Walking Dead Recap: Internment
by North
Well this was a pretty action packed episode yes? Oddly despite the previous episodes featuring a daring extraction of antibiotics from a zombie infested animal hospital this one felt more fraught. Perhaps it’s because the action took place mainly on home turf? In any event my disjointed ramblings follow below.
Lizzie (aka creepy zombie loving kid) has been getting some serious face time, is the show setting her up to be a new regular or something else? Commentators theories have placed the responsibility for everything from the walker baiting to murdering the sickies at Lizzie’s little feet. Still that little lass was rather helpful this episode when she wasn’t annoying the adults or swirling her shoes in pools of plague blood (eeew). “Go away hun, Uncle Hershel needs to stab a man in the head.”
Hershel is undeniably the star of the episode which is nice. He’s been the generally admirable if somewhat naive at times social backbone of the group. The role of courageous healer suits him well; even the super flue seems impressed since it courteously stays out of him. That said he sure isn’t good at taking advice from Doc Caleb about keeping people in their cells. Not a good call there Hersh.
Then as if to contrast we have ol’ Rick who, having unilaterally exiled Carol, arrives back at the prison with less manpower (so to speak) to offer than he should have. Oh and Rick doesn’t feel comfortable having Carl’s tender teenage brain exposed to zombies or violence so he can guard the babies while Rick and Maggie shore up the fence by themselves. Yeah, great call there Rick. Kids don’t need green yards anyhow.
It also bears noting that we saw at least three able bodies adults this episode who, prior to this episode, apparently did not a lick of work about the prison. What the hell!? The idiotic unforced continuity problems are grating, couldn’t the show shell out for elderly extras? It’s not like old people make especially infirm walkers.
On the subject of the Walkers I remain mystified by their continued clustering at the fence. Is the mysterious mousketeer (or should I say ratketeer?) still feeding the things? Why are they bunching up like that? It’s oddly strategic for a bunch of mindless dead. If Lizzy is the ratketeer she’s quite epic since she’d have to be sneaking out of the cell block to clandestinely feed her pets. Maybe the ratkateer has greater freedom of movement now that Glenn and Maggie aren’t vigilantly watching the perimeter (aka making a prison tower into their own private love shack) every night.
On a similar subject it was brought up in previous discussions that the prison fence shouldn’t be buckling as easily as it is, being designed to stand up to the pressures of large groups far more energized than walkers are. I was somewhat agnostic on the subject until this episode until the fence literally fell apart under the press of Walker bodies AND the inner fence (remember there are two layers) fell apart like chicken wire. I’m sorry but that’s complete bull so to rescue the narrative I have an alternative theory: aluminum fences are vulnerable to the super flue. If Rick and Co had any sense they’d have had Hershel out in the dog run administering his elderberry tea to the ailing hard working aluminum links instead of those slackers in the prison wing.
Frankly the machine gun solution to the walker incursion struck me as idiotic. The entire US army with these weapons and better is overwhelmed by walkers but a Sherrif and a teenage kid can put a whole herd of them down with two automatic weapons? North does not approve, not even a little bit. Also the scene of them walking around finishing the walkers off afterwards made equally little sense. If you shoot them in the head they die, if you don’t shoot them in the head they keep coming after you so why would Walkers being laying around waiting to be finished off? Maybe they were stunned by the huge plot holes or caught the super flue from the fence and needed a lie down. Poor walkers.
Rick shamelessly avoids telling Darrel about Carol and Hershel blatantly punts that same question right back to him. Good for Hershel, Rick’s going to have to own up to this and I don’t think Darrel is going to be mollified with the taste of some fresh lima beans. Also on the list of men who likely won’t be mollified by some fresh lima beans is the Governor who is lurking outside! Welcome back gov, you wouldn’t happen to know who the prison’s ratkateer might be would you?
I would note that setting aside the fence collapse and the Governor’s reappearing the prison also lost several people including their only full fledged doctor. That puts this episode as one of the most devastating blows the community has absorbed pretty much all season. It looks to me like the deviation from comic cannon that occurred at the end of last season is gradually working itself out and gur cevfba vf qbbzrq gb snyy nebhaq gur fnzr gvzr gur Tbireabe qvrf sbe tbbq V nffhzr.
Thoughts?
Lizzie (aka creepy zombie loving kid) has been getting some serious face time, is the show setting her up to be a new regular or something else?
I’m already hoping she’s a Dramatic Feeding Moment this season. Carl is shaping up with a semblance of acting ability this season, let’s stick with one developing actor/actress at a time, eh?
Right now, I’m very, very ready to get irritated about the Governor’s presence. If he’s the one bringing the herd, why he didn’t choose to shoot Rick and Carl while they were fighting off the zombies is an unanswerable question. If he’s not the one bringing the herd, the writers need to decide right now what this guy’s motivations are and how it’s going to play out, not wing it on a weekly basis. If he’s not, what’s he doing there by himself?
Frankly the machine gun solution to the walker incursion struck me as idiotic. The entire US army with these weapons and better is overwhelmed by walkers but a Sherrif and a teenage kid can put a whole herd of them down with two automatic weapons?
Actually a big waste of ammo.
Let’s look at the walkers for a minute. Their ability to swarm is limited by their really poor dexterity. It actually *should* be possible for someone who is a decent shot to take out a very large number of walkers provided two conditions hold: they’re approaching from pretty much only one direction and they’re funneled into a limited cross-space, so you don’t have to traverse much to switch targets.
Which pretty much applies here, it’s the optimal zombie herd shooting gallery, almost. Hell, I could probably take out sufficient numbers of zombies; you hit the first one, it becomes a stumbling block for the next, etc. After five or six shots you’ve got a nice little pillbox built out of zombie bodies to slow down the incoming horde, rinse, repeat.
(But the whole fence falling apart thing made me ranty again.)Report
Actually, I have a question about automatic weapons use in a zombie world. Bear in mind that I know next to nothing about guns.
The advantage of firing multiple rounds at human opponents, is that any hit is better than none (spray some bullets, and whether you get a head shot or a leg one, that opponent is pretty much down).
But given that with zombies, anything short of a head shot is just wasted ammo, why would you ever set a weapon to auto?
Also, the Away Team came back in a different car, but luckily our genius heroes opened the gate right up anyway, blithely assuming it *must* be them. Maybe the Governor could just pretend to be delivering a Candygram to gain entry.
Also – The Governor. They really needed a DUN DUN DUNNNN music cue there. So silly.
What was not silly – Herschel with his bible, weeping. It’s powerful moments like that that keep me from writing this deeply problematic show off entirely.Report
Herschel made that episode. Otherwise, it was frustrating.
And while I’m not a firearms expert, I’m pretty sure that in the vast majority of cases, the only reason to use a weapon in full auto is because you’re firing at an area, rather than at a specific target, and it works better as a means of suppression.
Now, Rick and Carl were firing in bursts, and I imagine someone could make the argument that a burst at the height of most of the zombies head means you’re more likely to hit the head than if you just fire one at a time, but at that range, that seems unlikely.
I kept waiting for them to run out of ammo or have to turn back to get more from their little armory.Report
Yeah, even bursts seemed like a waste – if the first bullet misses the head, I assume the second probably will too. Like you said, if fighting humans, suppression makes sense, but against zombies I think I’d go full manual, 1 bullet per shot, both to conserve ammo and confirm each shot’s efficacy.
The actor that plays Herschel takes what could be an annoying character – folksy, religious, the “we must retain our humanity!” guy, and makes him feel like a real and decent person, doing his best.
Even in the disease ward, they don’t lock the cell doors. Sigh.Report
The advantage of firing multiple rounds at human opponents, is that any hit is better than none (spray some bullets, and whether you get a head shot or a leg one, that opponent is pretty much down).
Sort of what Chris said:
In the vast majority of cases, the only reason to use a weapon in full auto is because you’re firing at an area, rather than at a specific target, and it works better as a means of suppression.
In the vast majority of cases, even using full auto is a terrible way to provide suppression fire (three round bursts is better than blowing through your entire magazine in a couple of seconds).
Unless you’re firing a heavy machine gun from a fixed position at a large advancing group of infantrymen in an open field, maybe.
In the case of fighting an approaching group of zombies, burst fire is contraindicated because you’re going to have to compensate for recoil when you traverse from target to target. Single shots = less recoil == less likely you’ll miss your next target.
When you need to make a bunch of head shots in rapid succession, any loss of accuracy is a bad idea, I’d say.
Even in the disease ward, they don’t lock the cell doors. Sigh.
Actually, the right way to deal with this is not to lock the doors, because you don’t want to cut down on access if someone needs to provide aid in a timely fashion. Or, you know, if you need to get access to the shotguns or something.
Instead, you just cuff everybody who isn’t mobile to their bunk. They’re not going to go anywhere, they can’t turn and go attack someone outside their cell, and thus you don’t need to worry about a breakout (unless Hershel has a heart attack and turns, but then everybody is probably screwed anyway).Report
I know nothing about automatic weapons really so I’m going to defer to your collective expertise here.Report
Glyph,
With regards to specific zombie fighting tactics I believe World War Z is the best field manual out there. They talk about how the military moves to very careful single-shot marksmanship in the wake of too many losses to herds of zombies where the soldiers were using bursts or full-auto with not as much success.
So short answer here is that single shots are the best idea.Report
General thoughts:
When Rick and Carl were fighting the zombies did anyone else think of Aragon and Gimli at the Battle of Helm’s Deep? I half-expected Carl to say, “Dad, just throw me at them.”
I think with regards to the first fence collapse, we can give them a pass based on continued pressure against the fence. The second collapse happened way too fast. I repeat my earlier suggestion that someone needs to borrow a backhoe and start digging trenches, or better yet, arrange Morgan’s spike traps or lots of school buses around the perimeter. The lack of security is getting ridiculous.
Lastly, I can actually forgive most of the craziness in the cell block. It was a like a chain-reaction of death but it all sort of worked other than the suspect timing of three walkers becoming reanimated at once.Report
When Rick and Carl were fighting the zombies did anyone else think of Aragon and Gimli at the Battle of Helm’s Deep?
Not until just now, but maybe that’s what wasn’t working for me. Because yeah.Report
I don’t know. It still bugs me that one of the single most effective tools you could have against zombies is a closed door. And yet, there are always effin’ doors open!Report
Agreed Mike. What is worse, the aftermath of Rick and Carl’s showdown definitively shows that it is possible to clear the fence; the herd was gunned down and there were no more walkers streaming in. So that means that in the past when the community was healthy and at its strongest they -easily- had the capacity to armor the fence. As you correctly note, simply towing trailers, cars and buses along the perimeter would exponentially impede the ability of walkers to put pressure on the fence. That would not have been an enormous challenge for a group of this size and resources. How much gas or diesel would a tow truck or two have cost them? Worth every drop.Report
What did they do to close the breach? Rick said he was going to back the bus up against it, but the next AM I saw no change in the situation except for a pile of corpses. Did I miss something?Report
North / Glyph,
I think the lack of a bus at the breach was an oversight by the director. They should know by now that fans are watching the show with a magnifying lens.
Unfortunately, while I am sold on the idea of a prison being a great defensive location, they have to keep the security crappy in order to facilitate eventually leaving it for somewhere else. In reality Woodbury was much more secure which also re-enforces the question of why they brought everyone to the prison instead of the other way around.Report
Agreed, to say nothing of the fact that Woodbury was also infinitely more livable than the prison.Report