The Walking Dead – ‘Mercy’

Well, it’s back. The Walking Dead has returned for the premier of its eighth season. Not only that, but the episode, ‘Mercy’, also doubles as the show’s 100^th episode. So as you can imagine, it has a lot going on, meaning I’m going to get on with reviewing the episode.

First of all, a quick summary of the episode’s premise. As with most important Walking Dead episodes, we open with a slightly weird montage that leaves us a bit confused for the rest of the episode. This time we have Rick (Andrew Lincoln), Maggie and King Ezekiel delivering a speech to rally the troops before they launch one final assault on Negan, while Rick also idealises/we flash-forward to the ‘Old Man Rick’ who featured during the marketing material. While fans of the comic books have had their own theories about what this aged-up Andrew Lincoln could mean for the show, we still don’t really know, with the no significant evidence towards whether it’s a dream or a genuine flash-forward.

Slightly unusual for Walking Dead, this episode only really has one plot, and showcases all the cast at once. I really hope that this continues throughout Season Eight, with the single character episodes that featured prominently during Season Seven slowing down the pace of the show and wasting the extended run time the episodes are often given.

 The call backs to the show’s past do ultimately remind me that the show just isn’t as good as it used to be

While the device of slowly unveiling the protagonist’s plan as the episode develops is far from original, it is used effectively here. Writer and showrunner Scott Gimple sets up the right teases in the right time to clue the audience into what is happening, allowing us to make our own predictions as we watch the episode unfold. However, the actual plan itself is, once again, unoriginal, and not exactly difficult to predict. While I far from expect the show to reinvent the wheel, it would be good if Gimple could redesign it a little bit.

Unfortunately the episode’s major drawback is, once again, the big-bad himself. Despite being introduced 18 episodes ago, Negan still remains an immensely cartoonish villain, with no depth or motivation given to his character. I can understand the writer’s wanting to keep Negan a relatively mysterious character to add to his enigma, and while this could work in a movie, it just doesn’t on television, a medium that allows a deeper exploration of villains (i.e. Fisk and Kilgrave in Daredevil and Jessica Jones). The only saving grace for the character remains Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s performance. But even Morgan can’t save the poor writing of the character all the time, particularly when he asks Father Gabriel if he’s wearing his shitting pants, because he’s ‘about to shit (his) pants’.

Gone are the days when a small group of zombies walking into camp results in devastating losses and drastic measures

Right, let’s get to the real talk. As mentioned, this is the show’s 100^th episode, and this is handled, on the whole, pretty well. The most effective aspect of this are the call backs to previous moments. The best of these call backs is the scene after the opening titles, with Carl walking around the gas station, recreating the very first scene of the series, but replacing Rick with Carl. This call back would have been even more effective if it opened the episode, and considering its relative lack of narrative importance, this does feel like a missed opportunity, but remains effective none-the-less. So, while the writers didn’t decide to celebrate the show’s 100^th episode in the same way other shows might do (for example, Arrow brought back major cast-members that had left the show for its 100^th episode), it still celebrates it, just in its own way.

I am going to finish this review with one final, small, niggle. The call backs to the show’s past, in particular its first episode, do ultimately remind me that the show just isn’t as good as it used to be. The move away from the walkers to focus on the human conflict, while interesting, has gone too far. The Walker’s no longer feel like a threat at all, to the extent that you don’t actually worry that Gabriel is going to get killed by the GIANT HOARD OF ZOMBIES. Gone are the days when a small group of zombies walking into camp results in devastating losses and drastic measures. It’s a shame, because the show has been able to deal with the balance between human and zombie conflict well in the past (the early Governor-era). But as I said, this is only a minor niggle, and the show remains, on the whole, a good watch.

The Walking Dead is back, and so far a serious improvement over Season Seven, though the Negan-in-the-room still remains – 4/5 stars.