New Westworld and TWD in the space of a few hours, phew, it's been emotionally exhausting. I was really frustrated with the pacing for the first half of the episode, and most of it was needless filler. The floaty flashbacks almost dulled the horrifying impacts of what occurred. If they'd let the scenes play out without the flashbacks, it would have been a lot stronger. Everything with Carl's arm onwards was fantastic, and some of the best TWD has ever done, partially due to the tension build. Andrew Lincoln, and later Lauren Cohan, were fantastic. I was wondering who would stand up first in the group at the end, and of course it was Maggie, love her. (The show would really like to pretend Eric doesn't exist, I'm really baffled why they bothered adding him to the show in the first place. Even Spencer was at the family dinner at the end.)
Negan and Rick seemed to have retained their slightly odd chemistry from the comics, which is impressive. The Negan/Rick dynamic in the episode seemed a lot more personal that their comic counterparts. It's ludicrous that AMC can show something so violent (Glenn's body twitching was horrifying), but swearing? Nope, too far.
I think it's a bit sad how the two deaths played out. Abraham was used so Glenn's death could be more shocking. Glenn's death was due to Daryl, and had some extra layers of bullshit - the moment was a 'oh, look we might actually kill Daryl this time... nah, it's Glenn'. Daryl's kinda-sorta impulsive, but I couldn't quite believe he'd be so stupid - it all felt frustratingly transparent. Daryl's character has had very little momentum at the moment, they needed to add in some more angst again, and they also needed to get him to Sanctuary. Bye, Glenn. (Both Glenn and Denise died for Daryl, joy.) Abraham's and Glenn's deaths in the comics were horrifying and random, and their loses were focused on. The show managed to diminish both, but hey, losing two leads at once - shocking!
The loss of Abraham and Glenn is (intentionally) even more heartbreaking, because they both had interesting places to go with their characters and relationships. (Which is the whole point of loss, I know.) The Daryl fake-out feels even more insulting, because his arc continues to be a chimera of other characters' story lines. At least Carol and Morgan have plot lines that are more unique. Glenn's loss is even more tragic, unlike her comic counterpart, Maggie is already in a stronger leadership position, so Glenn didn't even need to die for her to keep growing. It's also a bit crap that Glenn had very little to do in the past few seasons, and then got shoved under a dumpster for a few episodes. It's insulting to Steven Yeun, and a waste of the viewers time.
This episode encapsulates my love/hate relationship with the show in a nutshell: awful, self-indulgent pacing, followed by some fantastic character moments. One of the reasons I'm such a fan of the comics, is Kirkman is fantastic with pacing - we're 150+ issues in, and the pacing has rarely dropped. I have a love/hate relationship with Game of Thrones, but the pacing is really solid for such a huge cast. I feel like the fever dream could have been justifiable if it was the thing that actually broke Rick, but the disturbing scene with Carl's arm accomplished the same thing in a few minutes, far more successfully.
At any rate, I'm looking forward to seeing a certain King and his beautiful lady next week.
