Monday, February 20, 2017

The Walking Dead: Season 7 Episode 10 - New Best Friends


Hello friends and welcome back to The Walking Dead season 7 discussion time!  The resistance against Negan continued to build last night.  We spent our time meeting "new friends" and with the residents of The Kingdom (and its outer perimeter).  Some funny moments, some intense moments, some tender moments were shared with us.  It's getting easier to see how the hanging plot threads from this season are going to tie together.  Let's dive into the discussion!

Discussion Points



The Kingdom

  • An intense meeting with the Saviors shows that tensions are high and things are about to break.  Richard is no longer going to be a bystander.  Morgan is making enemies and lost is stick, but still is towing the line of peaceful negotiations.  Most importantly, Jerry is continuing to be a hilarious presence.  (And Talking Dead was actually thoroughly enjoyable last night from start to finish)
  • Ezekiel still does not want to get involved in the fight and had stern words for Benjamin who got involved in the encounter.  
  • We met another Kingdom resident (maybe we met her before) in Diane.  She's good with a bow and seems to be emotionless.  She killed a girl walker that was wearing a dress that her sister wore.  (unclear if it actually was her sister) 
  • Daryl/Richard looked to be forming an alliance to get the Kingdom involved.  But when Daryl learned Richard's plan was to lure saviors towards Carol and kill her to motivate Ezekiel he was totally out.  Intense infighting occurred and then Daryl made his intentions known if anything happened to Carol.  (i.e. Richard would be a dead man.)  
  • We then catch up with Carol who is first visited by Ezekiel and his crew who are trying to "quietly" protect the area around Carol and give her a cobbler.   
  • Daryl, now knowing where Carol lived, stop by for an emotional reunion with her.  Carol basically filled Daryl in on why she left.  Stuff we already knew why, but a nice reminder why and well performed.  She didn't want to turn into a killing machine.  And she knew if anything happened to anyone, she would and she would lose herself.  So, when she asked if anyone was hurt or if everyone made it home Daryl decided to lie and say everything is fine and the Saviors are taken out.    Clearly, this cannot last.  Carol cannot stay out of the fight forever.  Either Richard's tactics are going to pull her in or she's going to find out a different way what's going on.   
  • We later see Daryl bonding with Shiva and Morgan stops by for a chat.  They catch up on Carol.  And Daryl tries to wake Morgan up and let go of whatever he's holding on to and help convince Ezekiel this fight needs to happen.   Of course, the fact that Daryl lied to Carol meant he is holding on to a little something too.   Daryl decides to abandon his protective quarters and skip town.   He's heading back to Hilltop.  We were left with Richard and Morgan giving each other an intense stare down.   Maybe Daryl did enough before leaving?   But, gotta say.  Leaving is a pretty dumb move at this juncture! 

Rick and the Scavengers
  • So, this panned out pretty much as we thought it would, but with maybe some more trust issues than I was considering.  Makes sense given the world we've been watching for 7 seasons! 
  • The Scavengers live in a junkyard and make a living by stealing.  They never set foot on the boathouse, but instead waited for someone else to take it so they could steal it.  Then they sent someone back to Alexandria to steal more supplies.  Gabriel got caught in the mix and taken as captive, but not without leaving a breadcrumb trail for Rick.  
  • Rick, kept a smile pretty much the whole episode.  He negotiated with Jadus (don't know the spelling).  The Saviors were the real threat and they have ALL the goods to be stolen.  Gabriel helped sell the case.  "They found me, imagine what else they can find!"  
  • Jadus had to test Rick before she would barter with him though.  She threw him into a Trash Heap arena with Winston, a spiked helmet/armor clad walker.  Had to be the most inventive walker yet.   Through teamwork, Rick managed to take out the walker.  He used the trash walls to his advantage to bury him and then stab him with broken glass.  But it was not without injury.  One of those spikes went through Rick's hand.  (That dude gets more hand injuries.  If only he would've just had it removed like in the comics!)  
  • Jadus liked what she saw and agreed to fight the Saviors.  They haggled over the prize cut.  They'll take 1/3rd of what they reap from the saviors plus keep half of the boathouse winnings. But they also need ALL THE GUNS.  They need weapons before they can fight the saviors.
  • It was no coincidence that Rick asked Tara where NOT to look.  We know where the guns are.  Oceanside has a whole supply of them. And somehow they're going to get pulled into this. 
  • It should be noted that Rosita is still being all kinds of pissy and is a loose canon.  She got into a verbal fight with Tara and I'm still not sure what it was about.  But, basically she's impatient and wants to kill saviors now.
  • Aaron also got hurt in the negotiations, but he appears to be okay.  But boy is he gonna get it from Eric! 

Okay, it's a federal holiday and I'm home with the fam so I'm going to keep this brief!  There's really not much else to report from this episode.  In the scheme of things this was a fun break from the Negan beating they've been taking.  But, he'll be back next week in all his glory!   As always, I'm excited to see where this goes next.  Hope you enjoyed my ramblings and I'll see you next week! 

9 comments:

MJ said...

I wish someone would take Morgans stick and hit him with it to knock some sense into him. After hearing what the saviors are like and witnessng a little of it - how can you think that there are other ways ? SIGH. I guess his point of just taking Negen out is a valid one though. But Simon would need to go too - cause he enjoys it.

As for Diana - I don't remember her but they sure seemed to just put her there like we should know her.

Best part was Carol and Daryl finally seeing eachother again. I can't actually remember he last time they were together. And his budding friendship with Richard sure took a turn when it came to Carol. LOL Interesting though - you say Daryl told her the Saviors are taken out. I don't remember that. I know he did not tell of the deaths - bu I don't remember him saying the Saviors are taken care of. Hmm - could just be my faulty memory. Not happy Daryl is going to Hilltop. And I feel when the saviors go they will find that Maggie is ndeed not dead too.

Scavengers - what a strange group. Were they in the books ? Funny that on TD Seth Gillam kinda said that the Scavenger chick (boots we saw) forced him to take the food and go with her. But - how'd she get into Alexandria to do that ? Not adding up - he was on guard duty - starts talking to himself then goes to the pantry to empty it. Drives off with her in the car. How exactly was he forced to do any thing ? Eh - writers license I guess. They made in non-sensical last week so that we'd be surprised I guess. But eyah - Oceanside will obviously get pulle din cause why else show them, right ? LOL


Talking Dead - yeah - it was a good episode.

I - unfortunately - am at work. LOL

Mike V. said...

Gonna be brief but will comment more later.

I thought Daryl said that the remaining saviors surrendered to them or something like that. Like there wasn't a whole fleet after they took out that compound.

MJ said...

Oh maybe. Like I said - I did not come away with that but could be my memory.

Jason B. said...

I believe Daryl said that another group of Saviors came and they defeated them, but later they were forced to make a deal where they produce for the Saviors. But, similar to Ezekiel's deal, their way of life in Alexandria stayed the same otherwise and no one was hurt because both groups agreed to no more bloodshed. Something like that anyway haha.

Diane was shown briefly in the first Kingdom exchange with the Saviors that we saw back in episode 2, I think that was all.

Yeah, thinking back I'm pretty sure the last time Daryl and Carol saw each other was when they were burying Denise. It's definitely been awhile.

Fun fact - The Wolves in the show were a rendition of a very small group called The Scavengers in the comics. The Wolves were much more developed and lasted longer (believe it or not) than The Scavengers, but they showed up around the same time frame and were both antagonists to Alexandria. But I believe that the only similarities between the comic Scavengers and the show Scavengers are the name and their tactic of taking things from others rather than trying to produce for themselves. Other than that, no group like this one existed in the comics.

Mike V. said...

SuperJ - That sounds probably right with what Daryl said about the saviors. I'll need to watch again (I say this, but I probably won't lol).

Makes sense on Diane. I'm sure we've seen her before. They just gave her more attention in this ep.

Interesting on the comic vs. TV show differences. It makes sense to pull in some different threads for TV purposes sometimes. We'll see if it pans out in this case. Speaking of - my reading of the comics is going quite slow! lol Shane is gone, Lori is pregnant and that's about it! Just keep forgetting to go back and read more .

MJ said...

All kinds of stuff out there about how Negen dies in the books. I refuse to read it though. Don't want THAT much info.

But very interesting about scavengers in the books.

Mike V. said...

Yeah I haven't heard anything about how Negan dies in books and don't want to know!

MJ said...

So - read that what Daryl told Carol was that after killing the small group of saviors there were others and that we made a deal with them like the Kingdom did. Technically not a lie - but not quite a deal since we were forced into it.

Mike V. said...

right, that's basically what super j said too. I totally did not listen correctly the first time around. lol