# The Walking Dead; 7.03 "The Cell" (open spoilers) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 6, 2016, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919 "2016-11-06T23:39:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Edward\_The\_Head](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ce73a5/32.png) [@Edward\_The\_Head](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Edward_The_Head)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/21 "2016-11-07T16:54:02Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > I don’t think it’s a spoiler, but from what I read about Negan’s background in the comic, rape and sexual assault is a big “no no”. Well, there’s always some good in everyone then huh? There were way too many commercials in this one. There were a couple of times when there was 3-4 minutes of show and 4-5 of commercials. If it wasn’t for a DVR I couldn’t watch this show. ---
**Author:** ![stosh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e95f7d/32.png) [@stosh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stosh)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/22 "2016-11-07T17:00:17Z")
Did you notice that " the walking dead" are no more than a minor nuisance now. That’s what they were from the beginning, except for Rick and his bunch. ---
**Author:** ![stosh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e95f7d/32.png) [@stosh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stosh)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/23 "2016-11-07T17:46:44Z")
This idiot Dwight pulls up on the motorcycle and instead of driving through the “walking dead” or driving around them, he pushes the bike, in slow motion, through them and then he stops and lets one fall on him. Anyone this stupid should join Ricks group right away. ---
**Author:** ![gytalf2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ac91a4/32.png) [@gytalf2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gytalf2000)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/24 "2016-11-07T18:01:27Z")
> [@stosh](#): > > Did you notice that " the walking dead" are no more than a minor nuisance now. That’s what they were from the beginning, except for Rick and his bunch. Yeah, at this point, anyone who has survived for this long (except for the sheltered Alexandrians), knows how to handle a few zombies. If it isn’t a huge horde of them coming at you, if you just keep your head, you can deal with them fairly easily. ---
**Author:** ![Superdude](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superdude/32/13450_2.png) [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/25 "2016-11-07T18:03:11Z")
> [@El\_Kabong](#): > > \Just for one thing, Negan is such an unrelenting asshole that he almost certainly would have been offed by his own people long ago. I’m sorry, you can twirl all the barbed-wire-wrapped baseball bats you like, but a scoped deer rifle at a couple hundred yards wins every time.\ You would think that, but you’d also have thought that about Chairman Mao, or Pol Pot, or Idi Amin, or any other dictator. ---
**Author:** ![Terry\_the\_Tramp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/838e76/32.png) [@Terry\_the\_Tramp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terry_the_Tramp)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/26 "2016-11-07T18:21:51Z")
I hope there’s a scene this season in which we find out that Lucille literally talks to Negan and orders him around. It would fit Negan perfectly: he’s so deranged that he hallucinates Lucille communicating with him and is not joking when he says that she’s a stickler for the rules. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/27 "2016-11-07T18:26:21Z")
So are all of Negan’s minions brainwashed? Or do the just know where their rations are coming from? The runaway seems to have been one of the latter, until he couldn’t take it anymore. OTOH, Negan is trying to ‘break’/brainwash Daryl. How many of the Saviours consciously or unconsciously hate their situation, and how many are True Believers? Ruthless dictatorship though it is, it seems to work well enough. For the most part, people seemed satisfied. (‘Bread and circuses’, I guess.) Dwight took some ‘convincing’, but we found out why. (I guessed from the preview on _The Talking Dead_ last week that he may be doing some soul-searching.) These don’t seem to be Reavers, but normal people operating within the bounds of their society. It seems that if you don’t break the law (e.g., don’t steal) and do your ‘civic duty’ (whatever is asked of you) you’re going to do OK. And it looks like they have a big enough population that they could become at least nominally self-sufficient, trading with other communities for things they need. Raiding is easier though, and self-sufficiency isn’t going to happen until Negan is gone. I didn’t quite get the ‘points’ system. (Mrs. L.A. sometimes talks during shows.) Is it that you perform tasks in exchange for ‘points’, and then use the points to purchase the things you need? Sounds like living paycheck-to-paycheck. What’s the other system they use? ---
**Author:** ![E-DUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/e-dub/32/403_2.png) [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/28 "2016-11-07T18:28:33Z")
Let this be a message to would-be musicians. Work hard, practice daily and someday your music could be used to torture people. ---
**Author:** ![Superdude](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superdude/32/13450_2.png) [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/29 "2016-11-07T18:30:37Z")
Rick Astley knew that already. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/30 "2016-11-07T18:37:46Z")
> [@El\_Kabong](#): > > Just for one thing, Negan is such an unrelenting asshole that he almost certainly would have been offed by his own people long ago. I’m sorry, you can twirl all the barbed-wire-wrapped baseball bats you like, but a scoped deer rifle at a couple hundred yards wins every time. . So is Donald Trump. Look how many people follow him. First of all, a significant number of people are with Negan for the same reason people followed The Governor or Rick Grimes for that matter. Because his leadership allowed them to actually survive in their new world. Because of that, they are willing to overlook the occasional erratic behavior or atrocity. Many of them probably see themselves as the “good guys”. Second, much like Trump or any other strongman or dictator, there are always people who are attracted to those sort of leaders. Basically other “unrelenting assholes” who get off on the power of having someone legitimize their assholeish behavior. Once you have someone like that in a position of power, surrounded by a core group of loyal supporters and a larger extended group of hanger-ons, sycophants and general dependents, it becomes very difficult to remove them. You don’t know who to trust and very few people are willing to give their lives to be a “lone gunman” taking out a dictator. > [@stosh](#): > > Did you notice that " the walking dead" are no more than a minor nuisance now. That’s what they were from the beginning, except for Rick and his bunch. Generally, mindless, slow moving, easily distracted walking corpses would be nothing more than a nuisance. Until there are a hundred thousand of them. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/31 "2016-11-07T18:45:45Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > Ruthless dictatorship though it is, it seems to work well enough. For the most part, people seemed satisfied. (‘Bread and circuses’, I guess.) Dwight took some ‘convincing’, but we found out why. (I guessed from the preview on _The Talking Dead_ last week that he may be doing some soul-searching.) These don’t seem to be Reavers, but normal people operating within the bounds of their society. It seems that if you don’t break the law (e.g., don’t steal) and do your ‘civic duty’ (whatever is asked of you) you’re going to do OK. And it looks like they have a big enough population that they could become at least nominally self-sufficient, trading with other communities for things they need. Raiding is easier though, and self-sufficiency isn’t going to happen until Negan is gone. Exactly. They aren’t “raiding” though. Raiders, come in, grab whatever they can, then leave (possibly destroying anything they didn’t take). Negan basically creates vassal states of the other communities where they routinely pay a set “homage” or tax. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/32 "2016-11-07T19:07:31Z")
> [@Edward\_The\_Head](#): > > There were way too many commercials in this one. There were a couple of times when there was 3-4 minutes of show and 4-5 of commercials. If it wasn’t for a DVR I couldn’t watch this show. I normally don’t watch live, but I did last night and damn if it didn’t seem like there was a commercial every 5 minutes! D was pushing the bike because the wheel was fucked up. That was shown pretty clearly. ---
**Author:** ![stosh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e95f7d/32.png) [@stosh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stosh)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/33 "2016-11-07T19:17:46Z")
Dwight rode up on the bike and the front wheel was fine, then got off and pushed it through the " walking dead". ---
**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/34 "2016-11-07T19:29:58Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > I didn’t quite get the ‘points’ system. (Mrs. L.A. sometimes talks during shows.) Is it that you perform tasks in exchange for ‘points’, and then use the points to purchase the things you need? Sounds like living paycheck-to-paycheck. What’s the other system they use? The way Negan explained it to Daryl was 1)work for me and get anything you want 2) work for points, which will make you wish you were dead 3)death and work for me as part of our defensive zombie screen. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/35 "2016-11-07T20:20:12Z")
> [@DigitalC](#): > > 3)death and work for me as part of our defensive zombie screen. I can see that being used against them. Just before the place burns down. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/36 "2016-11-07T20:23:19Z")
> [@DigitalC](#): > > 1. work for points, which will make you wish you were dead OK, I did hear that. Why would they wish they were dead? Why would they be abused if they’re doing a job and accepting ‘points’ as payment? ---
**Author:** ![El\_Kabong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/el_kabong/32/496_2.png) [@El\_Kabong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Kabong)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/37 "2016-11-07T20:45:21Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > So is Donald Trump. Look how many people follow him. Point taken, although at this time we’re pretty sure Mr. Trump hasn’t bashed anyone’s head in with a baseball bat. So far as we know. ---
**Author:** ![voltaire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voltaire/32/313_2.png) [@voltaire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/voltaire)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/38 "2016-11-07T20:47:31Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > OK, I did hear that. > > Why would they wish they were dead? Why would they be abused if they’re doing a job and accepting ‘points’ as payment? I wasn’t clear on what exactly “points” meant either, but it’s possible he means points as in percentage, and it seems his favorite percentage is 50%. So, if he means giving up half of everything you manage to scrounge or produce to him, that would probably make you wish you were dead in such a resource-limited world. ---
**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/39 "2016-11-07T20:48:50Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > OK, I did hear that. > > Why would they wish they were dead? Why would they be abused if they’re doing a job and accepting ‘points’ as payment? Well Dwight’s friend literally chose death than going back to that. I assume it’s basically slave labor with barely enough “points” to get by. The reason it works is the people in group 1, if it was just Negan he would’ve been killed long ago. ---
**Author:** ![gytalf2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ac91a4/32.png) [@gytalf2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gytalf2000)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2016, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919/40 "2016-11-07T20:56:18Z")
> [@Terry\_the\_Tramp](#): > > I hope there’s a scene this season in which we find out that Lucille literally talks to Negan and orders him around. It would fit Negan perfectly: he’s so deranged that he hallucinates Lucille communicating with him and is not joking when he says that she’s a stickler for the rules. I actually like this idea. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-7-03-the-cell-open-spoilers/770919.md?page=3)