Did you watch last night's mid-season premiere of Helpful Tips for Overthrowing Trump 101The Walking Dead? Then by all means, let's chitty-chat about it! Lotsa spoilers and opinionated opinions after the jump! LET'S DO THIS.
Here's what I'm thinking about last night's mid-season premiere, "Rock in the Road."
1) First did you miss me? (YES!) Did you miss Rev. McChickenshit? (NOOOOOO.) And yet he was featured prominently in this episode's cold open, shirking his duties on the watch tower, stealing a bunch of food and weapons, and hightailing it out of Alexandria (with a mysterious figure riding in the back seat). WHAT IS HIS PLAN? WHO WAS THAT BACKSEAT DRIVER? WHY AM I NOT MORE INTERESTED IN THIS SUBPLOT?
2) Rick's Rangers show up at the Hilltop to try to convince Governor Smarmy McDick that they should help out with the revolution against Negan. McDick is all like, "No, because I'm a cartoon character that cannot be taken seriously." So then Sexy Jesus takes them to King Ezekial and his pet tiger, which doesn't seem to surprise Rick all that much—c'mon guys, it is a TIGER! Show some freaking enthusiasm, already! And because the King is less than psyched about donating bodies to Rick's possibly doomed plan to overthrow Negan, Rick launches into a terrible, long-winded and kind of nonsensical story about a rock in the road. Which I guess would have been fine, except for the part about finding a bag of gold underneath the rock? WHAT. Time to go back to metaphor school, Rick.
3) Anyway, Morgan's teen sidekick Benjamin meets Carol in the woods, just to remind us there is a Carol. Aaaaand... scene.
4) King Ezekial sleeps on Rick's idea, and wakes up to say, "NOPE. However you can leave Daryl here where Negan's men won't find him." Rick's all like, "Good idea," and Daryl is like, "Why does everybody treat me like shit?" On their way back, Rick's Rangers stumble on some type of Savior explosive trap. Sgt. McSexy shows them how to disable and steal all the explosives (which is muy caliente), and the gang is almost devoured by a zombie mob, except that Michonne and Rick decapitate a bunch of them using a couple cars with a wire strung between them. THIS READS A LOT MORE BORING THAN IT WAS, BECAUSE IT WAS AWESOME. A+ zombie kill money shot, people.
5) Rick and the gang rush back to Alexandria, where he's told that Rev. McChickenshit has run off, but he's like, "Don't worry about that right now, because the Saviors are coming to look for Daryl, and... oooooh, ahhhh, oh, HELLO SAVIORS. Didn't expect you, like, at all! To what do we owe this visit?" While looking for Daryl, the Saviors notice that a lot of the food is gone, but they are like, whatever! Because this show doesn't make any sense. They are also pretty chill about not finding Daryl, and they depart without saying a word about those dead, headless zombies on the highway or that mysterious explosion or their missing dynamite. IT IS SO HARD TO FIND GOOD HELP THESE DAYS.
6) With the Saviors gone, Rick's all like, "Okay, where the FUCK is Rev. McChickenshit, and why did he take our stuff?" Luckily he picks up a random notebook that has the word "BOAT" written in the back, and he's like, "AH-HAH! He's gone to the zombie lake boathouse!" (As usual, it's best not to think too deeply about the wild, totally unbelievable coincidences this show provides on a weekly basis.)
7) Arriving at zombie boathouse lake, Rick finds a random footprint and is convinced it belongs to Rev. McChickenshit (again, don't think too hard). They're following the footprints, when suddenly... AHHH! They're surrounded by a mean-looking LADY ARMY! At first Rick is terrified, but then rightly realizes, "Sweeeeet! A LADY army!" At least that's what I thought his smile meant. He could just be happy that he's found some people who may possibly fight with him against Negan. Still! Doesn't hurt that it's a LADY army, amirite? I hate myself.
8) In all seriousness, I think the first part of this season just accidentally dovetailed with the new Trump administration, but now? The writers are correctly recognizing that by drawing direct parallels to current events, they may actually be able to save this show from irrelevance. Unless they don't and screw it up. Otherwise, not a bad show, but they need to focus more on the Dirty Dozen-style secret missions and less on the chitty-chatty-chat. We shall see, what we shall see! WHAT DID YOU THINK OF THIS EPISODE? Let me know, and I'll see you all next week. Vive La Résistance!
