Be Excellent To Each Other

Carol is showing herself as a bit of a devious character, she is playing the quite women to the new group, whilst plotting with Rick to make sure they have a stash of backup guns hidden outside. Then when she was caught by the young boy getting the guns she told him that if he didn't promise to keep quite then she would take him outside and tie him to a tree for the zombies to eat! Also Daryl now looks to be taken in a bit by members of the group and turned down an offer of one of the backups guns, so maybe they are setting him up for a fall?

Carol is awesome. The actress can switch so well between happy soccer mom and terrifying murderer!

Interesting that everyone else seems to be settling in now, even Daryl and Michonne. Just Rick, Carol and Crazy Sasha are left who aren't totally at home.

I really liked the way that Aaron brought Daryl around.

Rick seems like he wants to kill that hot girl's husband and take her for his new wife. That's a tad worrying.

Obviously this all has to go to shit at some point. It'll be interesting to see if it is some internal nefariousness (like the politician woman being secretly evil), and outside agency like the ones who were exiled, or Rick and his crew screwing it all up.

If they wanted to ditch some cast members without having them die, they could always end up with Rick getting exiled but some others choosing to stay behind.

The bit were Rick was considering killing the woman's husband as he wanted her for himself! I wonder if the plot is going to be Rick's group killing what turns out to be a bunch of nice people due to all the horrors they have experienced to date changing them?

Rick's new crush: the maid from season 1 of American Horror Story.

Carol was great, seems to be taking the opportunity to rest, recover and re fucking arm like a duck to water. Her bit with the kid was ace. The kid will tell the dad, surely. that is a loaded gun right there.

Darryl looked at his "I have to do this to keep going" best, and looked suitably nonchalant with his ruftytufty tables manners at the Suburban Fantasy he hates.

The branded zombie is a good mystery, as with the ink branding. The uncomfortable setting of the party was also good

Not entirely convinced by Evil Carol, Crazy Sasha and Salacious Murderous Face Rick either - seemed a bit forced IMO, as does their whole planning to take the place over routine too.

I am convinced by Jessie's bottom though.

Daryl and Aaron were interesting, arguably the best bits of the episode.

Still too many 'main' characters cluttering the place up too. If only there were some zombies to munch on a few of them.

Carol has always been the darkest one of them. Remember how she killed Tyrese's missus and another one to try to stop the infection? Or how she killed the little mental girl in cold blood? Or took out the cannibal camp? She wouldn't hesitate to kill that kid if it helped her group.

I'm also hoping that the group doesn't turn into the baddies for no good reason, I mean, what is their main objection to Alexandria and its residents? It seems to be that they've been 'lucky' in getting as far as they have (which I think is incorrect anyway), and this will make them weak and forget how to be brutal killers of other humans, or something. Surely the smart thing to do here is integrate with Alexandria and toughen them up a bit, not start plotting a coup and stealing their guns before they've even settled in. Why steal the fucking guns anyway? They'll hand them out on request anyway, as Daryl seemed to realise perfectly well.

since The Governor ran a seemingly nice town, the main group are less trusting of new people no matter how nice they seem. Not to mention what happened at Terminus, where they were taken in, taken advantage of, and survived just because they left a stack of weapons hidden outside. They just don't trust anyone any more, but you can see them starting to thaw. Whether they should or not we shall see. I think it's smart given their situation that Rick et al want to seem to be a part of the place, but ready to cut and run, or tear it down, if they are threatened.

Their paranoia is well founded. They still don't know who stole Rick's gun.

Noah dead! Didn't see that one coming and really sorry to see him go Tara mortally wounded hope she survives. INTRIGUE back at the ranch with the mad Priest, Glenn did GOOD ACTING as Noah got taken down, cowardly Alexandria residents starting to show they're not really up to job albeit they have managed to survive fine this long so I guess it's a convenient plot device. But who cares, on this occasion I'll grant a pass for being a good solid zombie episode.

As well as the surprise character cull and the fact that the Alexandria residents are cowards and pretty shit at dealing with zombies, Carol showed her dark side again. She told Rick that she suspects that the Dr beats his wife (who Rick fancies) and son. Then she suggests to him that his only option is to kill him!

Wonder if Daryl will bring any surprises in terms of new people back with him? Also what has happened to the black guy that Rick meet in the first season? (the one he gave a radio to ?) he has popped up now and again but not seen him for a while.

Despite them all turning out to be crappy panicking cowards, they'd managed to do massively better on every single level than Rick's group, and weren't for example, on the verge of starvation and dying of thirst before actually being rescued by the Alexandria search party. It seems to me that the most serious problems in Alexandria at the moment are a bit of their solar power system has failed, and the supplies of chocolate are getting low.

Oh yes and lest we forget that they managed to build a wall which has remained 100% solid throughout the entire apocalypse scenario.

So there's that.

Alexandria certainly seems to be doing well, but as noted previously, it seems impossible to conceive how they have done this well with a mixture of apparent cowards and incompetents. Also it was notable in the first episode that there were at least two massive empty houses ready for occupation.

I think that there is a distinct possibility that the survival of the residents of Alexandria comes directly from being cowards and incompetents. New people come in, see the shit that they have to deal with and do exactly what Ricks gang are doing and do all the 'outside the wall' work. Then all the new people die, or get shellshocked and become drunk doctors, and they need to find new survivors with the skills required to take their place. Hence the willingness to actively overlook the darker aspects of Rick to be sure that they'll do exactly that, and provide de-facto protection.

alexandria residents were good people and rick group were the psycho's that would tore that community apart. And if rick killed the doctor (who happened to be a good man) just because he liked his gorgeous wife. Now they're finding excuses to justify that these people are enemies and that the gang actions are will be justified.

Noah's death was pretty fucking gruesome, I'm pretty desensitized to the whole gore thing now but that got a bit of a 'Ewwwwww' out of me.

EVERYBODY HATE CHRIS

Shit me, that was pretty brutal! I thought annoying chap getting his stomach eaten alive was bad enough, but then Noah having his head ripped to pieces right in front of Glen was pretty fucking nasty.

Set up so well for next week. I'd normally expect the politician lady to believe them, but coming back from the supply run with her son dead, Noah dead and the other Alexandria person being held at gunpoint makes it all a bit tense.

Carol remains steadfastly awesome. You just knew the second she found out about the abusive husband that she'd go into kill mode. Almost surprised she wants to get Rick to do it though.

Daryl finally accepts the other people, washes his damned hair, and by the time he returns the place is going to be rubble!

As for Alexandria holding up better than other places, there's enough unanswered things that it could go a number of ways. Mostly though, they stumbled upon a fucking town with a perfect supply of energy and produce, with a shitload of building materials next door, with their people including a bureaucrat and an architect!

Does seem like they survive best by fetching new people and then abandoning them when the going gets tough.

Can't wait for next week!

EVERYBODY ATE CHRIS!

Amirite?

The final showdown in the last few minutes definitely grabbed my attention - (and indeed took my mind completely off my bollocks for the first time since Friday, so a result there) - although whilst Rick's behaviour has been telegraphed I'm still not convinced it rings entirely true. And with Michonne knocking him out that sets us off at the start of the next episode with Rick being a prisoner? And he seems to have busted his chances with the boss of the place now.

Roll on next week, will be interesting to see what happens.

Not a great episode IMO, pretty disjointed in the main and despite lots of zombie splatters seemed a bit all over the place. If it weren't for the last few minutes I'll be calling relative stinker on it.

Rick looks to have got back some of the insanity he had when they were in the prison, not sure if the group think he is a liability or if he was knocked on the head to allow them to buy time. Sure when he pulled his "stash" gun out on the group that will have destroyed any trust they had left after the deaths on the last trip outside.

Also a bit more info on the zombies with letters carved in their heads, wondering what that's all about!

I know that really didn't ring true for me at all, and actually going to the boss of Alexandria to suggest executing the resident surgeon because he beats up on his missus, well, y'know, that makes no kind of sense.

The whole Rick turning into a borderline would-be-murderer psychopath angle is all a bit strained IMO.