Walking Dead Season 2 Episode 8 “Nebraska”

Naturally, we pick up right where we left off last time, looking down the barrel of Rick’s awesome gun. Now we have to deal with the aftermath of what when down when the barn zombies were unleashes, and Sophia punched us in the gut with her little zombie hands.

Overall, this episode was just…depressing. And I like depressing. But this show already has enough nihilistic undertones in any given episode and this one went a touch overboard with it. EVERYONE’S SAD AND IT’S A TOTAL BUMMER TO WATCH.

Thankfully, we still get good ol’ Walking Dead stupid arguments and unrealistic plot developments. Hershel decides to pick up drinking after 20 some-odd years and never having it be mentioned before. And Beth is, well, Rick puts it best: “in some sort of state.” So Rick, being Rick, decides to go and bring Hershel back. Glenn, being Glenn, decides to tag along. All of a sudden this becomes an issue, mostly because Lori’s there so naturally decisions can’t be made without an argument first. Thankfully Rick shows some development. Because this is not like his selfless search for Merle way back when. He needs Hershel for the sake of Lori and their unborn baby (I hope it’s a girl so I can make more Breaking Bad comparisons). Then we have Maggie, who has clearly been spending too much time with Lori, and so has to argue with Glenn about him going (Geez, the writing for the women on this show…). I don’t understand why Maggie is scared for Glenn to go. It’s a run they’ve made more than once before, easily, and if she’s so nervous for Glenn, shouldn’t she be at least twice as nervous that her father is there by himself?  It feels like a conflict for the sake of conflict. Which is further supported by Lori changing her mind, like, an hour later, going to get Daryl to go to bring them back. And the only reason she goes to get Daryl is so we can see how he’s dealing with the whole Sophia situation. Because Lori decides to go by herself without telling anyone, and manages to get into a car accident without the help of a cell phone. Lori’s character annoys me, because everything she does just makes me so away that I’m watching a television show character, and not an actual person. I might as well get over this, seeing as it most likely won’t change (that is, if she’s still alive, which I’ll have to wait until next episode to see, but come on, she’s totally alive).

Speaking of people I have to get over: Dale I don’t like how he just magically puts together what happened between Shane and Otis, but I do like that it gets to Lori, who has much more of a reason to believe it’s true (remember that time he tried to have sex with her at the CDC?), even though she initially defends him for the purpose of denial.

Back to the good stuff. Rick continues to prove Shane wrong by being able to get stuff done. He manages to convince Hershel to go back home. And of course, just when they get up to leave, Dave and Fat Tony walk in. “Oh hey! New people!” was my reaction, and from Glenn’s face that’s probably what he was thinking too. After some pretty friendly, if not slightly awkward conversation, things start to get a little…off. (And that actor who played Dave did a GREAT job, making that situation change levels of awkwardness, making it become increasingly hostile). Fat Tony pees on a wall, and Dave gets less and less subtle with his conversation. It was very suspenseful throughout, because Dave and Tony aren’t necessarily bad guys, but they’re suspicious, and the audience as well as our heroes are trying to gauge how suspicious. Rick realizes what’s going on and kills them, reinforcing that he’s the guy that can and will get stuff done (Move over Shane, Rick’s becoming quite the badass himself). Let’s just hope those gun shots don’t attract zombies. Or worse. This scene was a nice--or, to our heroes, probably a bleak and unwanted--reminder that zombies aren’t their only danger.

Other thoughts:

-Shane getting angry with Hershel, accusing him of knowing Sophia was in the barn. I believe that Hershel didn’t know, and that Shane is just trying to get some blame off himself for what he did.

-Carl: “He did the right thing: shooting her like that. I would’ve done it too.” AHH CARL STOP GROWING UP SO FAST.

-I’m worried about Daryl….

-Unfortunately, for her, I’m not worried about Carol. I mean, I don’t know anything about her, and now that Sophia’s gone, she really has no purpose.

-I did laugh at Dave calling them “Lame-Brains,” but do we need all these unnecessary terms like Walkers and geeks? What, Zombie isn’t good enough for you people?

This week in zombies: 
-Nice shot of Andrea piercing dead Mamma with a scythe.
-The arm falling off the truck was a nice touch as well.