Truth time, chirren: I picked up my son yesterday in the dumbest way possible and blew my lower back out. I went to bed at like 8:15 last night and only just got up, well over 12 hours later, and I’m still high oh wait I forgot to tell you about the Vicodin part. Because VICODIN!!!
Listen to this song, only replace “Heroin” with “Vicodin”:
It is entirely possible that what I’m describing at any point may not actually match what happened on the show, and it’s definitely not going to be in order, and if there are a few thousands more typos than usual it’s because I’m so very lifted right now guys Vicodin is awesome my god I weigh like 280 and I only took two half a day ago what the hell is in this stuff right I’m supposed to be talking about zombies.
PREVIOUSLY ON THE WALKING DEAD: Zombies, I think. And I know how this guy feels right now:
Hey, what if Rick’s really been in a coma this whole time and he’s hallucinated the entire show? What if I’m hallucinating writing this post right now? God I hope I’m typing in English.
So. Right.
The show begins with Sasha very angry with some pictures of white people. And I’m suddenly very confused about how this town works, because didn’t Mayor-lady say yesterday that the place hadn’t been moved into yet? And yet all of the houses are perfectly nice and furnished and we all know that pictures on the walls take a year to put up after you move in and they’re all there, and the houses are all fully normal except for the part that there are no corpses in them. Anyway, Sasha wants her guns, and the pudgy lady (remembering names is not going to be my strong suit today, guys) asks her to bring back some leg, which is maybe the wrong thing to say to Sasha, and she gets this look on her face, which is the look that will be on her face for just about the whole episode:
And then she’s out in the middle of nowhere wasting ammo on shooting photos of happy people, and they’re playing with the sound design in an interesting way and you can’t really tell if she wants there to be zombies or if she’s hallucinating them or wait maybe I’m the one hallucinating them.
Wait, I think this is Peg + Cat. I’m watching the wrong show. Credits.
We’re back in the woods again, and the Warriors Three are discussing how to steal guns from the gun-house, which basically amounts to a plan to try and unlock a window, because security is not these folks’ strong suit. A zombie shows up, and Carol shoots it like fourteen times before going for the headshot. There’s a W carved in its forehead. Daryl notices. Did no one tell Daryl about the W zombies? He wasn’t there when Tyreese died.
Cut to Michonne, who is sort of trying on her new police uniform, only she’s refusing to tuck her shirt in and has made some very odd and unnecessary-seeming alterations to the back of the jacket:
Seriously, what are those for? Also at some point she’s going to hang her sword over the mantle, which is all symbolic, but let’s just pretend that happened now because this is the only picture I can find of the back of her jacket.
(LATE “OH, I GET IT” EDIT: That’s so she can wear the sword on her back, I bet.)
Meanwhile, Daryl is still in the woods, and he runs into Aaron, who is hunting rabbits, and then the two of them spend a few minutes chasing a metaphor, only in this metaphor the metaphor is eaten by zombies, which are not metaphorical. The horse is the metaphor I’m referring to. A metaphor for freedom. And sweet, sweet opiates. I bet that horse wishes he had some Vicodin, while the zombies were eating him. Because his back would still hurt actually quite a lot but he just wouldn’t care. And also the other parts of him that were being eaten by zombies. Those parts would hurt too.
Anyway Aaron has to shoot the metaphor in the head. That’s also metaphorical.
Meanwhile, Mayor Whatever Her Name Is is leading Rick and Michonne around and talking security, and Sasha finds out they don’t have a lookout in the clock tower, and volunteers to live up there, and she’s got that look on her face again. Rick, who knows his son, says something hilarious about making sure that no one has climbed the wall. Dude you know Carl is climbing the wall. Because otherwise he would be in the house.
Carol is being grandma. Rick walks past (I initially wrote “Wick” there, and now I think it would be really funny if he decided to rename himself Wick.) and they discuss her sneaking out during an actual cocktail party later that evening to go steal many guns.
Carol needs chocolate. She’s only allowed a quarter-bar to make her cookies. These are Carol’s cookies, by the way. I may make them later, if I ever escape the clutches of this devil drug, because right now I think I’d probably set the house on fire. She unlocks the window and no one notices. Then there’s more metaphoring from Daryl and Aaron and now it’s on to the scariest thing the group has ever encountered: THE COCKTAIL PARTY.
Carol has cookies. Rosita is unrecognizable. Abraham is hilarious.
ABRAHAM: I don’t know about this.
ROSITA: They have beer.
ABRAHAM: I’m gonna try.
Speaking of the party, which would be a great place to show members of the cast in establishing shots:
The answer is no, you haven’t, because Fr. Gorboriel is dead and no one even noticed. Not literally, I mean. It’s just that he isn’t on the show anymore as far as I can tell. They cut from the cocktail party to the end of the metaphor sequence, which I described out-of-order earlier, and this really cool thing happens. Before the eating of the metaphor, I mean, because that was scary and sad and gross and not cool. But: GIF!
CG blood on the camera lens, dudes.
Back to the cocktail party. Maggie, too, is virtually unrecognizable at first with her hair washed and a bit of makeup on. Daryl doesn’t want to go into the party. Instead, he ends up eating spaghetti with Eric and Aaron, who (eventually, I’m out of order again) reveal that they a) want him to start going on recruiting runs because of his outstanding physical beauty mix of useful skills and also they have a bike for him.
Inside, Rick formally meets blonde haircutter’s husband, who is apparently only creepy when he’s lurking on his porch at night. Rick has lost his baby, by the way. At some point BH’s little boy is going to put a red A stamp on his hand, and then soon afterwards he’s going to clumsily kiss her for no good reason, because this show is specializing in clumsy metaphors today. Presumably the A is for Alexandria and not Adultery, but we know that it’s really about Adultery. Also, Rick makes the mistake of telling A-Stamp Boy about Carol and her cookies, which leads to a scene so chilling that I think it breaks my high while I’m rewatching it.
Because I’m totally still high, by the way. Vicodiiiiiin.
Right, that scene hasn’t happened yet. What is happening is that Sasha has shown up for the party, only she’s in full side-eye/PTSD mode, and she’s not going to be there for very long because she hates everybody there and also PTSD. Abraham, who has been adorable since that episode where they revealed he was a wife-beater, tells Michonne “I am a large man, and I have had many beers to make up for that.” He’s so drunk, guys.
AND THEN THE CRAZY PART HAPPENS.
Carol is breaking into the supply house. She’s breaking into the supply house, where she steals guns (which no one will notice) and chocolate (which will prove to be her undoing). Little kid follows her, because little kid is really stupid and thinks she’s the cookie fairy or summat. And you can see the precise moment where Carol shifts from Grandma Carol to Look At The Flowers Carol, and it’s goddamned terrifying.
Sam, you see, needs to be convinced not to tell anyone what he saw. But Sam tells his mommy everything.
Reproduced, the entire speech she gives to this poor, terrified, stupid little child, and the worst thing is she does it in the grandma voice.
“You can never tell anyone. Especially your mom. Because, if you do? One morning you’ll wake up… and you won’t be in your bed. You’ll be outside the walls.”
“Where will I be?” he asks.
“Far, far away. Tied to a tree. And you’ll scream and scream because you’ll be so afraid. No one will come to help. Because no one will hear you. Well, something will hear you. The monsters will come. The ones out there. You won’t be able to run away when they come for you. And they will tear you apart and eat you up all while you’re still alive. All while you can still feel it. And then afterwards, no one will ever know what happened. Or, you can promise not tell anyone ever what you saw here, and then nothing will happen. And you’ll get cookies. Lots of cookies.”
She smiles, the chilling, dead grin of someone who teaches little people to murder for a living.
“I know what I think you should do.”
It’s holy crap level creepy. And there’s never a single second of doubt that she is describing exactly what is going to happen. Never.
Back at the party, Rick gets his adultery on and there’s nattering about book clubs and freshness of things and more great sound design and flashbacks to eating human flesh and then Sasha is told that someone is worried that she might not like the home-cooked meal that they brought to the party, and she snaps. “You’re worried? THAT’S what you worry about?” Sasha is so messed up, guys.
The next day, Mayor Nameless decides it’s okay for her to go up in that bell tower after all, because a bell tower is exactly where you want the crazy sniper. Meanwhile, Carol passes out stolen guns and Rick and Blondie walk past each other in town and literally wave their adultery stamps at each other. And then Rick goes Full Shane for a split-second and reaches for his stolen gun, for like no reason at all other than dude touched his wife.
The episode ends with Michonne hanging up her sword and Rick standing at the wall, listening to the zombie on the other side. The Bee-Gees are playing. God, is that actually happening? The Bee-Gees are playing? That’s got to be the Vicodin. There’s no way this episode is ending with a jaunty Bee-Gees song.
Is it next Sunday yet? Seriously, I have no idea what day it is and I probably ought to go back to bed.
