Introducing: The Governor!
There is so much to talk about in this weeks walking dead, I don't even know where to begin. Well, first of all, thank you hurricane sandy for getting me off of work today so I have time to write this. If you are one of the thousands of people effected by the storm, sorry if I seem entirely insensitive, but just be glad you're not knee deep in a Zombie apocalypse right now. I think I have a friend who wishes they were just in a hurricane and were awaiting their power to back on, and her name is Andrea.Yep, Andrea is so blinded by her own powerful need for food, water, and medicine that she can't even see how terrible the Governor is! After all, she totally did see him do some evil stuff, like... give her food, water, and medicine. I guess what I'm trying to say is, for as badass as she is, I totally hate Michonne. Bummer. I understand they have like 15 more episodes this season to build her character, but right now she's just a disappointing sack of angry. Which I guess brings us to this weeks Things I didn't Like, which normally comes after things I like, but a little change never hurts, right?
Michonne, The Bad-Ass Linus Without a Blanket: Remember that moment in peanuts when Lucy steals Linus's blanket that he always carried and Linus got all mad and pouty? Something tells me that's what the writers are going for with Michonne without a sword. "Here, have some lovely scrambled eggs!" "Give me my sword!" It's just frustrating. Three episodes into the series, and all we've scene Michonne do is narrow her eyes, tighten her fists and clench her jaw. It's getting exhausting. Oh, and she keeps indicating her love for Andrea. Example: Andrea asks something like "how did you kill those walkers so easy, after they've kept us safe for months!" Michonne replies: "It was easier than you think." Putting this through a 1950's romantic classic dialog translator, what Michonne is saying is this: "I would do anything, to anyone, to keep you safe, my dear!" And I'm totally over it. On the plus side, though, it was really cool how she just lobbed there heads off like it was nothing. (Oh, and you know how there was no dialog between them shown after Michonne shut the door and they spend the night in the room? They were totally getting on some Sapphic stuff.)
I'm so mad, I just... want to make out with you!
Now don't get me wrong, I get why the writers are having her be so cautious and distant. She's not getting fooled by the Governor that we all know is evil, and so when the shit hits the fan, she'll be vindicated or whatever, and she'll become the fan favorite and it'll be something of a joke "always trust michonne" blah blah blah. But right now, it just doesn't make sense for her character. Keeping your guard up is one thing, but just being an ungrateful bitch is another. For someone so quick to adapt, she should know burning bridges is not the best way to survive.And just one more thing, in the preview for next week, it shows Michonne seeing blood on the military vehicle, indicating that the blood is making her suspicious of the Governor. If that's what ends up happening, that's totally dumb. "There's blood on the car! The only possible way that could have happened is if the Governor killed all the military people. It totally has nothing to do with the Zombie Apocalypse!" Anyway, I guess we'll see what happens next week. Moving on!
Guy Ferlend, aka The director: Although this was a strongly written episode from Evan Reilly, I feel the director made some dumb choices, which surprises me because I think he did a good job on the other episodes he's done (Better Angels and TS-19, both some of my favorites of the series). Case and point: When Andrea was drifting in and out of consciousness and the last thing she see's is Merle going "shhh" with that stupid, stupid camera affect, I don't even know what the name for it is. It looks sort of like how a video on youtube looks when it's loading all choppy and you hold on a single frame way longer than you should. It just doesn't seem authentic, doesn't create an experience that's similar to real life, and it's distracting. Doesn't add anything to a shot.
Another moment that was directed poorly is that impractical scene where the Governor shoots up the military dude. Made for a cool moment, but totally dumb. Anyway, that's the writers problem. The directors problem is just after the Governor shoots the military guy, everything goes slow motion and you have him center frame, and then there's a slight zoom-out where you see bullets flying and everyone getting shot. It just seems like a very amateur way to indicate "yeah, he's a badass." Maybe that's being too nit-picky, but it was just a little too obvious, which doesn't exactly work for walking dead.
Milton, Woodbury's jester: I guess this issue isn't so much with the construction of the episode, but the actors portrayal. Something about his meek-presence and the way he delivers his lines just comes off as though he's trying to be a comedic character. Listen to the way he says (paraphrasing) "I say 'it' because people aren't so quick to refer to it as him... or her." It's set up like a comedic line despite the fact that it has serious intent, trying to pry information out of Andrea as well as revealing Milton's connection to the Walkers as, well, life-forms. It's really actually interesting, I just think they played it wrong. The character himself I'm fine with. I like how he's the closest thing to being in contention with the Governor we've got, despite not being a powerhouse, or "hammer" as he calls it. He is also totally experimenting with the Zombie's and is going to try doing some crazy shit. I'm excited to see where that goes.
Phew. Anyway, I'm glad that's over. Now, onto things I liked (coz I really liked this episode).
Is he trying to seduce me here? Coz' it might be working.
Merley Merley Merley, Merle: This guys awesome. Not only is it good that we have a familiar face in Woodbury so that we have an impression of how evil it is, but this guy is Daryll's brother, so that'll cause conflict as well as a connection between the two groups (well, mostly just conflict in Ricks group). But also, Merle has an intimidating presence. That knife hand is great, especially the way he just nonchalantly stabbed that walker without looking at it or getting up from his crouching stance. Although he's totally under the Governor's thumb for now, it'll be interesting to see him in a situation we're he totally rebels and goes off the hook (get it, haha, hook for a hand?) I guess I don't really have much to say about him, but he has a great set-up for the writers.Andrea, the Governor, and the tea: All of those little flirty things "sitting pretty at the end of the world" and "what's your real name" provides an interesting angle for these characters. This notably didn't start until after Andrea drank the tea. There's totally something up with the tea, and I completely missed it (thank you Kelly for pointing it out!!). On rewatching the episode, it's kind of obvious. The Governor jokes with Milton, he keeps him around for his tea. At the breakfast table, Andrea and Michonne are offered tea, and Milton keeps refilling cups although he never drinks from it. My girlfriend Paige said that she thinks there's something in the tea that's making the people of Maybury complacent. Seeing as we have a mad-scientist on the scene, that's probably not a bad guess. For instance, when the Governor gave that pep-speech, no one in the town reacted. No cheers or yells of celebration. Maybe I'm over looking it, who knows. But for some reason, it's not just making Andrea complacent, but it's giving her the hots for The Governor. I can't blame her for that, he's a pretty handsome man. Which leads me to my next point:
Now aint' that one attractive mouth-hole.
Cheerio, Governor: Here, we finally get to meet the series primary villain! Only took us two seasons. Anyway, he's totally great. What surprises me most, and what the episode entirely plays off of, is so far he's not that evil. I mean, yeah, he has this weird Zombie fetish, keeping their heads in glass jars and sticking his fingers in their mouth holes. And okay, he killed all those innocent military men. Although, there is something to be said for the fact that maybe he only did it because they abandoned their post and left people to die at the military base? If it weren't for the fact that he has a reputation from the comics as being the most evil person ever, I'd totally buy that. But maybe that's part of it. Maybe he's such a good villain because he feels he's so principled? Eh, but maybe not, because it most likely was him who shot down the helicopter in the first place, and he would have no idea of their history. But let's say that's not the case. killing the military people for guns and supplies isn't really that evil. I don't know what he could have done that would have been majorly evil, but that just didn't make the cut.Another interesting thing is trying to figure out what exactly his priorities are. Okay, so he loves his family that's gone (que the framed picture he's still got, and was that his family in the fish bowl? I don't know). But whats his angle exactly? Well we were watching the episode, one of my friends mentioned he may have killed the military so that there was no american presence in Maybury. One thing that may contradict that is that he has a flag on his front lawn, so he's obviously at least pretending to be patriotic to the America that once was. He also is very obviously suppose to be a part of the south-republican culture. After all, in there small pleasant community where everyone goes to work and kids go to school, the heavy artillery and guns "never hurt."
He also does have a very interesting theme. In the composers blog, Bear McCreary breaks down the theme into two parts. The first, a very subtle melodic theme, and then a tougher more aggressive theme. Personally, I think it's the best theme in the show thus far. It's very beautifully melodic well still being able to hide in the background. McCreary states that this is reflective of the Governor of the show, who is "more nuanced" than the one in the comics, which makes breaking down and analyzing him all the more fun, for me at least.
Like what you see Andrea? Turn around!
People are still clueless about the infection: One thing that I liked is that Andrea and Michonne didn't know that everyone turned. But not only that, the military was indicated not to know, which is really interesting. This can be seen when the military guy said to the Governor that someone on the inside got bit, they don't know how. Obviously someone just died and turned and starting killing everyone. But on a more interesting note, I always thought that the flashback in TS-19 when Shane was in the hospital and it showed the military shooting civilians it was to indicate that they knew everyone was infected. Now, they don't know that? Interesting. So then why shoot the civilians? That's just some nice information for those who are trying to figure out what happened at the time of the invasion.Whew. Alright. That was a long post, but this episode was filled with interesting things. On it's own, maybe not the best episode of the series, but very interesting set up, and I'm very excited for next week. Anyway, what'd you think? Agree, disagree? Let me know in the comments below!