Better late than never!
Sunday, October 14, was the much anticipated Season 3 premiere of “The Walking Dead” on AMC.
As the episode begins, one has to wonder, what the hell happened over the winter that the group so skillfully ransacks houses, they all can shoot guns, and most shockingly, not only does Carl have a gun, it has a fucking silencer on it. Why does this little punk have a silencer? I suppose we will find out what happened over the winter in flashbacks because that is crazy.
It clearly has been months since we last saw the group. Everyone has longer hair and is slightly aged. If this is the case the group must think Andrea is dead. What is odd is that no one in the main group mentions her all episode long.
The other shock is how pregnant Lori is now. I expect she will be giving birth fairly soon. Will we find out if it is Shane’s baby? I hope not. We never do in the comic books, and I think it would take away from the show to add that soap opera drama.
One of the other interesting things happening is that characters in the show are assuming different roles to fill the roles the comic book created. Now with Dale dead, Hershel is taking the wise old man role and saying and experiencing similar things to Dale in the comics. Among our group of friends, we have taken to calling Dale “Summer Santa”. I suppose Hershel will have to be Summer Santa number 2. It also seems that Beth has taken the role of the young girl now that Sofia is gone.
Once the group finds the way to get into the yard of the prison they easily take out the walkers. People, including Carol, Hershel and Carl (who were previously not shooters) are in sniper towers and Rick is being good ol’ Rick taking out walkers as he runs through the yard to get to the next gate. The whole scene is very video game worthy and just damn awesome. The silhouette shots they show of the different group members is very much like the comic books. I love that they put that touch in there for those of us who are fans of the comics.
The night after the yard is clear, Beth and Maggie sing a drinking song called “Parting Glass.” It is really eerie to hear that soft song while walkers surround the fences of the prison in the background. This scene was a great for creating horror. The following day, the main five warriors of the group, Rick, Daryl, Maggie, Glenn and T-Dog create a Phalynx to enter the prison. Again this scene is very video-game worthy. Once they come into the main entrance of the prison, the walkers are ready and waiting. Prisoners and guards. The most media-worthy walkers were the Riot Gear walkers. I have a question about them, though. How were they bitten to become walkers? It is possible they just died and became walkers, but even then, how? I suppose it doesn’t really matter because putting that twist in for our heroes was scary to watch, which is the whole point. But for me, the most noteworthy walker was the lady in a red dress. Who would have been in a men’s prison wearing a red dress? That’s right, Conjugal Visit Zombie. And for me, she will always be known as that. You can check out a picture at this link:
Cell Block “C” is cleared and the whole group moves in. At this point, Lori tells Hershel to kill her if something happens during the child birth. She also has a super gross out creepy moment where she tells Hershel she is worried her baby will be a walker and may eat her from the inside. That may be the hormones talking, but that is some morbid shit right there.
Meanwhile, our Spartan army (Rick, Daryl, T-Dog, Maggie and Glenn) plus Hershel decide to go further into the prison to clear out the walkers. This scene was horror at its best. The dim lighting, the flashlights around corners and sudden appearance of a small herd of walkers. The comics could not have captured the terror and fear the same way the TV series did. The group does their best to kill the walkers, but in the chaos, everyone is separated. Hershel tries to find his way back to someone and steps over a “dead” walker. Now how in the world would anyone in the zombie apocalypse think it’s a good idea to step over something you know could kill you? I would have bashed its brain in before I would have walked over it. There weren’t any walkers behind him, he had the time to kill that walker on the floor. But instead he walks over it and of course he gets bitten. It was a good one, too, right on the back of his ankle. The group finds him, quickly breaks into the locked cafeteria and lays Hershel on the floor. Then the absolute craziest thing I have ever seen on basic cable happened: Rick Grimes, in a moment of insane heroism, took off his belt, made a tourniquet for Hershel’s leg, took Hershel’s hatchet from its case and cut off Hershel’s leg below the knee. They showed that on TV. Shocking. Hard to watch. And yet, it never ceases to amaze me how awesome this show is because it is changing standards for television every week. And then the episode ends with the surviving prisoners looking on at the gruesome scene and living people. The smallest inmate exclaims, “Holy Shit!” And I would say he got that right.
To check out more pictures from the episode, check out
Written by Adrian Puryear
Hush Comics 