The Walking Dead returned for it’s second episode of the season this week, effectively following up what was probably the series’ strongest opening episode with something that could best be described as a disjointed and sloppy slog.

Review By: Clark Thompson

Before anyone thinks they’ve got my whole view pegged here, I am not one of those ‘TWD is only good when there’s tons of action morons’. Quite the opposite in fact. I’ve always been a firm believer that this show is at it’s best when it’s character study first, with zombie mayhem second, as without the former that latter falls flat. And while this episode did go for a healthy mix of the two, it’s meandering pacing and shifty focus made for a truly unappealing hour of television.

The episode did seem to hit the ground running with some fantastic scoring by Bear McCreary and cool slow motion footage of our group, a la Reservoir Dogs. It’s just everything in between these shots that was the problem. The dialogue is stiff and unnatural . Giving me the sensation that the actors themselves didn’t have much faith in the writing, or they couldn’t do much with it. And this only persisted as the episode wore on.

For a show that, in my opinion, usually nails these intimate encounters, the tone was noticeably off here. We had characters repeating each other’s dialogue verbatim in some vague attempt at profundity. Like Carol and Tyreese’s spiels about wanting to forget past events or Abraham’s speech about questing for ‘the cure.’ These both fell flat.

But for this fan, no aspect of this episode was more jarring than the appearance and portrayal of Father Gabriel. To make a potentially long winded rant short, I wasn’t feeling this guy at all. I understand it’s way to early to be writing him off, but as far as first impressions go, this one was bad. The thing I can’t figure out is whether or not it was the character’s annoying quirks, or the actor’s performance that was making me grit my teeth. If memory serves, that’s more or less the feeling you’re supposed to get from this guy most of the time, so for all I know Seth Gilliam was crushing the role.

What I do know, is that I hated every second this guy was on the screen. After what just happened, the last thing I care about is some self loathing priest who’s most pressing matter currently is a lack of canned food items left over from his Church’s food drive. 

Now for what this episode did right for me. Well for starters, despite everything I just said in the previous couple paragraphs, the introduction of the church and the good father. When we got our first glimpse of Terminus last season, most of us (comic fans) knew who we we’re dealing with immediately. Only the setting had changed. We are now officially on track to a more familiar scenario, and quite frankly, a scenario that has added weight due to what went down at Terminus.

The main parallel with the books could be seen in what happened to Bob, a character I was starting to really like. Those who read the graphic novel will remember Dale, after being bitten, leaving his group in the dead of night to find a quiet place to die, only to be nabbed by the hunters.

It’s absolutely fantastic to see this element of the original story coming back in augmented form, It’s extremely powerful, especially when Dale got into his rant about tainted meat, but I’m getting ahead of myself. Something tells me Gareth is going to be on the receiving end of a similar statement from Bob right after he finishes chowing down on that hunk of leg.

It also has to be mentioned that the water logged zombies in the food bank scene were among the show’s best looking/most grotesque. There’s something about horribly aged and disfigured zombies that make them immediately more threatening. While the scene itself seemed just as confused in it’s shot composition as the rest of the episodes stunted dialogue, the dead heads on display were top shelf material.

In the end, I would liken watching this episode to being trapped in a dark room with an hours worth of air, only to illuminate any chance of escape in the last ten minutes. I was excited by the end, if for no other reason than feeling of familiarity on the horizon, which is strange for me as I tend to enjoy when the show deviates from the beaten path. With the groundwork laid down for what is sure to be a harrowing ordeal between survivors and hunters, Daryl and Carol on the trail of Beth, and Morgan wandering around somewhere in close proximity, we’ve got some pretty interesting elements at play. Even if we did waste an entire episode on surprisingly weak exposition. 

One more thing of note before I drop a rating on this sucker. I don’t know if Tyreese lied, or we have the biggest continuity error in The Walking Dead history, but did anyone else notice in the final scene when Bob is regaining consciousness the dude with the gum that Ty supposedly killed last episode. Because I did, and It got me a little worried. If something like that could slip through the cracks, we may be in for a rough rest of the season. Only time well tell.

In the meantime, here’s looking forward to a Rick Grimes hosted BBQ a few episodes down the road. Comic book fans, you know it’s coming.

What did you think of Strangers? How was Seth Gillem as the good father Gabriel? Has The Walking Dead really hit it’s stride with this season? 

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Clark Thompson is a 31-year-old horror fanatic currently residing in Kelowna B.C. His main goals in life are to one day experience a zombie apocolypse,and/or undergo surgery to have his heart mounted on the exterior of his chest. You can reach him at clarkthomspon@yahoo.ca or on facebookClorkwork Torange.