The Walking Thread

Peek-a-BOOOOOOOOOOOO!
(Spoilers are lurching around undeadly herein. CN: Violence; rape culture; misogyny; disablism; stalking.)

Previously on The Walking Dead: Clues to what will happen in this episode of The Walking Dead! Can you guess what things will happen in this episode, based on the scenes just shown to you? Can you guess what characters are about to REAPPEAR? Unless your brains have been zombified, I BET YOU CAN! Especially if you watched "on the next episode of The Walking Dead" at the end of last week's episode! Because this show continues to be great in every way.

This is the episode where we go on Andrea's Big Superfun Journey of Conscience with her. Which I bet would have been an interesting episode, if only for the fact that any human being who isn't a total dirtbag would have left Unpleasantville about sixty-seven years ago and never would have fucked Governor Cyclops in the first place! Whoooooops!

The episode opens with a Lostian flashback sequence of Michonne and Andrea sitting around a campfire making s'mores or whatever, while Michonne's chained, armless zombie pals stand watch. And by "stand watch," I mean gurgle and hiss and flail desperately. Andrea asks Michonne how she came upon them, and Michonne conveys with a look that she knew them. She then tells Andrea, "They deserve what they got; they weren't human to begin with."

Now, I don't know about y'all, but the way I interpreted this was that these men (who I swore Michonne said in another episode were her brothers, but maybe I'm misremembering) hurt Michonne, and probably in a very specific, sexually violent way. In which case, thanks a shitload, writers of this show, for introducing the Rape Turns Ladies Into Superheroes! trope. OF COURSE Michonne only kicks ass because she was raped, or in some other way violently hurt by men, because that's the only thing garbage writers can ever imagine could underlie female strength. WAY TO GO.

The camera zooms in on Michonne's prisoner zombies' chains, which segues into chains on a torture contraption Governor Cyclops is building. (Way to draw a bullshit equivalence between Michonne and Governor Cyclops, assholes.) Cy is real excited about this torture device, and he pops a huge boner or whatever as we cut to the titles. And I can't believe we're only at the titles, because I already feel like I've watched three hours of this episode.

After the commercial break, through which I fast-forwarded because year of our lord Jesus Jones two thousand and thirteen, we find ourselves in Unpleasantville, where Martinez & Co. are preparing for war by stocking a military vehicle with lots of weapons. Andrea stumbles across this scene and says, "I thought there was a deal on the table," and we all laugh because this show is a comedy, right? This show is definitely a comedy.

Melvin Nerdly pays Cy a visit, and gets all freaked out by Cy's torture workshop. Really, Nerdly? REALLY?! You're still surprised by evidence that this guy is a monster? Fuck's sake. You and Andrea should get married and have the stupidest babies on the planet, and you can all marvel together at the DELIGHTFUL SURPRISE of the sun coming up each and every day.

Melvin Nerdly spills all the beans to Andrea, about Cy's TOTALLY PREDICTABLE OMG plan to shock-and-awe the fuck out of Grimes Gang at their next diplomatic negotiation. Andrea says she has to stop it, and Melvin Nerdly tells her, "I don't think you can." Welp, that's the smartest thing he's ever said. No, Andrea, you cannot stop Cy's evil machinations, because you are too goofy to realize when he's evil-machinating in the first place! You have the deductive reasoning of a table lamp, and also you are not in possession of your own militia! Which, let's be honest, is not something we can trust Andrea to have noticed.

Melvin Nerdly shows Andrea Cy's cool torture chamber, and he tells her to GTFO and go warn Grimes Gang. Andrea says she has to kill Cy instead, and, as they watch him LITERALLY WHISTLE WHILE HE WORKS as he sets up his torture chamber, Andrea aims her gun at him. But Melvin Nerdly stops her, telling her if she kills Cy, Martinez will just take over. Which, okay. That's probably true. But I have to say, Martinez just seems like a garden-variety jackass, not a zombiequarium-having torture-head. It's not even evident if Martinez is totally aware of the depths of Cy's depravity, no less that he's totes signed off on it. So maybe take your chances with Martinez? I'm just saying.

Anyway.

Melvin Nerdly convinces Andrea her energy is better spent going to warn Grimes Gang, and she takes off, but not before getting stopped by Martinez, who takes her gun, and Cy, who gives her some bullshit rigmarole about how he just wants to keep her "separate" and "safe" from all the man-violence, I guess. She has to talk her way past Tyreese and Sasha, who are doing some practice zombie-shooting on the boundary wall of Unpleasantville, and she tries to warn them that Cy is a nightmare psychopath, but they think he seems pretty cool.

Obviously, they immediately run to Cy and tattle on Andrea. (Seriously? I feel like those characters wouldn't do that. HA HA I'M THE ANDREA OF EXPECTING CHARACTER CONSISTENCY FROM THIS SHOW!) Cy tells them bitch be crazy. Which, obviously, makes perfect sense, because they live in a world in which any woman warning anyone about a dangerous man can be summarily dismissed at the intersection of "you know how women are" and "challenging authority is a mental illness."

Cy then takes his leave to go after Andrea, but not before getting superpissed at Melvin Nerdly after he realizes Mel's told Andrea about the double-cross he's planning on Grimes Gang. Uh-oh! You're on The Shit List now, Nerdly! You should have gone with Andrea when you had the chance, instead of giving some limp speech about how you belong at Unpleasantville. (You do, though. There are way fewer nerd clothes available at Grimes Jail.)

Tyreese and Sasha are told to go with Martinez, and they're uneasy about what it's going to entail, but the Two White Dudes from their on-the-road adventures tell them not to ruin the good thing they've got going at Unpleasantville. White Dad is mad at Tyreese because Tyreese was brave in front of White Dad's wife, Donna, once upon a time. Oh god this is so tedious. I can barely care about Rick Grimes, who is the epicenter of this trainwreck, no less the patriarchal grudge of a character so minor I never even remember he exists when he's not onscreen.

Cut to Andrea running in the woods and getting attacked by zombies, who she manages to kill with her knife. A typical moment of non-tension, because we all know Andrea's not going to get zombified in the middle of the woods alone in the middle of the episode.

Cut to Martinez & Co., including Tyreese and Sasha and the Two White Dudes, pulling up to a zombie pit where they start unloading zombies into a truck, and the penny drops that Cy is going to unleash them on Grimes Gang, which makes Tyreese uncomfortable. White Dad gives him guff, and Tyreese brings up how White Dad was a coward in front of his wife, omg yawn this show ugh, and they wrestle until Tyreese has White Dad dangling over the zombie pit and Sasha has to beg him not to throw him in. I'm sure she said something real profound while I was yelling at the TV: "DOOOOOOOOOO IIIIIIIIIIT! Toss him in and put us all out of our misery!"

Cut to Cy stalking Andrea in an open field. She's on foot, and he's in a truck, but she is ONE FAST RUNNER. She makes it to a weedy area into which he can't follow her because whoooooooops it's an "All-Terrain Except Weeds Vehicle." Darn it to heck! She runs to a cluster of abandoned buildings, and Cy stalks her through them, as night falls. Andrea passes fully one million items in this abandoned Widget Factory that could be used to thump Cy on the head or ram through his guts, but she picks up zero of them. Cy whistles, which brings out a zombie that Andrea has to kill, allowing him to peg her location. Sure.

Cy calls out to Andrea that she she needs to come back to Unpleasantville, because they need her and it's her home. Aww, he's so sweet! Incredibly, Andrea does not believe him. And when she fails to answer, Cy says, "Suit yourself!" before smashing the shit out of everything with a shovel. One of the many fine smashing implements Andrea could have picked up!

Looking like Tom Cruise's Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg in Valkyrie with his eye patch and flipped-up Nazi jacket collar, Cy stalks her through the building some more, then changes directions and delights in killing some zombies. MOAR BONERZ! It's cool how he was just telling Melvin Nerdly earlier in the episode that he believes there's "a spark of life" in the zombies, a trace of the humans they used to be, as justification for seeking revenge on Michonne for killing his zombified daughter, but doesn't have any problem gleefully pummeling these zombies. He's a real Rob Portman, this guy.

Eventually, he catches up to Andrea, and she closes him in a room full of zombies, but doesn't wait around to see what happens. (Perfect.) She does, however, pause momentarily in front of graffiti on the building that says, I shit you not, "HA HA!" This fucking show.

Cut to someone in a truck, wearing a jumpsuit and black gloves, pouring gasoline all over the zombies in the pit and then lighting them on fire. Obviously, the gloves were there to conceal the race of the arsonist, because if the hands were black, we would know it's Tyreese, and if they were white, we would know it's Melvin Nerdly. But it's still hilarious, because what?—is this arsonist afraid the Unpleasantville CSI unit is going to find him out?

"Looks like this case...is going to be a real gas."


YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!
In the morning, Andrea makes to Grimes Jail, only to have Cy show up and grab her. HOW TOTALLY UNSURPRISING! This guy's a zombie without being undead, or something. Grimes, useless as always, misses the action through his binoculars while on watch.

Cy returns to Unpleasantville with no Andrea in sight, and tells everyone he never found her. He then meets with Tyreese and Sasha and Two White Guys, to reassure them the pit zombies are just a scare tactic, and they believe him, because THIS FUCKING SHOW, and Tyreese promises the Governor they won't question him again. Jesus Jones. During this exchange, Cy realizes it was Melvin Nerdly who arranged the zombie BBQ, and now he's even more superpissed.

But he doesn't have time to deal with Melvin Nerdly's subversive shenanigans right now, because CUT TO ANDREA STRAPPED INTO CY'S TORTURE CHAIR! Of course.

Get on the case, Caruso!

Discuss.