Killing them wasn’t a ‘make you worse’ sort of thing - walkers need to be killed. Except, I guess, and particularly in the case of shooting Lori, the potential of making him a sociopath (discussed in an earlier thread).
However, I think that in this world, it becomes necessary to really accept internally that walker <> person. Shooting walkers will (if it hasn’t already) become no different than killing rats or mice.
Not that shooting your mom and/or a father figure wouldn’t give you pause in the early going, of course.
It’s sometimes hard to tell because Chandler Riggs’ acting skills…leave something to be desired, but Carl appears to be getting rather callous and cold inside. Recall that he showed up at the barn to watch his father execute a prisoner (Randall), he goes off on his own to find supplies (the medical gear) and that Lori warned Rick of exactly this, that Carl was growing cold. It could be argued that this is a necessity in the apocolypse, but without it, Carl would just be a regular schoolchild with squabbling parents.
If he had any sense at all he would have had a sharpshooter out in the woods and picked Michonne off cleanly as soon as she was out of sight of the walls.
I was a little disappointed with the way the Merle-Glenn reunion went down. There was some small indication Merle might be more than 2-dimensional evil guy early on in this season, but that’s pretty much vaporized. Now it’s, “Oh, yeah, he’s just a shitty person and experience hasn’t changed him a bit.” It’s a shame, because Michael Rooker is a good actor.
I understand him to be a little kid trying to figure out how to be tough because he thinks that’s how his caretakers think he has to be. Nothing particularly callous about that–though over time, without good care from a parental figure, it could grow into something bad.
I guess I’m saying that what I’m seeing is totally compatible with him growing up to be Daryl, and is also compatible with him growing up to be Shane. (Strange how I don’t mention Rick here…)
FSR I thought it was their entire body. I even have what feels like an actual memory of a bit in the scene where they were applying it around (though of course not on) their eyes.
Rick seems pretty detached from the rest of his group in general. The others are paired off: Glenn & Maggie, Daryl & Carol, Herschel & Beth, Oscar & Axel. Rick and Carl seem more isolated and emotionally vulnerable than the rest; Carl even before Lori’s death, and Rick since. The baby may well change that for both of them, though.
I’d say the closest approximation of what Carl is right now is ‘child soldier’. He’s seen and done things that no boy should have to, and they are clearly affecting him. I didn’t mean to suggest that he’s a remorseless psychopath or anything, but the world he lives in has directed his youthful rebellion and desire to be grown up into dangerous places. He stole a pistol to confront a walker, which then killed Dale. Carl was wracked with guilt over this, which indicates he still had the ability to feel (as does his making eyes at Beth all the time).
That said, I have to maintain that the apocalypse has, so far, made him a worse person, though as you note, his ultimate fate is still to be seen.
The actor’s 13; I assume the character is supposed to be 12 or 13. I can’t recall if it’s ever been stated.
They had the SWAT gear in that episode (102, “Guts”) that they never used again. Didn’t they wear the helmets with face shields, then don white coats from somewhere, and drape the zombie guts over those?
Put me down as disappointed/confused about the Governor’s motivations for tracking down Michonne. As it stands, we know he’s evil because he wants her dead, and the reason he wants her dead is he’s evil. How about some behind the scenes with his lieutenants with him wigging the fuck out over security, Poindexter or someone trying to reason against risking four good warriors to kill someone who doesn’t give a shit about Woodbury and will probably die on her own quite quickly, and him showing that he is psychotically obsessed with keeping Woodbury safe and secret.
However, “What’s she gonna do, jump out of the woods with her sword and kill a bunch of guys with guns?” makes me forgive a LOT.
Everybody (well, not Carol) looked like they’ve showered. They mentioned getting the generators working again, but have they addressed the prison’s water supply at all yet?
Which was the only correct action. Not destroying them would’ve led to some pretty disastrous consequences. Carl is becoming cold & hardened in a way that before the zombie apocalypse would’ve landed in him therapy or an institution; in the world he lives in now it’ll keep him alive.
They covered themselves in gore, but they had no way of knowing how much was enought to fool the zombies (actually they didn’t know if it’d work at all). Michonne didn’t have nearly as much gore, but it was hot out & she didn’t get caught in a rainstorm.
So didn’t the governor tell Merle that they would retrieve the dead guys from the woods and give them a hero’s burial? Won’t Merle have some ‘splainin’ to do since the third guy has a bullet in his head? Or will he think that he was shot to keep him from turning? Did he have any other wounds?
They make sure to give all their dead the appropriate head-wound to prevent turning (notice they did so after Michonne’s first attack, where they even knifed the disembodied head). He did have a slash wound from Michonne, but it was apparently shallow, since it didn’t affect him badly. Of course, with the area being zombie-infested, the condition of those bodies should they return to retrieve them is not going to be conducive to disproving any part of Merle’s story - and he was smart enough to blame his failure to bring back any souvenirs on the presence of a crowd of biters (though that wouldn’t explain the absence of the sword . . . ).
Well, I just watched the episode, and liked it a lot! I can’t wait to see how Michonne interacts with Rick and the group. Perhaps she will actually speak a few words!
The fight scene with Merle was pretty good. He actually was able to knock that katana out of her hands! Impressive!
Maybe the townspeople don’t really give a shit about what the governor is doing to keep them safe, because honestly i most definitely wouldn’t. Slaughtering those soldiers was obviously the right call, anyone who doesn’t think so just needs to look at what happened to Rick’s group when he didn’t slaughter the prisoners. A large group of heavily armed men are a serious threat, much bigger than the zombies.
