[rating=5.00] “Sing Me A Song”
After so many aimless, rudderless plotlines spread out over the past several weeks, to have the focus on the show return to Alexandria was almost jarring. Not much has changed in the past few weeks, and as this episode starts to get going, everyone looks to do some last minute scavenging so they’ll have something for Negan when he returns, assuring us that everyone’s complete lack of foresight and logical decision making hasn’t been impacted by all this upheaval.
It also didn’t end for 90 GODDAMN MINUTES, which frankly almost seemed like a necessity… in the sense that cramming for an exam the night before a test is a necessity. With a narrative that’s spent the season as the equivalent of sitting by a window and spacing out for five weeks, it’s almost like the show suddenly realized that there’s a mid-season finale next week (I hate that this is a thing now) and they should probably get around to advancing the plot at least a little bit.
The big takeaway here is Carl and Negan meeting once again under less intimidating circumstances (but, you know, still fairly intimidating). After hitching a ride in the back of one of the Saviors’ vehicles, Carl manages to ditch Jesus so he can gain entrance to the compound itself, where he promptly kills two Saviors as soon as he’s inside.
“You are just adorable!” praises Negan, who seems to take to Carl partially out of genuine sentiment, but mostly for the same reason he does everything: he believes he’s leading humanity back to civilization. Really, if you take a step back and remove your personal attachment to the characters he’s killed (so far), his approach to the apocalypse has been a fairly positive one. He’s mobilized more people than any other camp several times over, and has managed to marginalize the threat of the undead to a mere nuisance. Sure, he makes people kneel when he speaks and burns off their faces when they screw up, but even his more extreme tactics too maintain order were used by major world super-powers as recently as WWI.
Still, before I get to comfortable normalizing how Negan rules the Saviors, the episode also points out his general scumminess and opportunism, not just with his harem, but his baiting Carl to remove his bandage and sing to him for his own sick amusement. That and he takes Carl back with him to Alexandria so as to continue taunting of Rick by not only having Daryl under his thumb, but also his son. These stakes get pushed to an uncomfortable degree when baby Judith is brought into the fold, while the episode ends with him cooing Rick Shane’s infant child, which seemed to leave everyone with a very uneasy feeling about what may come next.
Meanwhile, Rick and Aaron are off scavenging, but they only get as far as reading a couple hand-painted warning signs before they realize they have to cross a body of water. (This seems like a simple enough task, but remember Rick helped drive a truckload of supplies into a fucking lake last season.) Although, it was nice to see Aaron out and about doing something useful for a change.
Spencer continues to be the worst and with his typical childlike petulance still blames Rick for everything that’s gone wrong, even adding the all-too-obvious exposition of “I hate Rick,” just in case things were getting a little too subtle here. Father Gabriel does give him a verbal what-for, which is seems like a moment we’re supposed to really behind as an audience. But I can only assume. The problem with that is Father Gabriel is a shitty character who’s underwritten to the point that he may as well be an actual mute. That being said, I can’t wait for the inevitable two-part episode that focuses entirely on him for no discernible reason.
Finally, Daryl gets passed a key, setting the stage for a midseason escape that will undoubtedly lead to a groan-inducing cliffhanger ending. Also, Rosita seems go to to a hell of a lot of trouble over a single bullet, though it has an upside, which is someone is finally telling Eugene off and call him out on his bullshit. Oh, and Michonne does a pretty good impression of Omar from The Wire.
And, of course, next week, we have yet another 90-minute episode of The Walking Dead, because why the hell not, right?
