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The Walking Dead: Guts

Rick: “All I am anymore is a man looking for his wife and son. Anyone gets in the way of that is going to lose.”

This is an episode that really lives up to its title. This is The Walking Dead, so of course there are actual guts involved, but what is really central is the “guts” it takes to stay alive in this new world. It took guts for Rick to get out of the tank. It took guts for Glenn to help a stranger. And it literally and figuratively took guts for Glenn and Rick to walk through the zombies to the construction site. Only those who are brave and a little bit crazy are going to make it through this.

We got to meet and learn a little bit about some new people. Glenn is the voice of Rick’s savior. He’s fearless, funny and knows his way around the city. I like him already. Andrea is tough but a bit on the panicked side. Good to know that she couldn’t have shot Rick even if she wanted to. Morales seems to be a bit of a leader. T-dog doesn’t seem to know what he’s doing and tends to drop and spill things. Merle is a racist pig and I’m quite glad they left him on the roof, although it is a really crappy way to die. T-dog showed him more compassion than Merle would have in the same situation. I doubt Merle would have gone back or stopped to chain the door closed. If Merle finds a way out, T-dog may regret that.

Shane and Lori are definitely an item. It is going to get pretty interesting when Rick shows up. I know that there has been a lot of chatter about Lori going with Shane but this isn’t the world as we know it. She is convinced her husband is dead and she has a small child to worry about. Why wouldn’t she connect with Shane? He seems to know what he is doing. It was smart of him to refuse to go after the raiding party trapped in the city. It may not be noble or courageous, but it was practical. It would be a suicide mission.

Bits and Pieces

That was a nice bit of tension at the beginning of the episode. Having it be Shane instead of a zombie coming through the woods was in some ways even more creepy.

If there are still rats, then the area is probably safe. Good bit of information to have.

The talk about Wayne the zombie was an obvious connection to their past and their humanity. It was lovely, and darkly humourous, that Wayne was an organ donor.

In the gory moments I would rather miss category - chopping up Wayne and then wearing him - uber-gross.

The crowd of zombies were awesome. Great make-up work. I want to go to zombie school.

Zombies are drawn by sound and can tell the difference between living and dead by smell. Also good information to have.

This show uses music very effectively. I particularly liked the way music was used as the rain began to fall and you knew Rick and Glenn were getting into trouble.

Quotes

Rick: “Whoever you are, I don’t mind telling you I’m a little concerned in here.”
Glenn: “Oh, man, you should see from over here. You’d be having a major freak out.”

Glenn: “Nice moves, Clint Eastwood. You the new sheriff come riding in to clean up the town?”
Rick: “That wasn’t my intention.”
Glenn: “Ya, whatever. Yeehaw. You’re still a dumb ass.”

Rick: “Back there at the tank, why did you stick your neck out for me?”
Glenn: “Call it foolish naive hope that if I’m ever that far up shit creek, someone might do the same for me. I guess I’m a bigger dumb ass than you.”

Rick: “I can see you make a habit of missing the point.”
Dixon: “Well, screw you twice.”

Glenn: “If bad ideas were an Olympic event, this would get the gold.”

Rick: “Think about something else, puppies and kittens.”
T-dog: “Dead puppies and kittens.”

Morales: “Well, Officer Friendly, from up the road a ways, welcome to the big city.”

5 comments:

  1. It's been awhile since I saw this one but I remember thinking it was excellent. And I particularly liked the "organ donor" thing. It was brilliant.

    Great review, Doc.

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  2. Well, Jess -- I wish I had read the comment you posted on the previous episode before I watched this one. Chopping up Wayne was a bit more than I could take. I am watching this under a quilt on my sofa -- I just hid under the quilt until it was over. How chicken and squeamish am I??

    Having said that, this episode engaged me much more than the pilot did. I like the interactions between the various people and I like that all of them have their issues. What I particularly like are the small moments, like Rick telling Andrea to take the necklace for Amy. Humanity and sweetness while zombies are beating down the door. Incredible.

    Another fantastic moment was the final shot of Glenn barreling down the road shouting at the top of his lungs. When one spends all day simply trying to survive, my guess is that this provided him with a sense of living and freedom he hasn't felt in a long time. It made me smile.

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  3. Interesting, Chris. Maybe you'll end up liking the series after all. Heaven knows it isn't the "gross bits we could live without" that have kept many of us here on board (although I'm reasonably confident that those bits + action sequences are what keep a large portion of the fan base on board).

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  4. I'm re-watching Seasons 1 and 2 in anticipation of finally getting to Season 3.

    Last night's sleepwalking episode: I started shouting "get out of here!" and hit my wife with a pillow repeatedly. She told me to stop it. I started laughing maniacally. Yes, I know. Creepy.

    I'm pretty sure watching this particular episode before going to bed may have contributed somehow...

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  5. I came to this show late. Basically my husband told me I shouldn't watch it because I would get nightmares, but he would watch it and tell me about every episode. Eventually I wanted to see it for myself so I started watching it this year. Now we started watching/re-watching from the beginning. (I haven't been getting nightmares, but I'm pretty sure that's only because my husband lets me cling to him during the scary parts.)

    I really liked this episode. I shouted "Yay Glen!" periodically while watching it. One thing did bother me though and that is the inconsistency of the walkers that I know improves later in the series. Particularly, one of the walkers picked up a rock to break the doors. Walkers don't have the cognitive ability to do that. They also don't have the cognitive ability to know to climb a fence. They would have just kept walking into the door/fence until it broke from shear force. (I hope that doesn't constitute a spoiler.)

    ReplyDelete

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