# "The Walking Dead"; Episode 4:1 tonight **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 13, 2013, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138 "2013-10-13T14:37:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/81 "2013-10-15T13:13:22Z")
> [@brewha](#): > > I gotta work on my suspension of disbelief. We are watching a zombie show, afterall. I know what ya mean. I keep thinking, “How can something keep moving with out any energy input?”. You have these human sized things, that keep moving with out somehow ever burning calories. Unless the zombies have been somehow eating people every few days, they should all be starved to nothing by now. They can’t open cans or cook, much less catch any wildlife. Even a zombie can’t expend energy with out consuming calories. That’s the biggest thing you have to just pretend isn’t happening. ---
**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:** [October 15, 2013, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/82 "2013-10-15T13:41:13Z")
This was a nice episode. I’m OK with only a little action, as I can see they are setting up the chess pieces. My only complaint is that the Away Team was just sooooo sloooooow at collecting stuff. I’d be whipping through there as fast as I could go. And at the first sign of Walkers, get the hell out!!! They always seem to be running in circles. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/83 "2013-10-15T15:09:12Z")
Also, the show scored an insane [16.1 million viewers](http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/the-walking-dead-returns-to-record-16-million-viewers) for the premiere. It seems poised to break its own record for ratings for a scripted basic cable series. ---
**Author:** ![Rushgeekgirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rushgeekgirl/32/3715_2.png) [@Rushgeekgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rushgeekgirl)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/84 "2013-10-15T15:19:54Z")
There sure was a big focus on Daryl slowly licking his fingers before shaking the kid’s hand. The handshake scene seemed off anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/85 "2013-10-15T15:30:30Z")
I have to say that 4.1 was one of the best, most promising episodes in the last two years. Unless the seeds are allowed to sprout and die uncontrolled, this could be a very good season. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/86 "2013-10-15T15:39:08Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > I have to say that 4.1 was one of the best, most promising episodes in the last two years. Unless the seeds are allowed to sprout and die uncontrolled, this could be a very good season. That’s how they get you. This show follows the _Lost_ template of strong premieres, tolerable finales, and a long, dreary, meandering, unsatisfying middle. It’s quite good at laying pipe: _x amount of time has passed, and this is what our band of survivors has become, and here are the problems they’ll be facing._ It’s awful at payoffs. ---
**Author:** ![Trion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@Trion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trion)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/87 "2013-10-15T15:39:22Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > Sick boy was played by Vincent Martella, the voice of Phineas … Ferb, I know what we’re gonna do today! ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/88 "2013-10-15T15:49:30Z")
> [@Quimby](#): > > Unless you are the person in the car. Well, when the driver has slowly led the horde a few miles down the road, he hits the gas and leaves them behind. Frankly, there are many many simple strategies being overlooked. Heck, every time they find an abandoned vehicle, they should be salvaging as much gasoline or diesel from it as possible to fill and seal lots and lots of jerry-cans. Then they could find a car dealership with hundreds of identical vehicles from one manufacturer (which will make long-term maintenance much easier)… Any big truck they can find, they should just drive along the outside of the fence, squishing walkers with it until it runs out of fuel, then deflate the tires so it sits on its rims and forms a partial barricade. Do this often enough, and the prison will be surrounded by a solid wall of bumper-to-bumper vehicles instead of a flimsy chain-link fence. Maybe the line of trucks is about twenty feet from the fence, and between the trucks and the fence is a trench, as earlier suggested, filled with sharpened spikes. Given the resources at hand, the flimsiness of their defenses is downright idiotic. Of course for dramatic purposes they kinda have to be… As for store raids, I’d organize the effort better rather than waste time searching. “Okay, we’re all sticking together and checking the first row of the store for anything useful, with sentries posted at each end. We’ll move as a group and haul anything useful to the truck until the first row is picked clean. The codeword for “Position being overrun” is “Fireball”. If you hear someone say “fireball”, repeat it out loud and immediately evacuate. If we clear the first row without a fireball, proceed to the second. We’ll do at most two rows before regrouping back at the vehicles to compare notes. I want as little talking and noise in the store as possible.” Thus the store get systematically checked and emptied (with notes taken for future raids for items that are not immediately useful but may be in future) without people wandering off on their own like zombie-snack-idiots. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/89 "2013-10-15T16:08:27Z")
> [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > Frankly, there are many many simple strategies being overlooked. This relates to a major flaw with the story the show is trying to tell. The theme of persisting, (or not) in the face of futility, depends on the audience buying into the futility. The show has to write and execute scenes that illustrate the themes: young lovestruck teen gets senselessly killed by zombies, and his girlfriend is sufficiently desensitized to shrug off the death, for example. _But_, if the audience doesn’t believe that things are all that bad, then the theme falls flat. I always find myself asking “Why do they keep wearing clothing that can be bitten through?”, and similar questions. Because mindless zombies wouldn’t actually be all that threatening to humans as a species, the show must have the survivors make poor decisions to make them threatening. The end result isn’t horror at a bleak, nihilistic world where everyone has one foot in the grave and there are no ideals beyond surviving another day, it’s irritation that everyone is so stupid and unambitious. Even in the hands of better writers and producers, this flaw would hamstring the show. But, 16 million people watch it anyway, so they must be getting something out of it. ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/90 "2013-10-15T16:20:24Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > _But_, if the audience doesn’t believe that things are all that bad, then the theme falls flat. An insight which can be applied to almost everything (except comedies of course). Nobody wants to watch a zombie/horror TV show where everything goes well, because it is boring. People want drama, not intelligent or sensible crap that educates and informs. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/91 "2013-10-15T16:21:38Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > That’s how they get you. Well, I stared at the Vudu pricing last night and basically said “Fuck you very much” at $42 for the season in HD - that’s more than a season of Mad Men and both halves of Breaking Bad’s last season, and for a very marginal show, no matter how popular it is. I don’t much like watching shows in SD (too soft, on a 55-inch screen) but I finally chose the episode in SD at $2 and it was okay. I will keep buying individual eps as long as they’re worth it. If I do the whole season that way it’s only a few percent more than paying for it in one lump. ---
**Author:** ![Labtrash](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/labtrash/32/528_2.png) [@Labtrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labtrash)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/92 "2013-10-15T16:27:14Z")
> [@Trion](#): > > Ferb, I know what we’re gonna do today! Or NOT do (live) ! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/93 "2013-10-15T16:54:52Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > An insight which can be applied to almost everything (except comedies of course). Nobody wants to watch a zombie/horror TV show where everything goes well, because it is boring. People want drama, not intelligent or sensible crap that educates and informs. I dunno… people watched _MacGuyver_ to see the clever strategies he employed. I don’t think it’s too much to ask that we see some anti-zombie cleverness. Heck, there was that black guy who surrounded his place with baited spikes. That was clever, and he seemed to be doing okay (if slowly going insane) until Rick appeared and fucked everything up. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/94 "2013-10-15T17:44:25Z")
Im hoping for a road trip season, the prison is boring. From previews, it seems they do get chased out eventually, i hope its early in the season. ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/95 "2013-10-15T17:53:12Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > I don’t think it’s too much to ask that we see some anti-zombie cleverness. Oh I agree 100%. I spend half the time while watching thinking of how much better I could deal with things. For one thing, I would use fire. And lots of it. Them zombies on the fence would be a burning. And there wouldn’t be a tree or shrub for ten miles outside that prison fence. Burn the woods, burn the zombies. Burn em all. But it’s a TV show, a fantasy, I have to suspend disbelief enough to enjoy it, or else. ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/96 "2013-10-15T17:54:58Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Heck, there was that black guy who surrounded his place with baited spikes. . Have you watched the first episode? The pilot? You would enjoy it. And also know who “that black guy” is. And understand how emotional that episode was. ---
**Author:** ![gytalf2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ac91a4/32.png) [@gytalf2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gytalf2000)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/97 "2013-10-15T18:13:11Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > I dunno… people watched _MacGuyver_ to see the clever strategies he employed. I don’t think it’s too much to ask that we see some anti-zombie cleverness. Heck, there was that black guy who surrounded his place with baited spikes. That was clever, and he seemed to be doing okay (if slowly going insane) until Rick appeared and fucked everything up. Yes, his anti-zombie devices were impressive. Smart man! Didn’t that episode imply that he had been killing people and taking their weapons, or am I not remembering correctly? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/98 "2013-10-15T18:13:17Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > Have you watched the first episode? The pilot? You would enjoy it. And also know who “that black guy” is. And understand how emotional that episode was. Yeah, I’ve been watching this show from the start. I know who the black guy was, and who his son was, I just don’t remember their names. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/99 "2013-10-15T18:19:06Z")
> [@gytalf2000](#): > > Yes, his anti-zombie devices were impressive. Smart man! > > Didn’t that episode imply that he had been killing people and taking their weapons, or am I not remembering correctly? I think he had a _lot_ of weapons, like a truly ridiculous amount, but I don’t remember where he got them (the original police station where Rick worked and this guy visited had an armory that could easily be raided). Actually, accumulating firearms wouldn’t be that difficult at all. Gathering a stable group and training them how and when to use their weapons (including when not to use firearms when cutting or blunt objects will do) would be tricky. Heh, the more I think about it, the more ideas come to mind about how to secure the prison. In addition to layers of passive defenses, put out signs that say “Heavily armed humans within. Pull this chain to ring bell within prison if you are also human.” ---
**Author:** ![Glazer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a88e57/32.png) [@Glazer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Glazer)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2013, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138/100 "2013-10-15T18:22:21Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > Oh I agree 100%. I spend half the time while watching thinking of how much better I could deal with things. And there you find the attraction. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-walking-dead-episode-4-1-tonight/671138.md?page=6)