Tristan Mayer's
The Walking Dead Season 7 Premiere Review:
"The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be"
The Walking Dead Season 6 ended on what I consider to be one
of the most insulting and cheaply executed cliffhangers of recent memory. The type of gimmicky behavior commonplace in
soap operas, no the Emmy-worthy drama that The Walking Dead likes to say it
is. After a sixth season of ups and downs, The
Walking Dead had begun to lose me as a fan, and as someone who had been
watching the show since it premiered and still reads every issue of the source
material, that was a severely disappointing realization. Through the teasing marketing and undeniable
leaked evidence, I began to wonder if this season premier could be enough to
bring me back or if the true victim of Negan’s brutality would be my desire to
keep viewing.
Wait, Did I Miss Something?
This was the question I found myself asking a few minutes
into the episode. The strange way to drag out the already
overblown cliffhanger was confusing and made me wonder if I had somehow tuned in
too late and not seen the scene with the ultimate reveal. After two commercial breaks without a reveal,
it became obvious that eight months simply was not enough. AMC & Co. wanted to make us wait another
half an episode for the reveal we all tuned in to see.
They bought this extra time by having Negan drag Rick into
an RV, drive him away from the group, and throw him into a Silent Hill street
filled with Walkers. Negan is playing
with Rick, mentally deflating him to the point where he collapses on the roof
of said RV, crying and being taunted to “think about what happened,” all while
flashes of each character waiting for the bat interrupt.
Past the 20 minute mark, we are finally brought back to the
scene we left last season at. Negan is
playing his games trying to pick who to hit for his home run hit. Would he go for an A List long-running all
star? Or cop out for a no name?
Batter Up
Turns out, he’ll walk down the middle ground, taking out
Abraham Ford. While he wasn’t a huge
character, Abraham was certainly a lead and had slowly become a fan favorite in
many regards for his one-liners and charm that brought a lightness to a very
dark world. However The Walking Dead is
not stopping there. While Negan taunts
the group, especially Sasha and Rosita, Daryl decides he has had enough and
socks Negan across the face. Negan
gleefully reminds the group that he warned them not to let another outburst
happen before he spins out and decides one hit just isn’t enough, and this one
will be truly brutal.
Negan brings the bat down again, this time onto the head of
Glenn. In all its comic book glory,
Glenn, eye gouging out and blood pouring, gurgles helplessly to Maggie before being
fully smacked down. This death was
brutal, living up to the hype presented by the cast and producers for the last
few months. Glenn was one of the four Season One regulars left on the show, and
his exit, while predictable, still managed to be surprising in the moment after
Abraham’s death took away our guard.
Kill Me A Son
We jump back to Rick with Negan as he struggles to get the
axe and back to the RV. In a satisfying moment
of manipulative cooperation, Negan and Rick both kill walkers to get Rick back
to the RV. When Negan and Rick return to
the group, it is already morning. The
group has been on their knees all night, with the bodies of Abraham and Glenn
next to them. While the group seems
substantially humiliated, Negan isn’t sure that Rick feels the same. He decides to make certain once and for all
by insisting that Rick use the axe he worked so hard to get to cut off the arm
of Carl. Rick begs and pleads that there
is any other option, but Negan is taking none of it.
When faced with the impossible, Rick begins
to raise the axe above his head to cut the arm off of his son. Right before he bring it down, though, Negan
stops him, demanding that Rick works for him now and that he owns him. Rick tearfully complies to the powerful
overload above him.
This scene was perhaps the most powerful of a significantly
brutal episode of the series and can sometime speak to a problem that AMC could
learn from themselves. Sure a shocking
and gory death can certainly be devastating, but the highest levels of tension
and emotional defeat can sometimes come from knowing what terrible things your
heroes are capable of rather than seeing the evil that your villain is capable
of. It is also powerful because of the
obvious biblical allegory. In the Book
of Genesis, the aptly named Abraham is challenged by God to show his devoting
by sacrificing his son, Isaac. Abraham
is distraught, but decides to do it in his faith and devotion to God. At the last minute, God interrupts, saying
that Abraham showing he was willing is more important than him actually doing
it.
This could be interpreted on a few levels, with the obvious being
that while Rick is powerful and important, he is nothing compared to the power
of Negan. That Negan is the true power
in every situation. It could also be interpreted
that Negan probably knew this story himself and that him using it for his own
gain shows a huge God complex for the character, especially when he truly seems
to enjoy being the one in control and expressing his power. Negan is also a character similar to the
darkest elements of an Old Testament God, focused on law and order, with fire
and brimstone (and baseball bats) as consequences. He is painfully lawful, with the belief that
those he punishes have brought it all upon themselves.
After Negan spares Carl another lost body part, Daryl is
hauled off as a hostage for leverage.
Negan leaves them to wallow in their losses. Maggie stands up and painfully attempts to
rally the group into fighting or letting her fight herself, but the rest of the
group cannot join in her resistance as we finally see our group of heroes entirely
defeated and subdued, the slaves of a master whose pragmatic and sociopathic brutality
has only just begun. Can their
struggling attempts to keep the family together prevail or will the loss and devastation
they’ve experienced – and will experience – at the hands of Negan and the
Saviors be too much for even the strongest of heroes to survive?
What I Loved
The Binding of Carl: The episode could have been brutal by itself, but the scene where Rick was put up to disarm his own son, we are shown a glimpse of the greatness that The Walking Dead is capable of. It used literary allegory to effectively bring our protagonist to the lowest point of his life. To the day that Doctor Jenner talked about years ago as they were locked in the CDC. Rick was thankful to be saved and freed, but, as Jenner put it himself, "The day will come when you won't be." Seemingly, that day has truly come.
Home Run Derby: While Glenn's death at the hands of Lucille have been foretold for years since the 100th issue of the comic series, there were a few precious moment where it seemed he could have been spared. My mind wandered to what the potential of his continued presence could mean for upcoming events. How would Glenn react to E and S? Or AOW? (you'll know what those mean in a few episodes.) However in another huge twist, one hit isn't enough for Negan and he decides to go for another homer by nailing Glenn. Hiding this death behind another made even the people who thought they were ahead feel some type of shock and surprise. You will (both) be missed.
What I Liked
Brutal Honesty: With such a brutal source material to come from, I was unsure if AMC and the FCC would allow the series to push the barriers it would need to in order to hold a candle to the iconic images of #100. While there was a lot of off-camera sloshing and screaming to keep it from being over the TV line, they did not hold back on showing the brutality of Negan and his wrath. Shots of Abraham twitching with a crushed skull and Glenn kneeling in final moments of pain are moments that will live within viewers just as deeply as comic panels lived within readers for the last few years.
Down and Out: We have seen our group at low points in previous seasons from the destruction of the CDC to the death of Lori and the loss of the prison. But even in the lowest moments, we were given glimmers that darkness was not all that was ahead. However this low point is incredible and seeing the group curled on the ground, unsure of what to say and where to go, knowing that they are truly the puppets and victims of Negan, was striking. While it is obvious that there needs to be goals in the future and that this bottom is not the final point, it will be hard to see how the group can come back from this. Both comic relief characters are gone, which can be disappointing, but it also sets us up for a dark season.
What I Disliked
Road Trip!: The scenes with Rick and Negan on the road, playing mind games as Rick slowly begins to realize the gravity of what he has experienced were entertaining by themselves, it felt very out of place and totally unneeded, existing purely to buy time and keep the cliffhanger there a little bit longer. In the end, these scenes clearly did not do much for the standings of the characters if Negan still was not convinced of Rick's loyalty. I think that the two Lucille deaths and the Carl Cut moment could have been enough to break Rick without their filler road trip.
What I Hated
Think About It…Keep Thinking About It: For the last hours or so, I attempted desperately to think of a genuine reason that they decided to drag out the cliffhanger beyond its timeline. In the end, it weakened the potential of dialogue by having to avoid names and numbers and just added to the annoying and gimmicky aspects of the cliffhanger we already waited so long to have revealed.
Let It All Hang Out: Speaking of cliffhangers, why did we even have one? With two deaths, it could have been immensely more satisfying to kill off Abraham in the finale, and leave Glenn for the premier. Instead, they left us with an incredibly dissatisfying and off putting finale that brought me to the point where, if it wasn't for this blog, I would not have watched the show. Why risk that level of anger when you could have split the deaths and given two satisfying episodes? It is more than likely an AMC corporate decision that cannot fully lie of Kirkman, Gimple, or the other writers, who have sadly taken the brunt of the beating over the summer. The most troubling aspect of this reality is that, even if we change showrunners and empty the writers room, the problem will still remain. I hope beyond anything else in this show that AMC has learned their lesson and that they will not rely on such Network TV cheese in the future.
What Still Could Happen
Next week we will examine the aftermath of this attack. Rick and the group will probably split, with Maggie and Sasha going to the Hilltop for treatment and to fill them in while Rick and the rest go back to Alexandria to break the news that they have a new leader. I do not imagine Alexandria will take this lightly. Rick comes into their town and suddenly sells them over to a crazy brutal leader, set on taking half of their output. Could their be some type of cue against Rick? And how will Negan react to that?
At the Hilltop I hope we can get a better look at the scale of this place. We have seen very little of it in the TV show and its importance to the larger world needs to be shown as we get closer to a kingdom of new characters in the upcoming story arcs.
We also need to get back to Carol and Morgan who, last time we saw them, had been taken in by some mysterious outsiders from a different group while Carol was significantly injured. We will need to catch up with them and see what their plans are to reconnect with their lost group as well as to introduce is to whatever animalistic characters could be waiting for them.
Thanks for reading this review and it seems I will be back next week for the second episode of The Walking Dead Season 7. My name is Tristan Mayer and this is The Film Fan Awakens. Until next week, I'm going back to sleep (and taking a cold shower).
The images used here are not owned by me and are the copyrighted material of their respective owners. They are reproduced here legally under fair use for criticism and commentary. Any requests or complaints about their presence here should be directed to me at TheFilmFanAwakens@gmail.com
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