Article by FisterRoboto of lefthandhorror.com
Recap = spoilers
There really isn’t a kick back and relax moment enjoyed on The Walking Dead these days. After securing their new home last week, the episode ended with the sudden walker attack on Hershel. Rick, always the man of the hour, rushed to action and hacked his leg off just below the knee. Now they have this to worry about his bleed out as well as some newly freed inmates in a power struggle. This show is always one step forward, two steps back. They get past one problem, just to run headfirst into three news ones, and probably worse problems at that.
The democracy days are clearly over, dying with Rick’s announcement last season. The titular Rick faces a threat from within the prison as they free a group of inmates that were holed up in the prison cafeteria for ten months. The zombie apocalypse is never good news, and the cafeteria gang isn’t prepared to hear life on the outside is even more desolate and grim that within their own confines. Grappling for a position of power or balance, Rick and the new gang’s leader have some direct words over their immediate future. After briefly working together, Rick sees the inevitable and kills the leader. I love the widening gap in the show’s current moral vacuum. Rick is a hard ass with a moral compass, but with a new baby on the way and the only person able to deliver it on the verge of death – the stakes are raised. They did take that prison after all.
Carl steps out of and into his father’s shadow, demonstrating his ability to be both crafty and fierce as he raids the infirmary for Hershel’s sake. Lori, the consummate bitch, manages to alienate her son further. Carl’s out of the house and into the fire. This young man is growing up and has an awfully big role model to emulate, so let’s cut the kid some slack. Glen is asked to step up his game as well, tasked with dispatching the new and not so improved Hershel if he should have a fundamental change. Maggie’s bedside moment with her father was touching. She pleads for her caring father to pass on if he’s clinging to life only for her and her sister. There was a collective sigh of relief to see the old man make it to the end of the episode alive and zombie-free.
Carol chooses to take down a walker with hopes to gain some surgical skills as she thinks forward for Lori. Someone is watching from the shadows. Is this Michonne or even Daryl’s long-lost brother, the creepy Michael Rooker? God knows they need some more drama/trauma in their grim lives. S3 is 2 for 2 now, delivering a gripping and shifting show with each passing episode. Bring on The Governor.
