The Walking Dead Season 1 and 2

Floro's Late To The Party Reviews - The Walking Dead (Seasons 1 and 2)

I need to open with a lame reference-slash-metaphor/pun of some sort, pick your favorite:

1) I only just woke up to find my world surrounded by zombies. At least it's not sparkly vampires.

2) I would have joined this party sooner, but the people at Netflix move about as quick as a Walker with one leg.

3) I was watching the Lakers play, and I thought it looked familiar for some reason. Then I saw Season 2 of The Walking Dead was put up on Netflix Instant.

I know enough of the comics to know there's no way they are getting away with putting those things on basic cable television. I also have learned to not underestimate how far TV will go, so I didn't know what they'd get into. It made for an interesting experience.

Before I get into any of the details, I have acquired a knack for dropping in on the big deal shows at the big deal moments, without any frame of reference. When you first experienced Game of Thrones (or A Song of Ice and Fire for the literate), you clearly remember that first "OH SNAP" moment in season 1/Book 1? I turned to HBO 3 minutes before that happened.

I am not a horror genre fan. My brain doesn't let things go, and I don't like to encourage it to keep additional fodder for keeping me awake. I did a little interweb research into the comics first, and had heard enough about the show to know it isn't designed to be abundantly horror-movie terrifying (it's much more cerebral). I decided to tune in to the 2nd season of TWD while I was in SYR last year. Instantly hooked, I randomly tuned in part way in to the Shane and Otis resolution, the Dale happenings late in the season, and the middle 25 minutes of the season finale. Yea, I'm that good. Netflix had the first season up, and I had my Nook, my month long stay planned, and my insomnia. Game on.

--Season 1 --

I watched the first season 8 inches from my face, on an 8 inch screen, alone in a hotel room, starting at 11:30PM and running until 4 or 5AM over the span of 3 intense overnights. I was working late shift anyways, but I think the combination of "what will happen? I gotta know!" and "Oh sh...those zombies are really eating that...everything....woah." kept me up longer than originally anticipated.

They managed to keep the pace moving at that awkward, slow, stumble-jog every seems to get when chased by shuffling zombies. I am equally glad they didn't make the horde impossibly immobile or Romero Dawn of the Dead (2004) sprinting freaks. They picked a set of rules, and they stick to them. They also, thankfully, reveal them to us. Both of those things mean a lot to me.

The tension builds around increasingly dire situations and miraculous escapes, meetings, or discoveries. This builds for us a sense of "Things will always mostly work out! It's television! Rick's a southern hero cop!" Robert Kirkman does this in all of his works (that I'm aware of), to then unload some extremely spiteful views on "humanity". 

I think we as a country are in a creative period past hero worship. We drowned ourselves in superheroes for a decade; nigh untouchable paragons who learn mortal lessons while defining their greatness. Now, we want our "heroes" to be questioned, prodded, challenged, flawed, beaten, and fallible. We don't want it to always work out. You can predict these changes in our views on heroes with the results of the protagonist team in sports movies. Even Keanu Reeves won the big football game, but Samuel L Jackson's team loses at basketball? (The Replacements (2000) and Coach Carter (2005))

That's all to say, it gets worse over and over again. I was hooked with the endlessly bleak outlook on what would life be like when faced with an unstoppable force that knocks humans off the top of the food chain. How far would people go to survive? How quickly would we lose who we are? What will be worse, the living or the dead? The first season forces these questions at every turn. I was left stunned, raw, and impressed. At the same time, I had no problem waiting for a second season.

-- Season 2 --

With all the hullabaloo around season 3, they powers that be decided it was time to put up the second season on The Binge Channel (Netflix Instant). I too decided it was time. The first season had left enough of an impression on me, and I figured the second would start off with a little review for anyone who forgot the important stuff.

Instead, they start by writing off Rick's external monologue device, the radio broadcast. I liked this function and I really liked the possibility of meeting back up with his saviors from early season 1 (only to have them horribly murdered by horribleness). Not a good start, season 2.

Then they lose Sophia in the woods, the little girl, because both her and Carl are incredibly dumb. I truly dislike Carl. I credit my mom, and blame Jean Claude Van Damme, with my expectation of smart movie/TV children. In Sudden Death, JCVD has to do a lot of inexplicable stuff. But he has a son that's with him. He tells the son to stay in his seat, no matter what. A freaking helicopter crashes through the middle of the Mellon Arena, and the kid stays put! AND EVERYTHING WORKS OUT FINE!

The lesson is: Always listen to your father, especially when he dresses up like goalie Tom Barrasso to save the President.

In TWD, Sophia is told to stay put. She doesn't, and instead the entire cast has to spend half a season wandering around looking for her one at a time. Carl shows up at the worst time, every time. Every time, someone tells him to stay put, he doesn't. It always ruins everything (with one critical exception) and he never learns. His parents do nothing, because they're so glad he's alive. They wouldn't have to cry and cling to him like he just escaped by the skin of his teeth every 2 days if Carl just did what he was told. Carl constantly ruins everything, so when he got shot, I applauded. He's fine and I knew he would be, due to my expert timing in catching parts of future episodes and my previous comic book research. The applause was more because I wouldn't have to deal with Carl ruining everything, and maybe we could spend more time developing the other characters.

The Walking Dead game by Telltale does an amazing job of doing what AMC should be doing with Carl. I'm not going to review this game here. I haven't finished it, and it's amazing go play it. In short, every choice you make clearly impacts the girl you are protecting, Clementine. Except, unlike Carl and his stupid hat, she learns! She adapts and changes! She reacts differently based on how you handle protecting her innocence as the world descends into madness around you. Carl just sucks. Seriously, the only way I'm going to believe/appreciate/like Carl is if the series ends with him buying a house in the run down part of New Jersey, and Frylock welcomes him to the neighborhood.

Aqua Teen Hunger Force meets The Walking Dead: Carl's Redemption

The only time I liked Carl was the only time his ninja powers came in handy, right before the season finale when he saves Rick. The reason I liked Carl then? He wasn't the dumbest character on the screen; Rick was. By a mile. This quickly goes back to normal as the season rushes to a close. 

The second season was OK, but it was poorly paced and underwhelming. They spent way too much time accomplishing nothing, and building towards a confrontation between Shane and Rick that took too long to get there. By the time it happened, I just wanted a decision to be made. They make the characters lament leaving the farm, but they hadn't even finished moving in! The day everything goes back to shit? It's the same day that they finally all decide to work together. I couldn't believe anyone aside from Hershel that spoke about how they felt on the farm. I also couldn't remember who the eventual zombie snacks were until shortly after their deaths. There just wasn't good use of the time.

I understand that the show can't match the same pace as the comics. Knowing this, they either needed to spend more time on the farm, like a full season longer, or less time not accomplishing anything. There's a lot of introduction to more interesting conflicts: the living raiding parties, the potential challenges of a newborn in zombie world, Andrea having crazy boyfriend jealousy over Shane with Lori, Daryl going nuts over Merle, Hershel's internal conflict with religion, winter on a farm surrounded by the dead, T-Dawg having more than 2 lines. Unfortunately, all of these things are left to rot in a jumbled mess of an ending. The transition to the next place (the prison) is a long dark shot with some ominous music that they held for 8 seconds longer than normal because you couldn't immediately identify what it was. If you aren't a fan of the written series, you have no reason for this to matter. I've not read the series, but I know they spend significant time at the prison.

The same goes for the other new thing that happens at the end of the season. I'm speaking, of course, of The Robin Hood Zombie Wrangling Sword Person? Consider the odds of this happening:

- A survivor of the zombie apocalypse

- Owns and maintains a sharpened and polished short sword

- Survives In the woods of rural Atlanta

- Tames and chains armless zombies like dogs, who have no apparent interest in eating the living, unlike every other zombie we've met to this point in any condition.

- Appears at just the right moment in the woods at night with a herd of zombies around

- Has a sword that is immune to zombie blood sticking to it, or nicks from slicing bone.
For a series that has stayed well within the realms of plausible suspension of disbelief (really? the US military couldn't handle the walking dead with tanks and automatic weapons? I know some Marines that would disagree, but OK, let's go with it.), Zombie Taming Swordsmith Ninja Elf with absolutely zero set up or explanation was too far. I don't think there is anyway this can be resolved without me being frustrated and having to just get over it. [EDIT: I have one theory that I feel is remotely possible, but still rather stupid. If I turn out to be right, and they explain it in detail quickly, I will be more inclined to let this go. Eventually. Maybe.]

And that's how I feel about season 2. I'm frustrated at the missed opportunities to hit the same quality highs and lows from season 1. I'm frustrated that the big twist deaths had such a limited impact on the crew overall (expect for Shane). I'm frustrated that when Rick finally hit the point they were grinding him down towards, the reaction was crammed into the last 6 minutes of the season. They don't have to use any of that character momentum past the first 3 minutes of season 3.

Finally, I'm frustrated that I have to wait to bingewatch season 3. Even when it doesn't know what it wants to do, The Walking Dead is a captivating series. It draws you to pick people to root for. It trusts you to have more hope than the entire cast. It takes as many chances as it can to connect you to a variety of possible choices, and it makes you suffer through the always negative consequences. It gives you a window into the pits of hopelessness, and humanity at it's basest. Are we good or bad at the core? When faced with survival situations, what happens to human nature? Which is worse, the unknowable horror of a legion of the undead, or the fact that the living might be more dangerous? Season 2 did not apply this as liberally or as gracefully as season 1, but it was still solid drama. I hope they get back to the greatness of season 1, but so long as they don't go jumping any undead sharks, I'll be looking forward to playing catch up to the rest of you.