THE Walking Dead

[Admin]

703 trailers

 

 

[EvilsergE]

No no no no no

 

Not even trailers. Zero spoilers.

 

Also, its "The" Walking Dead ;D

[Admin]

I have to say, for all the bitching I've read online about Season 7, I have really loved the first two episodes, and in fact think they are possibly the best episodes of the series so far. 

[HardcoreHunter]

It's seriously only hipster Glenn fanboys that are bitching. They act like his death was exclusive to the show and only used for the sake of shock value. Except he dies in the comic roughly the same way. Abe's death was a bit different because in the comic he was shot in the head with a crossbow. Still I found it funny how there were ten thousand reviews saying how the walking dead is failing, then a black guy with a tiger shows up and everyone changed their tune. I still don't know how many time that I read the term "over-the-top" or "unnecessary" when reading about the deaths. It's like like people hate continuity, at least if it goes against their head canon.

[Admin]

yeah when I saw the premiere I was just like "wow take that doubters and haters" but then the reviews and comments I read were like they didn't even watch the episode and were still butthurt over the cliffhanger/character death stuff.

 

But I am actually very pleasantly surprised by how tight and focused this season is.  I keep expecting it to roll downhill again, but the first two episodes were amazing.  And I was kinda like "well they are Nicotero episodes, so that's to be expected".  So was expecting episode 3 to begin the roll back down the hill then, and that was also fucking amazing.

 

I'm really into this - cinematic, yet very character-focused direction this season is going in.  Dwight could have been such a throwaway as characters go, I mean, he's Negan's henchman (very prominently), stole Daryl's stuff, and killed Denise.  So - soooo many strikes against him.  It would have been so easy to make him into a 2-dimensional villain.  But it's just incredible to me that they would even attempt to delve into that character, much less succeed in showing the character in such a flatly human context, without skimping on the things that make us potentially beautiful.  Just an amazingly well crafted character and episode.  You see that he's a shit.  You kind of glimpse how he got there.  And you see the cracks.  You see the cracks and flaws, and you see the glimmers of hope and the tiny bits of light trying to shine through. 

 

A really fantastic little character study episode, and Daryl's stuff was also fantastic.  This Daryl/Dwight/Negan triangle is a very powerful story dynamic.  And when you toss Dwight's wife into the mix, it just kicks it up even more.

 

I've been one of those that is often disappointed with the show for not quite getting there.  But these so far with Season 7, these first three episodes I think are as good as the show can and should be.

 

[HardcoreHunter]

Another thing I have noticed is Negan getting a lot of hate. Maybe it's just me growing up in a biker gang, and Negan reminds me a lot of someone. However I don't think he has done anything all that horrible that Rick hasn't done if not attempted. I mean Ricks group has killed 17 named saviors and 42 nameless, that's 59 damn people, or as Negan puts it "A lot more than I'm comfortable with". Negan was going to kill only one which turned into two. All in all he's being a reasonable guy. I read a lot of stuff about people saying he was scum for stealing Dwight's wife...You know like Rick stole that one from that doctor in Alexandria. Not saying it's right, but fans really have a bias for the home team going on. 

 

I think it'll be interesting to see if Daryl does eventually break. As we saw back before Terminus, it didn't take too much for him to fall into a group of bikers. Even after him and Rick killed them he said that they were alright and had a code, almost defending or apologizing for them. This however is a lot harder to gauge as to where it's going to fall. Most likely I do see him falling into line. However will this cause his loyalty to Rick to waver in any way is a better question.

 

As for the Kingdom I didn't fully understand why they were feeding the pigs. Sure the guy said he wanted their bellies full of rot. At first I thought it would make them weigh more and be better for trading. However when they showed the pigs again they had already been butchered, this would make anything that they ate that day meaningless, unless it was an attempt to contaminate the meat. Pigs share many of the same diseases that we do. It's one of the reasons why we can take organ transplants from a pig. Also why Jews are against eating them because in the days before antibiotics it was a gamble. Not to mention that was the cause of the outbreak back in the Prison. So one thought was that they may have been hoping for contaminated meat, but I doubt it. Really I think because of the sake of filming that they didn't think through that it takes about 48hrs to gain body mass after eating something, or they have pigs on rotation. Catch one group of them and have them eat, then butcher the previous group of them that have been fattened up.

[Admin]

Ezekiel is intentionally trying to infect the pigs he gives to the Saviors in hopes that it will make them sick.

 

I reallllly hope Daryl just doesn't break.  Though not sure how that would play out story-wise.  I love that character's stubbornness/resolve.

 

And I think at the forefront of his mind is Glen's death atm.  He obviously blames himself, but ultimately, he wants to get payback on Negan.  I think that's one of the instincts currently driving him.  Basically a combination of defiance, regret/self blame and basically on some level feeling that he deserves what he's getting for what happened to Glenn and also Denise, a need to escape, and plain old fashioned revenge. 

[Distortedreasoning]

so far im enjoying seaon 7 for the most part. still didnt like the twist in the first episode.

 

i said this before but having both abraham and glenn was not only lazy but illogical. im fine with either one dying or both but after watching someone youve known and been with for such a long time get killed in such a brutal fashion, you do not act out like daryl would. i dont care if hes all bad ass or not, watching someone get killed like that should put anyone in line. that should have been enough to get rick in line to do whatever negan wants but he still resists after those events. but even with those complaints, i enjoyed the intensity and brutality of the episode.

 

episode 2 and 3 slowed things down which was nice change of pace after the season premier. we were introduced to a new camp that was under the control of negan but was led by ezekiel. lots of things going on there, the most interesting thing is king ezekiel. good set up episode and follow up to carol and morgan. the next episode was seeing daryl get broken down and some tension with dwight and negan.

[HardcoreHunter]

Negan paid a visit and it looks like Rosita and Spenser are setting up for some shenanigans. Seems dumb that Rick was crying about the guns, but then just lied to Negan saying that Maggie died. The whole "What will happen if they see us with guns" bit is going to apply to seeing someone that Rick lied about just as well I would think. Got a laugh at Negan talkin shit on Gabriel, I still hate Gabe. Everything about him reminds me of a social climbing worm.

[Distortedreasoning]

Negan paid a visit and it looks like Rosita and Spenser are setting up for some shenanigans. Seems dumb that Rick was crying about the guns, but then just lied to Negan saying that Maggie died. The whole "What will happen if they see us with guns" bit is going to apply to seeing someone that Rick lied about just as well I would think. Got a laugh at Negan talkin shit on Gabriel, I still hate Gabe. Everything about him reminds me of a social climbing worm.

 

i agree it was dumb showing rick intentionally hide maggie like that and then show him being so concerned about being subservient to negan all the sudden. you cant be both rick, do one or the other. either concede fully to negan or pretend to be loyal to him. maybe someone else can explain that to me? spencer was right though, ricks leadership did lead them to their current situation. season 6 was nothing but one bad decision after another. season 7 kept the trend going.

 

negan has been good most the time but not for this episode. wtf does "find something interesting" mean? thats the vaguest shit ever. and how the hell are they suppose to find shit without their guns negan? he should have taken rosita as well. at least the actor does a good job of playing him.

 

the rest was just the members of ricks group trying to cope with their new negan owned lives. with some planning on rebelling.

 

 

[HardcoreHunter]

The comic I think played this out a bit better. Negan's group mainly uses melee weapons in the comic and few of them actually carry guns. Rick takes that as "oh they don't have guns, we can take em". Turned out that Negan had a policy to use melee whenever possible and guns were more or less to use against people. The whole set up of Negans group hasn't even been explained well which they kinda half assed it in this one with Negan saying "service" after killing a walker. The point is that you give Negan half of your shit and his group will take care of walkers in the area.  It's like the old mob days of offering insurance so something "bad" doesn't happen.

 

The whole something interesting bs I think was added to make Negan give even less reasonable demands. Pretty much it breaks down to this as what he gets mainly from each group. The hill top they get melee weapons from, The kingdom they get food, and Alexandria they get bullets via Eugene. Those are the main things that make each group important to Negan.

 

 

 

[Admin]

good episode (4).  The first three spoiled me with how amazing they were, so it was inevitable that eventually that pace would lapse.  I felt did in this episode.  and - that in no way makes this a bad episode.  Because the first three I thought were way good.  Like among the best (if not the best) episodes the series has produced so far.

 

Where I tend to get annoyed with the show is how they seemingly insist on investing in peripheral character in terms of screen and story time, but don't really invest in the overall writing and creation of those characters.  Many of them behave relatively inexplicably, turning on a dime to service the plot with no real attempts to delve into motivations or anything like that.  Seemingly because the characters aren't complete enough for the writers to really understand or care. 

 

It's particularly glaring on the heels of the first three episodes, which were fantastic character studies, very well focused and tightly written. 

 

When they - sort of feel compelled from a story perspective to return to Alexandria as the story takes its next step, which is establishing the relationship/routine between the Saviors and the Alexandrians.  It was a fairly nicely paced chapter in that descent.  A little too much of it felt kind of surreal with no real emotional payoff or particular depth of character.  Like "hey I want Daryl's bike go git it"  "okay we will go get daryl's bike now for you"  "okay well I will be right here waiting for that"  "k we'll go get that now".

 

And then the stakes with the search the whole "find me those guns or Olivia gets it" stuff was just - put too much on a character that nobody really knows about or particularly cares about.  I mean - she's another one of those vaguely fleshed out characters.  Kind of fodder really.  There are too many of those.  Too much of that in the series.  And that's where they always lose their footing I think is - sort of selling themselves on "okay this is where the story needs to go - so we'll make this character do that" rather than cultivating a more organic approach. 

 

It tends to create a perception that characters really don't matter as people, more just as plot advancers. 

 

When characters are dismissed in that way in the writing, I think it makes them that much more difficult to embrace or care about by people who are watching the show.

 

Having said all that - 704 had a lot of ground to cover and the first three eps were a tough act to follow.  So, while I felt it was uneven, and fell into some of the obvious pitfalls the series seems to routinely fall into, but still good.

[Admin]

I was kind of expecting the story to slide a bit more with each episode after last week.  but that did not happen with this one.

 

I thought 705, focusing on the Hilltop and Maggie and Sasha, Jesus, Gregory, Enid and Carl, was just another damn good episode.

 

I'm super impressed with this season so far.  It really hasn't been plagued at all with the usual problems the show tends to run into.  There were hints of that in 704.  But this episode pulled it right back up to that higher plane of the first three eps.

 

I love the Jesus/Gregory dynamic, those two characters.  I liked the subtle growth in Sasha, Enid actually came across as a real character in this episode as well.  Another really well paced, tightly scripted, and well executed story.  Great episode, but also perfect in terms of story progression and fitting into the season as a whole.

 

I honestly think this is the best this show has ever been.  There have been some spectacular moments, but just in terms of overall consistency and general quality, season 7 is blowing all the other seasons out of the water for me.

 

 

[Admin]

Fear the Walking Dead Season 3 started off well.  Just watched 301.  It was a good focused episode.  Mostly a Travis episode.  Nicely composed episode with a lot of cause and effect.  A few new characters, but not too many that it lost focus.  A spotlight on Travis.  bad guys got their comeupence.  A few of the group was reunited, but then split up again at the end of the episode (though in theory they are all headed for the same place this time, just in different vehicles).

 

Personal highlight:  Travis hucks a cinder block at a dude's head.

 

Story felt much more grounded and complete than much of last season to me.  If they keep this up, it'll be better than Season 2 (though not a particularly high bar there).

[Admin]

uh okay.  Watching 302 now.

 

so - nvm.  Basically all the nice stuff I said about episode 301 are more or less out the window in the first few minutes of 302.

 

Basically - FINALLY 301 gave the audience a rallying point for Travis.  Then, in literally the first 3 minutes of episode 302

they completely randomly kill off Travis out of literally nowhere

 

 

After fighting his way through an entire episode, a pit full of walkers, crazy soldiers wannabes, etc etc

in the first three minutes of the show, en route to the new compound the helicopter they're riding in takes random fire, he gets mortally wounded, and jumps out of the copter so he doesn't turn into a zombie and eat Alicia

 

 

Season 1 I thought was fairly tight and intriguing, with some interesting characters.  Season 2 was utterly random and unsettled, taking those characters and making them almost ridiculously impossible to care about.  Season 3 - the first episode seems to finally be getting the show's shit together, and then they do this.

 

It's just utterly utterly stupid.  It has zero emotional impact.  Zero story impact.  And I'm sure, if I check the press stuff about it, fucking showrunner will be front and center with "this will have ongoing effects on the characters for some time to come"  No it fucking won't.  The characters are random-ass whatever the writer decides they are at any given moment.  All this horseshit about "Fear the Walking Dead is TWD with a family element" I mean - I guess good luck with that

since we are down to three family members

 

 

so k.  gonna try to settle down and watch the other 40-odd minutes of episode 302 now. 

 

We're back at the hotel.  fucking shitchrist.

 

So Strand - I forgot that last season Strand just randomly decided to stay at the hotel and not go with Madison and the others.  God the writing on this show is just fucking awful.

 

I'm glad there's a new showrunner coming in for season 4.  But good luck fixing this hot mess.

 

Meanwhile, Madison and Nick arrive at yet another survivor community (so - this again) and yet again, Madison has snuck a weapon in because if anybody hurts her family

(all two of them)

she'll KILL THEM with that weapon! because that always ends well every time she does that.

 

More hotel bullshit that nobody cares about because the only reason these scenes exist is to provide some sort of pretext for Strand getting kicked out of the hotel so he can rejoin the group.  Which he wouldn't have to do if he hadn't randomly decided to remain behind in the first place.

 

Nick randomly doesn't trust these new people in this camp.  Madison says they should trust them until they need killin.  It's like bad soap opera dialogue where they randomly give each character a point of view so they can create tension.  Because god forbid tension derive organically from the actual plot and/or real characterization.

 

Back at the chopper, Lucianna is now the randomly wounded party member they're dragging around with them (this episode and last episode)

 

back at the hotel, drag drag drag, waiting for Strand to leave.  blah blah blah

eileen randomly forgives Strand for killing her zombiefied daughter and jumps out the window

 

 

so - jesus christ.  so - Alicia and the good son from last episode make it back to the camp with Lucianna.  Bad son and leader daddy greet them at the gate and so - suddenly bad son says they have to shoot Lucianna in the head because she's too far gone and she'll turn. Or something.  Of course nobody says or does anything because - dunno.  Nick steps in and offers to shoot Lucianna because why not?  well - clearly he's going to try to pull a switcheroo and kill bad son or something whatever.

 

this is terrible.

 

oh yeah, forgot, Alicia told Madison that Travis died and she mourned that for like - all of 15 seconds or so before this other totally random shit started to happen with bad son demanding they shoot Lucianna.  So Nick points the gun at bad son and everybody's like "put the gun down now" so he does.

 

Madison goes off to cry by a tree (to get that mourning in) but she gets interrupted by the dad, who asks her to sign out the gun she swiped.  She does.

 

Strand (finally) steals a car from the hotel and leaves.

 

Madison decides that they're going to stay in the new community and possibly take it over if they need to.  so - k.

 

so another season of "good episode - bad episode".  not sure I can handle it.  The promise of a new showrunner for Season 4 might keep in the game just so I can stay caught up on the story in case Season 4 ends up being good or something. 

 

I guess.