Watching Dead - Walking Dead Podcast

Jim and A.Ron say goodbye once again to AMC's The Walking Dead, but first, we have some things to get off our chest and a ton of feedback from our fellow fans to share. What lane does the Dead need to stay in? How long can it last? How big a star is Andrew Lincoln, anyway? Will the War with Negan last 8 episodes, or 16? Just how many episodes of Trash People backstory will we be inflicted with? Should Gimple and company just let Heath go? All this and more will be discussed!

by The Walking Dead's season 7 finale, "The First Day of the Rest of Your Life". Well staged action and CGI stunt tigers get the pulse pounding, but it's not long before well worn bad habits start to get in the way; a convoluted plot by Negan to once again impress upon Rick that resistance is futile, literal Garbage People, and Sasha's "I'll save you from the situation I helped create" heroics, all these unfortunately mire the proceedings. But that's not our last work on the subject. We'll be back later this week to wrap up the season, so get your email in before Thursday if you want to be heard!

A decent episode of AMC's The Walking Dead nevertheless provokes a bunch of questions regarding "Something They Need".  Is Rick's group really justified in their "take no prisoners, take all guns" approach with Seaside?  Has Eugene really turned turncoat?  Is Gregory Negan's "little bird"?  Why can't Grandma McGee pull a gun on somebody proper like?  And does Rick know that a man is at his most dangerous when he's on his knees?  Dwight knows.  He's been to the School of Eugene's Nut Cracker, and shouldn't be taken lightly when he's at crotch level.  Be careful, Rick, is all we're saying.

Jim and A.Ron watched the latest episode of AMC's The Walking Dead, "The Other Side", and then immediately crawled through a wood pile and launched an assault on the episode. First we tried sniping, but then we went in for a frontal assault. I promised to watch Jim's back, and then betrayed him to his chagrin at the end. As always, Eugene, excuse me, Chief Engineer Dr. Eugene, was useless. Listen in for all this, some feedback, and yours truly holding court in the Spoiler Section!

Jim and A.Ron agree that AMC's The Walking Dead delivered an entertaining episode with "Bury Me Here", but maybe not for the reason we were supposed to. Hilariously bad premises, unbelievable payoffs to trivial moments, characters getting massive backstory dumps before being unceremoniously bumped off... it's a pretty full "Bad Walking Dead Bingo" card. But hey, an end to the era of rampant Morgalizing, so that's something!

Jim and A.Ron are reasonably pleased with the latest episode of AMC's The Walking Dead, "Say Yes". After many long years, TWD finally found a way to have a philosophical argument about "why we fight" and "what' it's like out there" and "this is the way the world works" that doesn't actually involve any of those words, and inserts a few new ones, "hope" and "future". The fact that it goes down between Rick and Michonne, characters with chemistry that we actually care about, makes it that much sweeter. But then there's some dodgy action, and that whole mess with Rosita, and literal garbage people, and you know? Our feelings are complicated.

Jim and A.Ron point and laugh at poor Eugene in the latest episode of AMC's The Walking Dead, "Hostiles and Calamities". Eugene fails at lobster, succeeds at Yar's Revenge, blows up some balloons, puts on a wiz bang science show, and ultimate turns into the bad guy? Yeah right, we'll believe it when we see it. Meanwhile, Dwight reaches the sad boring conclusion of the Dwight/Sherry saga that began way back in episode 606, "Always Accountable". Also, A.Ron vents his spleen about Eugene's direction in the Spoiler Section tucked safely away at the very end of the show.

Jim and A.Ron slog through a mess of a Star Trek: The Next Generation inspired episode of AMC's The Walking Dead, as Rick negotiates a complicated treaty with the Romulan sub-commander of a garbage world. There's some good stuff too; some emotional punch with Daryl and Carol, some nuanced Morgalizing from Morgan, and a "have to see it to believe it" Mad Max / Lord of the Rings inspired zombie pit fight sequence. Maybe that's how TWD is going to roll going forward, pilfering from better sci-fi/fantasty tales? If so, I'm really looking forward to Battle of the Blackwater, or ooh, maybe the Red Weddding episodes!

Jim and A.Ron are back to further chronicle the legendary journeys of one Rick Grimes and his merry band of post apocalyptic crazies. This week, we consider "A Rock in the Road", which we found to be an amazing episode in terms of epic clothes lines, and considerably less so when judging by its titular morality tale. Speaking of morality, there is some rampant Morgalizing in this episode. But we get just the right amount of Negan. All this plus explosions and fan feedback!

The first half of season 7 wasn't exactly what we hoped for but it should have been what we expected. We dip into the feedbag one more time for the year to consider what we've seen and what's to come. We'll be back in February in some capacity so until then, enjoy your holiday and have a great 2017!