And the gang is all back together!
This week’s episode has us in our very first hostage situation. Good old friends reunited once again! The guinea pig of the group, Glenn, and his girlfriend Maggie are stuck under the supervision of Merle and the Governor. The motivation? To find out where Rick and Darryl are hiding out. Let’s just say that this isn’t a show for peaceful negotiation.
***SPOILER ALERT***
When Michonne joined the Governor it was all too evident that she never belonged. Now that she’s stumbled upon Rick’s group it seems like she was destined to be there from the start. This is apparent when Rick and Carl go outside of the fence to rescue her. Her injuries cause her to pass out right as she’s being attacked and the crew has to go into survival mode to make sure she comes back to normal. Although it seems like she could fit in, she pulls the usual Michonne act of not saying a single word to anyone. In fact, she back talks Rick and growls, “I don’t need your help.” Hey, why make friends with some of the last living people on Earth? On the other hand, Carol coming back to the group seems to bring a much needed lift to everyone, despite the fact that the news of Lori dying came back to the forefront.
If the interrogation of Glenn was rough, the interrogation of Michonne wasn’t much better. Her stubbornness gets old on Rick and soon he gets sick of waiting for her to say anything. He pokes her gunshot wound and Darryl points his crossbow straight at her face. Finally, Michonne relents that she saw Glenn and Maggie taken and she brought the formula to the prison because she knew where the prison was from the Governor. Michonne will get to stick around a little longer because of the few words she actually said.
Poking a gunshot wound probably seems tame to how Glenn is looking. Despite being beaten and exasperated, he still refuses to release any information to Merle. Finally the story starts to come out. The gang, including Andrea and Shane, has been hiding out in a “dungeon” for the past few months. The only thing he doesn’t know is that Andrea is strolling around the town sleeping with the Governor, something that Merle is all too aware of.
What’s this?! Rick is actually being a father! Who could have ever thought that that would happen?! He tells Carl that nobody should ever have to go through killing their own mother and insinuates his immense pride in his only son. Then he guides him on what to do in case something goes wrong while they travel to visit the Governor. Before leaving, Carl asks what his sister’s name should be, you know, since Ass Kicker isn’t the best of names for a newborn. Carl already lost his mother, is he capable of possibly losing his father too and having to raise his sister on his own?
If Rick’s fatherhood seems to be out of character, the governor potentially providing for a dying man seems to be even more unusual. The scientist, Milton, asks the fragile man some basic life questions for verification for whatever is about to come. While Andrea is forced to deal with the confusion, Glenn is forced to fight off a walker despite being tied to a chair. It seems as if there really is no way out for the last true protagonist of the group. Somehow, he manages to smash the chair against the wall and stab the walker in the head with a shard of the chair. The “experiment” actually turns out to be a lot more pleasant than what is usually expected of the Governor’s twisted ways. Milton just wants to figure out if the same questions he asks while the old man is alive will resonate with the man in walker state.
The Governor has one upped himself when it comes to being a total and absolute soulless man. Instead of being reasonable with Maggie, he turns into even more of a monster than he ever has before. He forces her to stand up and take off her shirt. Soon he unbuckles his pants and starts to lean closer to her. It appears he’s getting closer and closer to raping her, only to back off at the last moment. We know that Merle solely wants to be reunited with his brother, but what is the reason for the Governor wanting to find them? To kill more people to prove a point to an invisible audience? To have more people to experiment on? In the Governors sick, twisted mind everything seems to be on limits.
The attempt to make it to the Governor appears to be thwarted when a massive pack of walkers falls upon the group. After attacking a few of them, they soon are backed into a shack that seems to be long abandoned and high on smell. The walkers have taken over the barn and it appears that there really may be nowhere to go. A man who long ago appears to have lost his mind is hiding in the bed and wants nothing to do with the intruders of his home. In an incredibly rare twist, he ends up with a sword through his abdomen. The man actually comes in handy as a nice use of bait for all of the walkers. Oscar, Michonne, Rick, and Daryl are able to make it to safety thanks to his heroism.
The experiment turns into a massive failure. The old man doesn’t respond to a single question, but the persistence of Milton means that something has to break. After untying his arms, the man lunges at the scientist and is only saved by the fact that Andrea quickly stabs him in the head. Her quickness is just as sharp as the Governor’s persuasion. At a last resort, he puts a gun up to the head of Glenn and forces Maggie to blurt out that ten of them have been living in the prison. The Governor and his crew are in disbelief of the fact that only ten people could clear out an entire prison, but it’s a little irrelevant where the prison is seeing that Rick and the crew are right outside the gates of Woodbury. It’s even more ironic seeing as Andrea is right on the other side of that very same gate, on her way for another booty call with the Governor. The Governor says that everything’s alright, but hell seems all too eager to break loose.
