In the new era of the Walking Dead things as we know have moved forward, we find out it’s been six years. Michonne talks, to herself a lot, she is at the bridge that Rick sacrificed himself at, telling it that she has never given up and she never will. She keeps going for “you”, she was rummaging for supplies and found herself toilet paper and a little figure that looked like Rick.
Judith and the new group catches back up with her hunting party. It included Rosita, Eugene, Aaron and others. The were upset that Judith brought people they know the rules, but Judith says she heard them needing help and she helped them, and they still need help. After mild arguing back and forth Judith said if they don’t go neither will she. With that, the group obviously stops fighting it and brings them back to camp.
At Alexandria, the group follows normal protocol by keeping a bag over their heads so they can’t see the way, Yumiko is in the wagon, but Magna is hesitant to go inside. Judith sees what is going on so she goes up to Magna and tells her that they will be safe inside, she promises and goes to grab her hand. Manga relents and goes inside with them. Inside the newcomers are amazed at what they see and what is built. The Alexandrians are curious to see who is here, Michonne arrives from horseback and is not pleased at what she sees. She asks who they are and who allowed this, Aaron said it was his call, and Michonne said it wasn’t his call to make. She goes on about the rules, but Judith steps up and said it was her decision, she made it, the truth is now that someone is in the infirmary and they are here now. They should vote tomorrow, during all this Michonne asked and checked if they had weapons and she was told they were as clean as a whistle, but she frisked Magna anyway.
At the meeting the next day the group tells who they are, who they were, what did they do to survive. They are all poised to make their vote when Michonne steps up and asks if they had anything else to say, she asks Magna to show her left hand. On her hand is a tattoo of four dots with a fifth in the middle. This was to show a prison and that she did time, she also tells Magna to put knife on the table, Magna undoes her belt and sets it on the table. Michonne says whatever the vote is she will second it, and walks away, Magna wants to know if she can ask Michonne a question and she says no and walks out.
At the Kingdom days also keep moving on, the facility is falling apart, the pipes are breaking and being held together by duct tape. Henry basically tells Ezekiel that someone needs to go and learn how to properly fix them, and he wants to go to Hilltop to learn. Ezekiel doesn’t want him to go he wants him to stay and help with the fair, a fair that is to try to get all the groups back together. With a little Carol help, Ezekiel relents and lets Henry and Carol head to the Hilltop.
On the way Henry gets hustled by some Saviors, he hears someone calling for help and rushes off to help, just to get surrounded, and Carol when she tries to save him. It was Jed, and some other ruffians, they end up saying they will let her live because she gave them a free pass, but they want all their items minus the carriage and horse. They had more horses but got hungry after Sanctuary went belly up and now use walkers as horses. Jed wanted Carol’s wedding ring, and Henry didn’t like that and attacked Jed, until Carol got in the way and gave the ring up.
Later that night, Henry was upset with Carol for not fighting back, but she was just waiting for her moment, after Henry was asleep she tracked down the saviors, spread gas on the ground, grabbed the match from Jed’s mouth and burned all the saviors to the ground. The next morning, Henry notices that Carol has her wedding ring back, but won’t say anything about it. On the way to Hilltop, Carol takes a detour, she finds good old Daryl who is living in the woods by himself, hunting fish and killing walkers.
Back at Hilltop, Judith and Negan talk. She is working on math problems and asking Negan for help. They have an interesting conversation and I’m sure this will be explored more in the future. Judith says the people she brought in yesterday are going to get kicked out by mom. Negan tries to talk about bringing home strays and how his mom got bit and he never did it again. Judith says she just wants help on math because look where everything got him now, and the numbers don’t care if you’re a good person or not inside.
Magna wants to fight for their freedom and chance to stay, the group tells Magna she screwed up with the knife trick and to give up Yumiko’s necklace, they all noticed, the necklace has a knife as well. The group says that this group in Alexandria got their for a reason, and if it’s their future to go back out in the world to fight then so be it. This place has little kids here and they shouldn’t try to start anything. Magna gives up the necklace, but later that night gets it back and heads to Michonne’s house. She looks like she was going to attack, but sees a young boy running around to Michonne. She knocks on the door, and tells Michonne that she missed one and hands over the necklace. Michonne thanks her, they talk about what they had to do, and Michonne said she had to do terrible things too. Magna says she gets it, if she had all this and met her, she wouldn’t trust her either so she gets it.
Judith hears whats going on and sits on the steps with Rick’s gun. Michonne asks what she is doing, and she says that she was going to use it to protect her family. She says that her dad would have wanted her to help those people yesterday. Michonne says her dad and brother would be so proud of her. Judith says that she knows Michonne talks to herself, and that she is starting to forget what their voices sound like, she isn’t trying to it just happens and she hopes that Michonne can still hear them, as she sets the figure on the ground. I honestly teared up at this it was very well done and touching, and I think it helped change Michonne’s mind as the morning she said she had a change of plans and will take the new group to the Hilltop where they can stay.
All this is nice, but it pails in comparison to the main event! WHISPERERS! After the meeting for the new group, Gabriel is looking at all sorts of radio equipment, finding new people has renewed the passion for him and Eugene to try to find new people. The two were talking and saying if they could get an amplifier up high enough who knows who and what other supplies they can find if they wen’t farther out. This is obviously a protocol breach according to Michonne and she won’t allow it. So Rosita says she will take Eugene and slide out and that he needs to stay and try to figure out how to help the new people. The two kiss and I DID NOT SEE THAT PAIRING COMING! Good for him that sly sly dog.
On the trip Eugene tries to be weird and imply that he has a thing for Rosita and can’t believe she is with Morgan, on the trip they see a bunch of fresh dirt and knows a herd went by recently, but Eugene said luckily they were going in a different direction. Eugene gets up on the big water tower and sets up the amplifier. When he turns around he sees a herd coming and yells to Rosita to get away, she sees the walkers and runs to the wagon to get the horses who got spooked and ran off leaving them stranded. Eugene is heading down and sees that the walkers made a very tight U turn towards them and coming up fast, he kicks the ladder on accident and has to jump down the rest of the way hurting his knee. Rosita has to break a stick to make a crutch for Eugene and they start to escape.
Eugene is holding up Rosita and he stops on a tree and says that he can be a diversion so she can get out, and he was looking at the stats and waiting for his moment to say something, and she yells at him to not make this weird and they will survive. They keep pressing forward and come up on an embankment and some fresh mud. They get close to the water and hide themselves with all sorts of mud, while laying down for the herd to pass they hear, “where are they?” More walkers pass followed by, “don’t lose them.”
I’m pretty sure Eugene pissed his pants, I know I would have.
For those who follow along with me on the west coast live tweet session on Twitter, for one thank you! For two it is very likely I will be missing this Sunday’s live episode while traveling back from Designer Con in Anaheim. If you are there say hi, otherwise I’ll catch up with you for the live tweet for the mid season finale.
