Reviews

This episode was brilliant. I enjoyed it thoroughly and felt a great sense of scale and momentum in the episode. I thought the Eugene trick was very well done too. Then... the last 15 minutes came. Maggie, Jesus and Daryl in a rebellion against Rick?! This honestly has just ruined everything the season was working towards. At first I was disappointed Rick asked for Negan to be saved, but then I understood for the direction of the story. But then for Maggie, who has known Rick from the start to turn on him, Jesus - a guy who has been against killing needlessly, and has sometimes frustrated audiences due to his uneccesary approach to SAVING THE SAVIOURS INSTEAD OF KILLING THEM. But now?! He is willing to go against Rick because Maggie wishes Negan should die? He was literally just preaching to Morgan THIS EPISODE that killing doesn't have to be the only way?! And Daryl . Daryl being Ricks number one, there from the very beginning, his right hand man. Now is turning against Rick, and siding with Maggie because he thinks Negan shouldn't have been spared too? - WHEN HE LITERALLY JUST SPARED DWIGHT LIKE TEN SECONDS AGO? If this "rebellion" just involved Maggie then maybe I could buy it. Because she's still grieving from Glenn. But I find it very hard to believe that Jesus would go against his own principles, and Daryl against a man that's been a brother to him. This has just completely got rid of any sense of credibility for these characters to me, and sometimes I wonder whether the writers have forgotten the last 8 seasons and have scrapped all character development and put all characters on a blank canvas.

It was a great episode, and I thought this show was back on track, but with this new plot I seriously worry for the future of the show. Once again one step forward two steps back. This plot is ridiculous, and it hasn't even started yet .

This is an average episode, it was filled with good moments but largely let down by clunky dialogue and issues that have been dragging the show down for a while now.

The action sequence to begin with was fun, while frustrating. The plot armour for characters on each side is so thick that it's hard to truly engage with the beginning siege from the saviours. This is just an example of the Negan story dragging, because everybody knows there will be no consequence to either side until the season finale. The aim on the show is something that I can usually ignore but has begun to irritate me slightly; how characters accuracy fluctuates as it pleases, from getting headshots on a zombie from miles away, to going full storm trooper aim at point blank range. How there wasn't more casualties to the saviours when they were out in the open blinded by the truck lights - I don't know. Oh, there is also the fact that all of the saviours somehow bunched up behind one bus and all walked out at once, which was something I was happy to ignore.

The Siddiq speech at the start of the episode was out of the blue and cringeworthy, with the other doctor woman saying "I like you" was a moment which sparked a roll of the eyes. (in addition to this, Siddiq's character is acted well, but why is he here? Isn't the cast already big enough that we can't get any decent development on any character, why are more characters being added?)

Tobin, a character that has drifted in and out of relevancy was finally let go of in this episode. I thought somehow he managed to survive the battle to my displease as I had to endure a pointless string of dialogue between him and Carol. Luckily , to avoid being an irrelevant love interest to Carol, he turned in the night due to the virus and began a mini outbreak.

Lazy writing such as a walker literally falling down a rather large flight of stairs and failing to wake anybody up is something that usually I can forgive, but it becomes a bit distracting after a while.

The virus/fever is something that was needed to add a bit of variety to this half of the series, but I doubt it will last long, the sequence was also dreadful in comparison to season 4 virus outbreak.

Tara decides to all of a sudden to side with Dwight this episode after wanting to murder him. Yes. Whatever. Make up your mind Tara.

Henry is a frustrating little story line, what is it with Carol and kids? She is like a magnet for mentally deranged children, and it's something that I've seen many times before. Furthermore, how did no one spot him? Where on earth did he find the key? Was it just lying around?

In conclusion I'm giving this episode less credit than it deserves, it was definitely better than any episode in the first half of the series, and is a step in the right direction. That being said however , it is weaker than the last couple of episodes, and the Negan storyline is definitely holding back the show.