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Monday, November 12, 2012

TV The Walking Dead Chitty-Chat Club!

Posted by Wm.™ Steven Humphrey on Mon, Nov 12, 2012 at 11:29 AM

Hey! While watching The Walking Dead last night, I uttered the following ultimatum: "Oh no. OH NO. If they go there, I swear to Christ I will stop watching and never watch this show again!!" Did they go there? Find out after the jump where I will also be recapping last night's episode filled with spoilery spoilers! LET'S GET THAT CHITTY-CHAT ROLLING!

Whether pre- or post-apocalypse, ponchos are always in style.

Courtesy AMC
Whether pre- or post-apocalypse, ponchos are always in style.

So here's what I'm thinking about last night's episode, "Say the Word":

1) It begins in the lesbian liberal-arts school of Woodbury where Guv'nah Morrissey is gently combing his adorable daughter's hair... WAIT. That's no adorable daughter! That's a zombie daughter—who in her defense, does have pretty hair. Nevertheless, put a bag over her head quick! I can't stand looking at her.

2) Meanwhile back at the prison, Darryl and Maggie race off to find formula for the new baby who really needs to be quiet! CAN SOMEONE PLEASE SHUT THIS BABY UP?? Apparently Rick can't stand it either, because his mind snaps, and he goes off on an unintentionally hilarious zombie killing spree inside the prison. (LOVED that point of view shot, and nice work special effects department!)

3) Back at Woodbury, Michonne is creeped out by the Guv'nah's perfect suburbia—where black people wear pleated cargo shorts? UMMMM, that's a good reason to be suspicious! She pokes around the Guv'nah's apartment, and decapitates their stockpile of zombies... because otherwise BORING, right? She rebuffs the Guv'nah's invitation to join their killing crew, and tries to get Blondie McGunnerson to leave with her—but Blondie refuses, because Blondie is DUMB and ANNOYING. So Michonne rightly says "Sayonara, suckah!"

4) In their search for baby formula, Darryl and Maggie search inside a presumably abandoned daycare—and this is when I had my freakout and said, "Oh no. OH NO. If they go there (and show crawling or toddler baby zombies) I swear to Christ I will stop watching and never watch this show again!!" (I'm not sure why I freaked out so bad about that thought... but I did. I'll ask my therapist about it later.) Anyway, they open up a cabinet, and... EEEEEEEEE!!! Opossum!!! (Which kind of looks like a zombie toddler if you think about it.)

5) It's party night in Woodbury—which actually turns out to be a half-ass staged Bloodsport-style fight involving the Guv'nah's men in a ring of chained up zombies. THIS is what everybody was so worked up about? And Blondie is actually offended by it? Well, color me "immoral" but I thought this was, like, the most boring cage fight EVER. If it's entertainment they're after, they should set up a concert with Zombie Justin Bieber.

6) Rick discovers Lori's body... inside the belly of a zombie! HAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAA! Gross. He blows its head off, stabs its belly a few times, cuts off its feet and makes a pastrami sandwich out of it, shoves a nuclear weapon down it's throat hole, and while he's thinking of another insane thing to do... the phone rings. Rick picks it up, mumbles "Hello," and... CLIFF HANGER! (Who could it be?? I'm thinking it's ATT calling up to bitch about the bill being late.)

7) So there was a lot to hate, love and laugh at in this episode. WHAT DID YOU THINK?? Leave your comments below and let's start chitty-chatting!

Look out!! That vein in my forehead is filled with INSANE and ready to pop!

Courtesy AMC
"Look out!! That vein in my forehead is filled with 'INSANE' and ready to pop!"

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Comments (16) RSS

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I'll be a very sad panda if this is the last we see of Michonne. I mean, I would trust most writers not to be that stupid, but this is The Walking Dead we're talking about here.

You do remember that the *very first scene* of the very first episode featured Grimes shooting a kid in the head, right?

Posted by keshmeshi on November 12, 2012 at 11:42 AM

We were a bit pre-skeeved out by that same thought- and grateful for the possum. And whodathunk Darryl would be the baby whisperer? Who's gonna have a happy woody when Carol turns up alive holed up somewhere safe in the bowels of the prison????

Posted by Duvall-ite on November 12, 2012 at 11:59 AM

Hey! At least they used hygienic, free range zombies for the "cage" match.
I mean, it would certainly be STUPID of them to risk their best fighters on the off chance that one of them gets a little boo boo or something when wrassling and one of the zombies oozes some zombie blood and goo onto it.
Which then gets infected.
So they're almost certainly using sanitary zombies.

And that's the dumbest part of the show for me.
All the hand to hand zombie combat with the characters yelling and no one ends up spitting out zombie brains and bone and blood and goo afterwards.
Even if they are otherwise covered in zombie blood.

So why was the cage match a surprise?
Did everyone at the town party just avoid talking about it?
Or did our heroes just avoid talking to any of the regular town folk?

Posted by fairly.unbalanced on November 12, 2012 at 12:00 PM

Ponchos say "Hi, I haven't bathed in the past month"

Posted by Cato the Younger Younger on November 12, 2012 at 12:26 PM

"Hello dinner!"

Posted by Joe Szilagyi

on November 12, 2012 at 12:38 PM

What did they bury in the graves dug for Lori and Carol?

Posted by cliche on November 12, 2012 at 12:41 PM

@3: Everyone's *already* infected--you turn into a walker if you die, not if you get bit, unless the bite kills you. Did you miss the end of the last season?

Posted by tiktok on November 12, 2012 at 12:44 PM

#4 I was on the same track, are ponchos coming back in fashion?

Posted by Sargon Bighorn on November 12, 2012 at 12:48 PM

This show has gotten too stupid for words. I realize it's a big fan boy wet dream because of the graphic novels and all. But for fuck sake can't writers develop believable identifiable characters AND action for once without contriving epic stupidity. Holding up in a PRISON? Clearly the zombie infection also makes people into morons. And. The constant "let's split up" trope? Really?

I gave up after episode two this season. The, sexism, predictability and stupidity just overwhelms my need to see post-apocalyptic people get their faces eaten I guess.

Posted by tkc on November 12, 2012 at 12:53 PM

I was glad to see the ringing telephone in this episode. Rick's mental instability has been one of the more interesting aspects of the comic book story.

That said, I am disappointed in how Lori died. In the comics, the zombies begin to pose less of a threat in comparison to the threat of other humans. Many of the most horrifying deaths in the books are at the hands of people, not zombies. In the books, Lori was holding the new baby and was shot, and the bullet killed both her and the baby.

The show has yet to develop that theme. That despite the apocalypse, the greatest threat to survival is the living.

Posted by ourkind on November 12, 2012 at 12:53 PM

@4 and @8 - that pic grabbed me too, but my first thought was—Apocalypse or no, you did NOT cut a hole in a Pendleton, did you?

Posted by Dougsf on November 12, 2012 at 2:17 PM

@7
"Everyone's *already* infected--you turn into a walker if you die, not if you get bit, unless the bite kills you."

Rabies.
Or any other disease / bacteria / virus that would be carried by a dead person that has been eating (but not necessarily digesting) raw meat for the past year.

And while they may have doctors, their supply of medicine should be approaching the end of its shelf-life.

Posted by fairly.unbalanced on November 12, 2012 at 4:03 PM

@10,

You don't think they're heading in that direction with the guvnah and his minions? They murdered a bunch of National Guardsmen.

Posted by keshmeshi on November 12, 2012 at 4:57 PM

I hope to fuck they do something with Michonne's role on the show. There was a reason she's a fan favorite and they are not doing that character any justice. I'm about to the point with the show timeline where I quit reading the comic, so I have no idea what they'll do.

@9 Why is holing up in a prison a bad idea? I grant that it's handled a bit better in the comic, but it's a far better idea than the farm or them just wandering around for the winter avoiding zombie herds.

And I'll be defensive in saying that the show averages 9-10MM total viewers an episode, so I think we can safely conclude that this show is appealing to more than the fan "boys".

Posted by sisyphusgal on November 12, 2012 at 10:29 PM

I was really disappointed not to get zombie toddlers.

Posted by bleedingheartlibertarian on November 13, 2012 at 8:03 AM

It is a shame they treat Andrea (Blondie McGunnerson) as such a worthless idiot on the show all of a sudden. She was interesting, skillful, and competent in the books for basically the whole run.

@1: Don't worry about that, although it looks like Michonne dodged a hell of a bullet in the jump to TV...unless they are going to draw out the Woodbury arc way too far, like they did with the farm.

@9: Holing up in a prison is a really good idea. Fences, guard towers, locks on every door, open land for farming, medical bay, beds, space, food storage, armory, etc. It is true that the books treated this much better, as the survivors were not constantly wandering into the dark corridors alone for no reason, and they actually bothered to secure the medical facilities, kitchen, and armory.

Posted by Theodore Gorath on November 13, 2012 at 10:46 AM