Monday, November 21, 2011

The Walking Dead: Season 2 Episode 6 - Secrets


Well folks, this is why we invest in these shows!  Big payoff episodes like this.  The aptly titled "secrets" episode is when ALL (and I mean all) secrets between characters were outed paving the road to all hell breaking loose in the very near future.  Throw on time of that a few zombie whackings and you have yourself one intesely satisfying Walking Dead episode!  I give this episode my WOW seal of approval without any reservations.  We have one episode to go before the mid-season finale, and with the way things are developing I think they're going to leave us hanging off a pretty steep cliff!  Let's dive into this episode a little further and discuss.
Early Scenes
  • Andrea and Daryl had an early scene in the episode. Andrea kept apologizing for what she had done. Daryl forgave her in “Darylian” fashion. First, the serious answer was that he knew she was trying to protect the group. 2nd, if she ever shot him again, she better hope he’s dead this time! NICE.

  • Then there was the Chicken scene. Carl was looking for the mother chicken or something and started talking about the circle of life and how things eat other things to stay alive. Then we see Otis’s wife (forget her name) breaking chicken’s legs and throwing it to their pet walkers. Newsflash everyone – The walkers eat live Horses AND Chickens in addition to human flesh.



  • Speaking of horses, the one Daryl lost in the woods has returned.
Glenn's Secret Keeping/Exposures
Watching Glenn struggle with keeping secrets for about 5 minutes in this episode was hysterical. Maggie was telling him to keep the secrets about the Barn Walkers and Lori was telling him to keep the secret about her pregnancy. He didn’t last very long on either of them.
  • First, we do learn why they’re keeping the walkers “alive” and it’s pretty much what we assumed. They are family and friends of Hershel’s people. It’s Hershel’s wife and son, Maggie’s mother and brother. And then there are other people. (More specifically: her brother Sean, Mr. and Mrs. Fischer, Lacy and Duncan)
  • This shows how sheltered the people on the farm have been from the walker plague or at least how much Hershel is trying to shelter them. He believes that the people are just sick and still can be cured.
  • The farm folk are just starting to see the brutality of these crazy walkers from their run in with our band of survivors.
  • Glenn also is arguing to Lori that she needs to come clean on the pregnancy and that she needs to eat and take care of herself.  He offers to run back to town and get her some supplies but all Lori wants is Glenn’s silence.
  • I love when T-Dog asks Glenn “Sup?” and Glenn gets all defensive “Nothing!!” But the best was when Shane asks Glenn if he wants to go on the gun training and came up with some excuse about fixing cars with Dale which Dale overhears and knew nothing about. Then when Dale asked what that was all about Glenn just comes clean: “There are walkers in the barn and Lori is pregnant.” Awesome.
  • Lori does eventually ask Glenn to make a run to the store for some things (very emotionally I might add). And Maggie ends up going with him. She isn’t too thrilled about it either. And once she finds out what Lori wanted it got even worse. But the worst was yet to come because a Walker found his way into the pharmacy and right to Maggie’s arm. Maggie freaks out and Glenn goes into hero mode finding a shelf and partially tearing the Walker’s head off. Of course, we all knew that meant the thing wasn’t finished yet and Glenn brought out his knife and you could almost hear the Mortal Kombat announcer yelling “FINISH HIM!!” And that is exactly what Glenn did!









  • This earned him major points with Maggie, by the way and it also gave Maggie a taste of what these walkers are capable of.



  • And of course, this made her absolutely furious with Lori and she let her have it. “We are not your errand boys! Oh and here’s your abortion pills.” OUCH! Glenn takes the blame as Maggie really wasn’t supposed to go. Lori feels nothing but awful about sending Glenn almost to his death. But Glenn made a certain comment that worries me a bit. “I always come back.” Uh oh. Anyway, in addition to the morning after pills, Glenn brought her some prenatal vitamins as well, just in case she changed her mind. So either way, the trip wasn’t for nothing from Glenn’s perspective!
  • Glenn also tells Lori that she shouldn’t make the decision alone.
  • So Maggie is still fuming but it’s all because she doesn’t like how the group treats Glenn. They send him down wells to deal with walkers, send him to town for dangerous supply runs. And she can’t take another person she cares about meeting the same zombified ending! Cue some smooching!! awwwww


Gun Training
So Rick tries to map out Sophia’s possible whereabouts based on the stuffed bear recovery. And Shane continues to recruit for gun training.

  • A couple of Hershel’s female residents want to take up some gun training as well and tell Rick that Hershel is allowing it even though he doesn’t like it. It seems to be a running theme that people are lying about getting Hershel’s blessing. Rick said he was going to check for himself, but never did on screen. And yet we see these girls training!

  • And now, Sheriff Carl (seriously kid, take the darn hat off!) wants to get in on the action too and even swiped a gun from Dale’s RV. Oh boy. So Lori is obviously against this idea of Carl learning to shoot, especially after allowing him to go with Rick on the Sophia search last time. Carl wants to pull his weight though. He wants to defend the camp and help find Sophia. Eventually they allow it. No good can come from this, right? Or maybe a lot of good. I haven’t read the comics, but apparently Carl gets some meaty stories in them. Maybe they’ll follow suit in the show.


  • But the big story here is Andrea. Similar to the comics also, she has some amazing ability to hit her targets dead on. She sniped 3 holes in the “O” of a sign she aimed for. And then was able to hit a can with a pistol from a decent range. Shane said she graduated to the Advanced class. (Future note: Carl did pretty well with his can shot as well)


  • So Shane takes Andrea into the wilderness and gets her to work on her moving target skills whilst yelling in her ear. It was like Obi-Wan Kenobi and the Blast Shield training meets the Drill Sergeant from Full Metal Jacket. He wanted her to feel the pressure and become immune to it just like he is. But he went a step too far when he told her to think of that log as the walker that got Amy. Ouch.

  • This lead to Shane chasing Andrea down with the car as she tried to walk back to the farm. He apologized for crossing the line with the Amy thing but didn’t apologize for his method.
  • He eventually wins her over by asking her to go on a Sophia hunt with him. They hit suburbia, I assume based on the path Rick laid out on the map. Their goal is to go through house to house looking for her. They went through one house that was full of dead and decomposed bodies and things really heated up when the walkers start creeping up outside the garage.



  • It turned into on the job training as Shane took out a few walkers and asked Andrea to do so as well. She kept missing the heads and then her gun got jammed! Oh boy! Shane just watched and encouraged her on as she had to fix the gun jam (recalling back to one of her first training sessions with Shane). Once it was fixed she went. To. Town!!!! She was an unstoppable machine. The first one was the best as Shane easily could have taken the walker out. But he waited for the switch to turn off in Andrea’s head. And it did.

  • You could see the smile on Andrea’s face as they left suburbia WITHOUT Sophia. She got a high on killing Walkers and now has a reason to live. And it made her feel so good that she decided to give herself another treat. How do I explain this without getting too vulgar? Andrea made the most obvious move a girl can make on Shane to explain what she wants right there and then. (shocking everyone whose eyes were glued to the TV) Naturally, Shane stops the car in the middle of the street and says something like “Well, come on then!” All we hear after that his some honking horns (and perhaps that’s just a metaphor)




Dale's Intervenions
So based on Dale’s brief discussion with Glenn, he decided to take matters into his own hands.
  • He confronts Lori after he sees her almost throw up at the scent of cooked meat. Lori knew that Glenn must have let the secret out of the bag. Dale kind of guessed that Lori and Shane had something going on and Lori confirmed it. But we did get some resolution on the baby daddy business. Lori seemed entirely convinced that Rick is the father. I’m taking this as the writers telling us that there is not going to be a DNA test coming up any time soon. Maybe Shane will question if it’s his, but Lori knows her timetable.
  • Dale also confronts Hershel about the Barn Walkers. He tried to keep Glenn’s name out of it by saying he took a walk and passed the barn. But Maggie was furious with Glenn later knowing that he must have told Dale. There was more talk about how Hershel wants to find a cure. Dale offers to talk to Rick to make the barn secure. But Hershel only wants Dale to keep this to himself. He knows Rick is a good man, but doesn’t trust everyone in the group.


  • Neither does Dale. Going all the way back to his discussion with T-Dog at the highway. He knew it was only a matter of time before people start clamoring about “Needs of the many vs. the few or the one.” And seeing Shane returning all giddy from a Sophia search with Andrea broke the straw on the camel’s back. Dale told Shane it was about time he moved on from the group. He doesn’t believe Shane’s vague story about Otis’s demise and he knows the type of man he is. We recall back to season 1 when Shane had Rick in his crosshairs. Dale saw it then and hasn’t trusted Shane since. Shane’s response to Dale was just creepy. “You think I would shoot my best friend? What do you think I’d do to a guy I don’t even like when he makes that accusation?” (paraphrased) Ooooh things are getting intense!  


Lori/Rick

So Lori and Rick go through some “trust issues” in this episode. Lori is dealing with the whole pregnancy thing but she also has a conversation with Hershel too.

  • Hershel had just talked to Dale and realized the situation was getting complicated. He pretty much implies to Lori that the group will have to be moving on soon. This came as news to her and she went directly to Rick. Rick said he was still working on it and it’s not carved in stone. She wonders how Rick can keep this from him. Oh boy, can of worms Lori!!



  • So conflicted Lori is even MORE concerned about bringing a child into this world without the security of this farm. She swallows a bunch of morning after pills and then immediately runs out to the field and forces herself to throw them up.
  • Rick finds the pill packages and goes out to confront Lori. And that’s when all the dirty laundry comes out. First of all, Rick keeping the whole FARM secret doesn’t even compare to the secrets Lori has been hoarding. And Lori got what she always as wanted. Rick did INDEED yell at her showing that he DOES care. It was a bunch of back and forth about whether to bring another life into this world. We know Lori had considered letting Carl die because he’d be better off. So bringing another life to Zombie-nation wouldn’t be high on her list.


  • But Rick tries to find his composure and says that they will figure something out. A crying baby could draw in some Walkers and endanger the group. Rick doesn’t care, they’ll figure something out. She obviously wants the baby if she threw up the pills. It sounded like Rick would have supported her on the abortion if she had come to him with it though.
  • But Rick said he can’t keep living with all of these secrets and asks if there’s anything else he needs to know about. I just assumed Lori would say no, but she just came out and said it!! “Shane….and I” Rick’s reaction was really not what anyone expected. And maybe there will be repercussions down the road. But for now, he went the Princess Leia approach. “I know…somehow…I’ve always known!” Rick pretty much justified it the same way Lori has been justifying it. “The whole world went to shit and you thought I was dead, right?” Lori bawled and nodded in acknowledgement.

  • We leave the 2 as they reflect on these startling revelations.
Yikes! Surely, there are going to be some intense moments with Shane and Rick coming up as fallout from this. But it seems like Rick knows there are bigger things to worry about here. And he can see how something like this can develop. I watched The Talking Dead show afterwards and Kevin Smith was one of the guests. He said he had to rewind to the opening credits and confirmed that a woman wrote this episode because no man would ever react that way. I had to chuckle, but it was still an effective scene. And I look forward to our mid-season finale next Sunday!
For now though, I’m all out of words so I’ll turn it over to the comments. Hope you enjoyed my ramblings and I’ll see you next week!

End Credits

  • This season I will be recapping FringeTerra NovaThe Walking Dead and Alcatraz
  • Other shows that are being discussed in comments recently:  Sons of Anarchy, How I Met Your Mother, Once Upon a Time, American Horror Story, Dexter, Chuck, among others.  Feel free to join in!
  • The Walking Dead season 1 is a quick 6 episode watch. It is now available on Netflix streaming, at Redbox. I highly recommend the view!
  • See trailers for the Mid-Season shows I'm looking forward to: AlcatrazAwake and Touch.   I doubt I'll have time to recap them all but they will most likely be discussed on this blog!  
  • As always, there are other shows that I watch as well and would be happy to discuss with all of you. For a complete list by day, you can check out my "FALL TV" post.

6 comments:

Mike V. said...

EW's weekly interview with Robert Kirkman. Well, maybe the paternity thing is still up in the air, but it doesn't sound like they're going to address it too much!

http://insidetv.ew.com/2011/11/21/the-walking-dead-writer-robert-kirkman-secrets/

Candidate said...

Yeah!!! the last 2 eps of TWD have been INTENSE!!! I am psyched on the direction of our "investments" that has led us here so far. All cards are on the table for Rick and Lori. All Relationships seem to have been established. More Walker slaying and edge of the seat nail biting moments.
SOA
I was very happy to see a Sons recap. Of course I was requesting this back in the Lost days towards The End. lol and glad to see you've caught up with it and look forward to the next one as I do.
I am somewhat familiar with the rules of most MC's, Although I may not agree with most of them, This show has a real authenticy to it. I think I just made up a word. Great reading thanks again Mike.

Mike V. said...

Thanks Candidate!

Totally agree on TWD. It's just a great drama and can't wait for more.

As far as SOA goes, I do recall several people recommending it to me and I put it on my "catch-up" list because of it. Just took me until that 2nd summer after LOST to get to it. lol (BSG and Breaking Bad were last summer. The Wire and SOA were this summer). It's definitely awesome and I don't think a week has gone by where we haven't discussed it in one of these blog's comments. I'd just peruse each post to look for it each week. It's just tough to post a dedicated blog recap to it every week, but I would if I could! Of course, I am off this Wednesday, so there's no telling if I'll find some time to post.

Anyway, I appreciate the comments and props! Talk to you later.

Candidate said...

Once is not showing tonite. I gotta agree I wasn't into the last episode nor into the Cinderella character. I was hoping the next ep will make up for it. We'll have to wait til next week.
AHS woah what a show. I'm glad to know about this show and I heard about it here first. Rubber man is gonna be a Daddy soon. crazy stuff.

My word verification is lastrat. Is Juice gonna tell the police more or is he gonna keep his mouth shut?

Candidate said...

Oh hey I just finished The Wire from beginning to end. The Audience network ran the show and rebooted from the beginning. Some slow and monotonous episodes but totally worth watching. Interesting SOA and the WIRE at the same time. Like 2 different viewpoints from the first person. cheerz

Mike V. said...

@Candidate - I forget where you live but Once is usually on Sunday nights here! Anyway, the American Music Awards were on last night so no ONCE this week. I enjoyed the last episode as much as I've enjoyed all the episodes. But nothing stood out too much about it. Was cool to find out why Rumplestilskin was in that prison. But I still want to know how he knows everything in Storybrook too.

No clue with Juice on SOA. I guess even though he told Chibs about the "black" thing, he kept quit on the RICO investigation. And he did check in at the end of the episode. It might be too late to get out now. We'll find out more tomorrow!

The Wire did have some slowness to it. Though, I was used to that pacing from The Sopranos as well. I just loved the characters once again in it. Bunk and McNulty were classic! And hysterical. I could watch that "F" scene from season 1 on constant loop. (the scene where the only word they said over and over again was the "F" word while they were solving a murder. lol) And of course, Omar was a great character too. Love him on Community now. (and Boardwalk Empire when I watch...I'm so far behind)

To everyone - watched AHS from 2 weeks ago....that opening scene with the columbine-like shooting was intense. It was almost painful to watch. And everything that followed was rough too. Great show, but it tests my tolerance levels! lol And the BRAIN and Pancreas meals for Vivian? ewwww!!! Heeeerrrrre Piggy Piggy!!!! lol Good stuff. I'll try to catch up on last weeks before this Wednesday. If not...there's all of TG weekend to try and get to them.

3 behind on Dex now. I'll get to it eventually, but Homeland has been so good...I just can't stop watching on Sunday nights after Walking Dead!

Okay...I've procrastinated long enough on the terra nova recap. Time to get it over with. Although, tonight's ep was an enjoyable one again...and the cheese list was off the charts!