Margaux and I were not huge fans of last night’s episode of The Walking Dead. Below, our thoughts on “What Happened and What’s Going On,” which is best sung out loud in Emily Kinney’s voice.
Trevor: Well, before we start, let me just say: CONGRATULATIONS! Now literally dozens of readers will know that you were on the winning team at this year’s San Francisco Comedy Hack Day.
Margaux: Haha! My quips don’t just end with Gambit reviews, they also extend into tech culture. Shameless plug, check out our site! WellDeserved.me. Anyway, thank you Trevor!
Welp, I’m pretty sure I’m still drunk from last night but I managed to watch The Walking Dead and nearly fell asleep, so I’ve kind of seen it twice.
Trevor: Well, the gist of “What Happened and What’s Going On” is: Tyreese dies. They just took forty-two minutes to get there. The execution was pretty novel – with the hallucinations, and the first-person point of view – but I think we can both agree it wasn’t what it could have been. Kind of a letdown on a few fronts, as a matter of fact.
Margaux: Overall, it thought the repetitive nature of the Instagram filter shots, paired with the repeating The Walking Dead mistake of fucking with a character so much (in this instance, Tyreese) that they had no choice but to kill him. But since he was a sort of important-ish part of the story, or, they’d like you to think that, they give this fucking drawn out, really annoyingly meta send off. The “will he, won’t he die” back-and-forth was such a dumb, moot point – homey got bit, TWICE. But just in case the subtlety of this being hell was lost on you, they brought by Beth’s God damn ghost to SING. MORE. I was upset, to say the least.
Trevor: I kind of liked the hallucinations, until we heard the radio, and I fucking knew Beth was gonna show up to sing. But having Martin and the Governor show up to taunt Tyreese was kinda cool. Even though, if I’m being honest, the cameos overshadowed Chad L. Coleman’s great performance. I’m all over the place here, I know. (Also, that British announcer on the radio? That’s Andrew Lincoln, speaking in his natural accent.)
I’m wondering if they dragged out Tyreese’s death as a way to hint to the viewers that things are about to get even grimmer. Tyreese has long been TWD’s embodiment of hope and decency, and now he’s gone.
Margaux: Agreed, any attempt at gravitas the writers were going for with Tyreese’s character got completely muddled with this Ghosts of Pointless Deaths of Seasons Past. So, for me, it amounted to hokey and a leap backwards in terms of the storytelling and character progress they’d made with the front end of the season, save for the mid-season finale. If we’re going to go full-on derp mode, where was Lori to fold laundry and say some dumb, infuriating crap?
And, I’m not sorry, your excuse that things are gonna more grim on the show is again, A FOREGONE CONCLUSION. It doesn’t get much darker than Tyreese, who’s survived way worse, to go out the way he did. By a walker he just so happened to not see? I can’t buy that. Even if you want to blame it on Tyreese being a pointless pacifist at best and at worse, more indecisive than me trying to decided on what to eat for breakfast.
Trevor: Yeah, it’s hard to buy Tyreese – badass zombie killer who more than once has fought this way unarmed out of a swarm of walkers – getting distracted by a picture of twins without making sure the house is clear first.
And this was all Noah’s fault! I’m beginning to see why Everybody Hates him. (Nailed it.) He just kept running away from the group, when the group – of four of the biggest badasses on the show – kept telling him to stay.
Let’s talk about the rest of the group. First of all, Rick’s beard game is on point. Fucking awesome. Second of all, we get it. You’re tired of roaming aimlessly around, looking for shelter. BUT they did get out of Georgia for the first time in the show’s run, so that’s something.
Margaux: Actually, the only brief bright spot of this episode was that Michonne finally got something do/say. It was a welcomed relief to hear her to basically beg (by her standards) for the group to find a more permanent place for them to be. It was the most impactful piece of dialogue because Michonne is such a badass and believes in only speaking when necessary so that it actually makes you listen. I loved her performance, she conveyed so much without having to rehash what we already know. UNLIKE FUCKING RICK AND GLENN TELLING US LITERALLY WHAT HAS HAPPENED IN THE FIRST HALF OF THE SEASON – AGAIN. UGH.
Nothing pisses me off more, to paraphase Mamet (poorly), if two characters are talking about the events that just happened in the previous scene or episode, THAT IS NOT WRITING OR ADVANCING PLOT.
Trevor: And I’m fine with bottle episodes, which this more or less was. But if you want to do it right – like Breaking Bad’s “Fly” or Community’s “Cooperative Calligraphy” – you have to tell us about the characters, by which I mean, tell us something we don’t already know. I didn’t learn anything in “What Happened” that I didn’t already know, other than this show now has only one Wire cast member left to kill off. RIP Cutty, you’re teaching Naimond how to box in heaven now.
Margaux: Exactly, if you want characters to sit around and shoot the shit about other characters not the screen, fine – but at least make it interesting. Nothing about “What’s Happened and What’s Going On” brought to light anything new – getting ‘Nam style flashbacks of being trapped on the farm of season 2 isn’t really confidence building either. But whatever RIP Ty-Ty n’shit – I honestly feel nothing about his character’s death on the show. Worth noting that Sasha Fierce is having one shitty season this year.
Trevor: I will say this, though: the beanie on Tyreese’s grave was pretty heartbreaking. Even lackluster episodes like this are good proof that The Walking Dead is visually one of the best shows on the air. But pretty visuals do not a good episode make.
Margaux: The visuals seemed like a cheap distraction in the overall arc of this episode, a limp bid at “artistry in the absence of substance.” It’s hard to agree with you on The Walking Dead being one of the best shot shows on the air when Better Call Saul airs directly after it. SHITTIN’ ON EM GILLIGAN.
Trevor: Woah woah woah, I said TWD was VISUALLY one of the best shows on the air. Better Call Saul, which we’ll get to tomorrow, came on and ate this show’s fucking lunch, no question about it.
Margaux: I think The Walking Dead needs to step it up visually cause I’m disagreeing with you on being one of the best after last night’s episode. I’m consistently impressed with the way they shoot complicated fight scenes but last night did nothing but highlight every weak point about the show. In BOTH respects. If anything, the visuals only made the cheap story stand out more. Can’t stir up emotions with words? Throw some Valencia filters on that bitch and call it a fuckin’ day, apparently.
Trevor: Well, we’ll agree to disagree on that point. You wanna talk stars?
Margaux: Two stars. Underwhelmed, especially after I was so excited to see The Walking Dead return and got “What’s Happened and What’s Going On” – aka “Beth Dies Like a Dumb-Dumb Part 2.” What happened to the tone Carol set with the show’s best episode in recent memory, “No Sanctuary”? Let’s get this going, Walking Dead, I thought we were better than this episode.
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