The Walking Dead Season 3, Episode 312: Clear

     Sometimes I think that every single person on this show has lost their minds. A solo backpacker pleads for your help, you ignore him not once, but TWICE, and then at the end when you find his nasty, zombie-gnawed corpse you stop and snag his backpack?!? Unprecedented. These people are COLD! I fully get that no one needs another mouth to feed. And I get that half the time when you meet strangers in the Z.A. that they are absolutely nuts, but WHAT I ask you is the purpose of trying to get more guns when you don't have enough people to use them? That's twice now that Rick & Co. have rejected seemingly nice people asking for help and both times bad things happened. We've got Tyreese and Sasha now adding their head count to Woodbury and who knows, maybe lone backpacker guy was a doctor, or a farmer, or a mechanic - take you pick! At some point humanity is going to have to go back to the 60's and try to come together hand in hand. At the end of the day when a human being gets killed that's one less person alive in a very sparsely populated world and that, my friends is a tragedy.
    I like these episodes where you get to focus on a small story with just a few of the main characters. A few big things fell into place in this one: They found Morgan, and Michonne is now part of the group.
   Poor Morgan. This dude has had all the mental anguish that Rick has had without a group to keep his head together (not that Rick's head is all that together but you know...) He HAS however made a contribution to Z.A. life that should be nominated for the Nobel prize: The mouse-cage on a skateboard Zombie distraction device. Brilliant!! And so useful! The applications of this new technology boggles the mind. Need to loot a Grocery store? Mouse on a skateboard in to one corner while you head in the opposite direction. AWEEEESOME! I think that Morgan will eventually join up with the group. It will take some time but he'll get there.
   Carl is amazing. I had a long plane ride last week and I re-watched the last 3 episodes of season one. I was struck by 2 things: 1.) how much Carl has matured on the show. It's not just his size or his grubbiness... his first season character just exudes innocence and a child-like aura. He's now dirty and battle-scared, but it's the look on his face that says it all. He's an adult in a smaller body. He has seen the death or loss of every other child on Earth that he knows about except for the baby and if the take home message is "grow up fast or die", then he's gotten it. I love his independance, the struggle Rick goes through each time Carl wants to do something alone totally resonates with me as a parent, but Carl really seems like a capable member of the group.
    Michonne is great in this episode and scores the quote of the week:
Rick: "We're eating his food now?"
Michonne: "The sign said 'welcome'".
She has a lot of heart and wants to be an accepted group member but knows that begging for it gets you nowhere and actions speak louder that words. I love the way she manages Carl. She doesn't speak down to him but treats him like an equal.
   It was a very interesting episode. And I liked everything that happened and thought the 3 main characters made pretty good decisions. EXCEPT for blowing off the backpacker. That was totally bogus....


P.S. I forgot that Lennie James, the actor that plays Morgan is also British. That brings the Brit actor tally up to 4 now. We've got Rick, Morgan, Maggie and the Governor. What's the deal? Can we not FIND good old American actors?!? You don't see us goin' over there and trying to add ourselves to the cast of Downtown Abbey. I mean REALLY.