last season during a major war.

If only they had been this capable last season, it may have been more interesting.

I have heard many rumors that the actor who played Jesus wanted to be done with the show. So they had him killed off, and it was certainly unexpected and strange when it happened.

Overall it is safe to say this show is reaching its end, and not because I know there's only two seasons left. But because it's simply heading toward a dead end. There is only so much you can do with this story at this point that won't be already done.

It will be interesting to see how they wrap this up, its one of the hardest things for a show to do. Most end horribly and leave fans with questions or frustrated. But I feel like they could really go full circle and bring this ship home on this one. End on a strong note like your began back in season one.

Time will tell… I am looking forward to season ten.

Wrap up.

Intro/outro

Big Rock License

Big Rock by Kevin MacLeod

Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/3436-big-rock

License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Other Intro

The Walking dead main title theme song

by Bear McCreary

On Apple iTunes

The Rant with David King

enMarch 10, 2023

The Walking Dead special Part 8

Intro:

Buckle up, strap yourselves in because we are in for a strange and bumpy ride as we dive deep into Season 8 of the Walking dead!

Season 8 picks up not exactly right after season seven ended. We get a brief montage of the three communities working together to make weapons, armor and other items for the war with Negan.

There’s some weird kind of poetic speeches like you would see in some cheesy old war movie. The Generals long winded cadence to ready his men for the battle ahead.

That works for those movies, but really doesn't do much here. It just comes across as cheesy. I would much rather see everyone terrified and nervous about going into a war with another group.

This is more realistic as none of these people are soldiers or signed up for that sort of thing. The Emotions would be high. There would be more silence than noise or talk, more stoicism. People focusing, trying to build their courage up to go into battle.

But much of season 8 is like this, cheesy, awkward, and leaving you to wonder how any of these people survived this long or for that matter through one battle.

We really have come off the rails here in Season 8. In terms of Writing.

Don't let the flashing sounds, explosions, and abundance of action scenes distract you from the lack of creative writing.

We will start with episode one, when Rick arrives at the Sanctuary with his armor plated vehicles.

Here is the first red flag for me.

Negan is always one or two steps ahead of his enemies, including Rick.

Negan has the upper hand, he has more troops, and more weapons. He has several outposts that stretch out his reach around the area.

Negan knows they are at war and yet he allows Rick and the others enough time to build up their ranks, build armored cars, and give out cheesy speeches.

Negan could have attacked at any time, almost immediately after the declaration of War that he gave at the end of Season 7.

He could have easily taken any one of the communities out, quickly, and efficiently. And yet he didn't.

What he did do, was sit around and do nothing. He places a few scouts out and about but only one person per area, making them easy targets. Why would he do this when he has the manpower to put a minimum of squads of ten on watch?

If I am Negan, and have half a brain. I would have patrols on every road that led to and from the Sanctuary, twenty four seven. I'd recon hideout watching what Rick and his people do.

But no… none of that.

Rick is just able to drive right up to the front gates of the Sanctuary unchecked…

This is insulting to Negan's Character and frankly goes against it in a big way. Negan is supposed to be playing Chess while everyone is playing checkers and that is not the case anymore.

To make matters worse and the second red flag, as if all that wasn't enough, Negan just walks out onto an open balcony with no cover and no real way to escape to greet Rick and his Army.

Why would you do this? You are now exposed; you could be killed instantly. And why does Rick give ultimatums? You literally along with everyone else have a clear shot of Negan. Take the damn shot!

Sure you may have to fight off a few of his lieutenants, but you were already prepared for that.

This is a bizarre scene…

Rick stands there all the time of the day to take Negan down and doesn't.

Instead and here is another stupid move, the shoot out all the windows of the sanctuary. Scattering Negan and his men.

So you could have shot Negan and most of his Lieutenants and basically ended it right there but instead you waste a ton of ammo on windows.

This is a bad strategy. Because its the apocalypse, and ammo is in short supply. Why would you waste it on windows?

The answer is you wouldn't. You would take into account the scarcity of ammo, weapons, and people and be far more strategic in your operations.

None of that happens here.

Negan has to crawl away, and find cover as Rick and his group open fire.

And another red flag… Rick and his army apparently have the cheat code of infinite ammo.

First off every weapon they have seems to be fully automatic, which is ridiculous in and of itself. There are over 330 million legal firearms in the US. How many of them are full auto? If I had to guess probably less than thirty percent.

Even if you managed to find the very few military rifles that are fully automatic you would not have this many…

And yet they all are. Including the ones that aren't military weapons! I saw later on in the show a man firing a rifle, an M-14 that has a ten round mag and is only a semi-auto and it was full auto…

(If you didn't know they CGI they gunshot into this show which makes it even more cheesy. Some words of advice, if you aren't gonna have real firing weapons on set, don't do close ups of the weapons firing. You could clearly see no brass ejecting from the ports or the bolts moving back and forth…)

ITs so unbelievably cheesy!!!!

Not to mention they fire all those shots at the sanctuary and never once do they hit any of the saviors… none of the meaningful ones anyway.

So the war is on!

Now I do think it is clever that they move a herd of walkers into the sanctuary basically blocking them in.

But the fact that they could get away with such a complicated task to begin with makes my head explode. Again how the hell did these people get so close to sanctuary unchecked?

It's like the Writers made Negan a complete idiot for the sake of drawing out this war between him and Rick. Because the reality is Rick and his people would have been dead long ago…

Rick though again has a chance to Kill Negan, he sees him pinned down and can get the jump on him but Gabriel as always screws things up.. Gabriel convinces him to leave and continue the mission..

The Mission is to take out Negan!! Why are playing games here people?

Anyway..

We cut to the Group splitting up and going after all the outposts. This is a smart play. However the outposts seem to be irrelevant and useless.

Why have them if you don't use them? Why have them and only seem to have two or three guys on watch? You are at war, everyone should be on high alert and those outposts should be guarded like Fort Knox.

So aside from walkers surrounding one of the outposts the groups make quick and easy work of them.

Except the one they do a friendly drive by.

All of Negan's people are ignorantly unaware and just cleaning weapons, treating the workers like shit as always…

And then suddenly with no problems pulls up a squad of armored cars to wreak havoc. Again they all have full autos and manage to hit very few of the Saviors in the first volley.

So now we get the pleasure to see a battle go on for an entire show if not longer. Again All of these folks have full auto rifles and are managing not to hit a thing.

It's interesting to note that we see them all on both sides going gung ho with their trigger fingers and no one stops to reload. I made sure to pay attention, and nope, no one changes a magazine out… just keeps endlessly firing for all of eternity.

It's also interesting to note that none of them are carrying mag pouches, or backpacks. Where the hell are they keeping this endless supply of ammo? Don't know..

This entire battle again makes little to no sense. Their plan is never to advance on the Saviors beyond their vehicles. Just keep firing at them, eventually the ones they kill will turn and then eat the ones that haven’t!

WHAT A JOKE!

First off you have no idea when those bodies will turn, could be hours or could be days. It depends really on when the plot needs them to. But still! You are just gonna waste precious ammo shooting at this group hoping that a few turn in the next ten minutes.

Fire fights in real life combat can be over in seconds. There's a few variables. One of them being ammo, and how much you have. The average soldier carries a little over hundred rounds on him. I want to say 180 rounds but I can't remember.

If you were an idiot, had a full auto rifle and happy trigger finger you could burn through that ammo in under five minutes. I am not kidding.

And yet here is Rick's group just spraying and praying for what seems like an hour or so? Hard to tell but the battle drags on the entire show.

In reality it would be over in minutes because all of them would have run out of ammo. They would have had to wrestle each other or something…

This scene is asinine, and just goes to show you that whoever wrote it knows nothing about combat, how weapons work, or for that matter any real tactical thought.

I mean shit man, even old Arnold movies made more sense than this.

Its just plain awful. And to make matters worse no one is really dying here, I mean sure the saviors are. And ya some of them finally come back as zombies and go to work… how clever.

Its also interesting to note how everyone becomes stupid when the show needs them to so they can be bit. The saviors all head guns with and endless supply of ammo, and they just let the zombies bite them.

Ugh it's so BAD!!!

And I have not even passed episodes one and two yet!!!!!!

Food for thought. If you plan to do combat scenes in any thing. Do some research. Maybe hire someone, any one. Hire the half drunken jarhead grunt that tends bar in Los Angeles. Because even he would have ripped this scene to shreds.

But this is just foreshadowing of things to come my friends.

Because if all this stupidity wasnt enough, Rick runs into an old friend from season one! Well I can't remember his name because well. He wasn't very important then and certainly isn't now.

This man left with his family to go the Birmingham at the end of season one.

How did he manage to go from Birmingham Alabama to Washington DC? Don't know….

And what are the odds that he would run into the saviors, join them and be in a building that Rick happens to go into with just Daryl? Pretty good I guess…

UGH I HATE WHAT THEY DID TO THIS SHOW!

So, we get this waste of a scene… We know Rick isnt gonna die here. And since this dude was a nobody in season one we just have to wait for Daryl to show up and save the day.

And sure enough he does!

I like where Daryl is at right now. He's in a “I dont care Im here to win this”. He didn't care who it was, he just took him out.

Daryl is actually one of the few characters or really the only character this season that doesn't really deviate from who they are. While all the other characters are turned upside down from Sunday, he remains pretty much in plain with who he is.

His move later on with the sanctuary is a bit off character but not as much as others.

The writers have no idea what to do with these well developed characters and frankly are ruining them this season.

Oh ya Aarons partner dies. I know I didn't care either. I almost forgot. Don't worry the show wasted a lot of time on it.

Why would you dedicate so much time to a relationship and a character that was never developed? Given little to no attention from the beginning? Eric was barely a B level character.

This is like the Sasha episode, where we are made to watch an entire episode of her make stupid decisions that ultimately lead to her death. They drag it out to make you care, but you can't because the Character was never developed in such a way to make you care. You cant make up for that in a single episode.

We won't suddenly become invested in a character enough to make us feel real emotion when they are killed off in a single episode. This is Eric, no one cares. No one was ever made to care, and we won't in thirty minutes.

Stop doing this.

The show focuses heavily on the King too, and he is always smiling even though they are headed to battle. I don't hate his speeches, but again his character is over the top. The fact that he keeps mentioning that his ranks are untouched undoubtedly makes you believe something bad is about to happen at some point to them.

And sure enough it does. Would you know it! The King and his people get mowed down in a field by two fifty caliber machine guns.

Interestly enough, the show actually decided to accurately show the sheer power of the fifty cal, blowing the people to pieces.

Thankfully the king was defended and his army fell on him. They dogpiled that dude and somehow he managed to get out from under that dead weight.

Needless to say he aint smiling no more…

Neither is Jerry…

Thankfully the show only killed off a bunch of characters we knew nothing about in the scene…

The king ends up getting taken hostage by a guy who looks like Jeffery Dahmer.. Not sure what decade this dude just came from but whatever.

They waste some time and end up getting trapped at a gate as the dead kingdom fighters are walking toward them.

Jerry thankfully comes out of nowhere to save the day, and splits jeffery Dahmer in two with his battle axe. Ok, that's badass.

Carol gets into a fire fight with the saviors loading up the fifty cals, and that entire scene is dumb. She gives up, and instead of just shooting her and carrying on, one of them gets close enough to get killed by Carol and she opens a gate of walkers… whatever.

This is where I see that a semi auto M-14 becomes fully automatic….

At this point my eyes have rolled so far into the back of my head I forgot the rest of that atrocious episode…

Oh ya, the King is depressed and stumbles back into his community with just Jerry and Carol, the entire community looks on in sadness and horror that everyone is dead.

Honestly, that's how it would have happened from the rip if Negan wasn't sitting on his hands for some reason. But oh well.

And now we take a break from our usual programming to cut to Negan and Gabriel hanging out.

Gabriel somehow finds a way into Negan's head and we get to see a softer side of old Negan. We learn that he used to work with people, and had a wife that he wasn't particularly good to but loved her nonetheless.

Its almost like the show is trying to change Negan into a victim? Could this be to make him an anti-hero later? How could this be? He's such a bad man who manipulates and kills people… Guess time will tell dear listener.

All jokes aside I actually enjoyed The exchange between Negan and Gabriel. These are two opposites coming into collision. A man of faith who feels he's on a mission from God, and another who thinks he is God.

It was actually well done and I enjoyed it. I like the Negan kind of takes to Gabriel a little and works together to get out.

Now Gabriel gets sick, none of this really matters, it's just a subplot that leads to a doctor being killed.

It's really just there to fill the gaps.

So all is going to plan, and we get some filler until Daryl and some others get a wild hair to finish the fight and deviate from Rick's plan.

Now this is in my opinion where Daryl goes off character a little. He is always resourceful but he is also extremely loyal and follows Rick's orders to the Tee, he always has. So for him to do this is way off base for him

Their plan is to drive a garbage truck into the sanctuary and let the walkers surrounding inside to finish them off.

Well this doesn't work, and allows Eugine to come up with a plan to clear the walkers and now Negan has escaped.

Go figure!

This garbage truck scene is another bizarre moment. Negan was supposedly trapped and all Rick and the group had to do was wait it out. How did letting the walkers inside change that? Why now does the sanctuary have the ability to clear all of them?

None of this makes sense.. It seems like the writers accidentally wrote themselves into a corner and had to find a way out.

So we get this convenient scene…

And to top off all the bad writing this season we have Carl come across a random person. Now Rick Scares him off in the beginning but Carl being the kid that never, ever, not once has listened to his parents. Decides to venture off and find this man and save him.

Eventually he does, he sees him killing walkers in the woods.

Carl offers food and water to him, asks him the three questions and they proceed to head to Alexandria.

In the process of that they come across some walkers. Now the smart thing to do would be to avoid them. But the man tells Carl that his mother believed that killing them would release their trapped spirits.

I happen to agree with that a little. BUT! I don't agree with engaging with zombies unless you absolutely have to. This may be the Resident evil player in me.. But nonetheless no unnecessary risks!

But that's what they do, now you don't know that Carl gets bit here but eventually you find out he does.

Like I said earlier the rate at which you turn is whatever the plot needs it to be. In this case a few days for Carl, many days before he even shows signs of becoming sick.

Enough time to write letters to everyone including Negan, and help this guy in a sewer until he could convince his dad to let him in.

So that brings me to the scene where negan rolls up to Alexandria looking for Rick, its time to go nuclear.. Well kind of. Negan finally grows a set and attacks back.

Carl distracts Negan just long enough for people to escape, feeding him some BS line.. I love this scene because Negan gets pissed and says “I thought we were having a moment kid you little shit”

Anyway Negan lays waste to most of Alexandria while they all hide in the Sewer. This is when we find out Carl is Bit.

Apparently Chandler Riggs was set to graduate and go off to college so he had to depart from the show. At least that's how I remember it.

Now me personally, I would have rather seen Carl go out in a better way. But the show is trying to set it up so that Rick and the group dont kill the saviors or Negan. Which is odd I know but thats the direction its going.

It's a sort of let's forgive and coexist.

This is great and I believe we should forgive our enemies and love one another as the Bible and Jesus teaches us.

But the reality is people like Negan don’t forgive, and don’t coexist.

It's like my Sgt Major in bootcamp said, sometimes there's people in this world that need killing, and that's what you are gonna go do.

He was right. Sometimes people are too far gone and can't get with the program, becoming a danger to everyone around them.

But this show is gonna try to prove otherwise… that bashing out the brains of two of your friends, one who was a father and killing many others can all be forgiven…

Needless to say It was a pretty emotional episode. I will say it was one of the better ones of the season.

From my Rant so far that is not saying much…

So Rick once again sets off to mess around with the Garbage pail kids… He finds out that they're all dead because Simon went rogue and shot them all. Jadis is the only survivor.

Seeing this, Rick basically says screw it and leaves her. Because she no longer has anything to offer them.

Rick for the record Is Negan at this moment. Rick has channeled his inner monster but is no longer controlling it.

He shares more in common with Morgan and Negan than Glenn and Herschell at this point.

So Jadis has nothing to offer, fine leave her be. And honestly thats smart, because Jadis only ever messed with Rick anyway.

Any way Back at the Sanctuary Negan was given a great Idea by the traitor Eugien. So the Saviors begin to dip their weapons in walker guts in order to unleash some psychological warfare on the hilltop.

All of this because Negan wants to keep the hilltop and kingdom alive and providing. Simon does not seem to understand why and just wants to go full nuclear.

I think both are technically right.

After all, why does Negan put up with negotiations? Why not just take over those communities and have your workers farm and tend to the land and provide?

Either way, Negan wants to keep them alive and providing.

So they set off on their mission when Negan gets side swiped by Rick!

Just as I mentioned in the last episode when the head of a snake is cut off the body dies or maybe someone else steps up, but its not the same.

And that's what happens. Simon and Dwight think Negan is dead so Simon steps up as leader.

Simon decides to move along as planned but they are gonna take everyone out at the hilltop and do it for Negan!

We find Rick and Negan in a nice bout, they taunt each other and fight a little. But Negan manages to escape when Walkers get let out.

Back at the hilltop Simon and his crew arrive and wage a nice battle. But the Hilltop was prepared and eventually chased them out.

Unfortunately tho that evening when everyone is asleep, anyone who was cut or hit with an arrow ends up turning and the Hilltop is awakened to a real life nightmare.

Thankfully again none of the main characters die here… they all manage to escape.

We are led to believe that Tara might turn from Dwight's Arrow but we all know she won't because Dwight didn't taint his arrows.

Once again everyone makes it… Everyone that matters anyway.

So we get to see later on just how much Rick has become an uncontrolled monster. As he and Morgan set off to look for the escaped prisoners at Hilltop.

They get captured, but only briefly as a convenient herd of walkers find their way into the warehouse. The Saviors release Rick and Morgan in good faith and they all work together to clear the warehouse. In fact one of the saviors saves Rick's life.

But then suddenly Rick and Morgan shoot all of them in the back. And kill them.

The one long haired prick gets away but Morgan cuts him off at the pass and traps him with walkers.

This scene is important because it shows that Rick isn't playing games anymore. He will lie and go against his word and kill anyone.

Rick is now just as bad as far as I can tell as Negan.

Rick was always the moral one, taking the high road. And This was an easy road to take. These men wanted to help you and work with you. You told them they could and then double crossed them.

That's dirty…

You hear Rick kind of play over it a little with Morgan but not a whole lot..

Rick also gets on the Radio after Carl's death and tells Negan that he's coming for him and that there is no chance for peace. So again Rick is full send with this war.

Back at the sanctuary things aren't all ok.. Negan shows back up and surprises everyone including Simon. He messes with Simon and Dwight a little but he knows the truth about both of them.

Negan Fights Simon for the leadership position and ends up killing Simon.

Negan also turns Dwight into a worker, much like what Daryl was last season.

And so all that goes on… and Machonne ventures out to the Sanctuary to read a letter that Carl wrote to Negan. But Negan isn't having it. Rick and the group have done too much to come back from that now.

And that makes perfect sense. If I was Negan I would want to put an end to it as well.

The season ends with everyone in a field, Rick thinks he got the jump on Negan but really Negan tricked him and now has them trapped.

Negan and his army open fire on Rick and his group but wouldn't you know it! The old traitor Eugine pulls through and tampers with the ammo he built.

The guns all misfire, killing some of the saviors and wounding many more.

Negan's hand gets messed up badly and he tries to crawl away but Rick catches up to him.

They both fight it out but eventually Rick gets the upper hand and slices Negan's throat with a broken piece of glass.

Now Negan should be dead here but he isnt…

In some weird twist of event Rick calls his doctor to come save him.

Wait what?

After all this you decide to save Negan?

That's right, fair listener we went through that entire season of shenanigans only to end up here where Rick suddenly and out of nowhere has a change of heart about Negan.

Now first of all if you did have a change of heart about killing Negan why would you slit his throat? Its hard enough to survive that in real life with modern medicine let alone an apocalypse and a guy who was barely a resident before the pandemic.

But whatever….

That isn't even my biggest beef.

Sure I get it he read Carls letter… again.

But how do you go from shooting saviors in the back, ones who helped you. To now suddenly spare the life of the man that killed your friends and terrorized your people? In the span of one episode at that.

I could understand if Rick was having a change of heart when Carl died but he went deeper into rage mode… and now out of nowhere he snaps to?

No….

Sadly what happened is one, Negan is such a well loved character this show couldn't kill him off. Just like they could not kill any other of the well known characters off this season.

Notice we had a giant war and the only ones who died were basic C list, undeveloped characters? That's why the entire season was so flat.

Ya you lost Simon, but that was the only meaningful loss in the entire season. It actually made the season interesting to see Negan's guys start to turn on him. Because as I said before the Tyrant can only rule for so long before someone tries to overthrow him.

Rick doesn't suffer from that problem, even Maggie respects his decision enough not to go over and kill Negan herself when he decides to save him. Believe me though she wasn't happy about it.

Or maybe Negan is being kept alive because rumors swirled up during the end of this season. And that Rumor was Carl wouldn't be the only actor departing from the show.

Yup Andrew Lincoln has decided to break away too, Turns out his reasoning was he was missing his family back in London.

Or could it be that Andrew saw the writing on the wall and how bad this show has gotten and wanted to break away while it still had a little shred of credit left? And that most of the people he started off with in season one, the group that got along so well and made the show what it was, is mostly gone now.

Daryl and Carol are the only two left from season one, besides Morgan. I usually don't include Morgan because his appearance in season one was so short.

So how will that work?

The Walking Dead is about Rick Grimes. That's what it was always about.

The other characters orbited around him.

It will be interesting to see how Season nine goes and what happens next. How will the show progress without Rick's Character.

What will happen with Negan? Will he fill Rick's shoes? If so, how?

How do you take a character that was a psychotic maniac and place him in the role of the fearless respectable leader?

The answer is you can't.

Negan cant become the hero or anti-hero for that matter.

There's no way in any logical realm that he could appeal to Maggie, and that's exactly who he has to appeal to.

According to how the season ends Rick may have a hard time appealing to Maggie too as she is not at all happy that Neagan is alive and seems to have a plan in place to get him and kill him even if that means hurting Rick.

SO with that said, what is gonna happen?

Seeing as the writers couldn't handle this season, I am in fear of what's to come.

Wrap up:

Intro/outro

Big Rock License

Big Rock by Kevin MacLeod

Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/3436-big-rock

License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Other Intro:

The Walking Dead Main Theme

The Walking Dead

By Bear McCreary