stretch

And who would Chuck be without Jimmy? That's the thing about dysfunctional relationships - each person's brokenness feeds off the others'. Is Slippin' Jimmy a self-sabotaging fuck up because Chuck keeps him that way, or is Chuck a neurotic control freak because Jimmy's disregard for the rules made him that way? A little from column A and a little from column B, most likely.

Bolded mine. It occured to me while watching that the fact that Kevin cut his palm was probably not an accident. I see that playing into it somehow. His palm print doesn't match now because of the cut? That doesn't really make sense, but it can't have been an accident that he was cut there, of all places.

I feel like I want to quote all of stillshimpy's posts and just add an emphatic, "YES". I'm enjoying this show so very much, and it pains me to see/hear that people are frustrated or not getting it. Believe me, I understand post-traumatic-LOST-syndrome, but, as was said upthread, that was a (mostly) matter of the writers getting tied in knots by the network and the framework of network tv. Sometimes you just need to let art wash over you. Episode thoughts: 1. The Get Well card was a clue to the well, but also literal: Kevin was dead, and he needed to take care of Patti in order to "get well". 2. The security guard's "Congratulations" during Kevin's pat down made me laugh out loud. 3. The bird bit also had many layers. Birds are a common part of afterlife/underworld myths, and are often depicted as guides to the afterlife.

My lasting takeaway from this episode was that after one episode I liked Eastman better than I like all of CDB and the Alexandrians. Also, hat tip to whoever said Schrödinger's Glenn above - I'm still giggling over that one.

Good catch. One of the screenshots posted on page 7 or 8 shows cinderblock walls on three sides of it that seem to have disappeared too.

As they ran down the alley the camera panned past a fire escape. "Oh," I thought to myself, "they'll run right up those stairs and everything will be fine." Silly me, I forgot the level of bad, lazy, stupid, inconsistent writing we're still dealing with AFTER SIX SEASONS.

That's all true, but I took his motivation to be "make mom think I'm okay so she'll get off my back", which is also typical addict behavior.

Yes, except I think the reason Nick was pulled because detoxing junkies have an inconvenient way of dying on you (or finding a stash and overdosing and then dying) and they were probably afraid that Muscle Car Guy was either a suicide risk or that he'd flip out and kill others before killing himself. What they know right now is that death = zombies, so their action plan is to remove immediate threats. Edit: ninja'ed by ghoulina

That's not a character, that's an extra. In my mind, it doesn't matter if the casting of Cal, Matt and the principal was just a coincidence. They've gotten enough heat for "one black man out, one black man in" on TWD, that someone should have paused and said, "Hey, you know what - we need to use one of these guys in a different role instead of one of the first three people killed."

I had no problem buying the fact that a junkie would put on a woman's sweater, but motivation behind that particular sweater was eye rollingly obvious. They were allllll about the church symbolism, and the opening scene where we saw Nick at the balcony, artfully lit, with arms outstretched and the flowing white "wings" of the sweater hanging just so was definitely a falling anvil.

No, as said above, the walker bits were left after the walkers came through the open gate. The gate was open because FPP halfheartedly gave it a push toward "closed" and walked away without noticing that it had bounced back open. It's a heavy slidey door without an automatic latch, so the momentum caused it to bounce back. Any normal person living in a zombie apocalypse would pull it shut and manually latch it, but then we wouldn't have a story, I suppose.

I thought the same thing last night and it irritated the hell out of me. Carol is one of the few characters who has been fleshed out, and they're taking huge leaps toward making her a caricature suddently. Bleah.

I understand the rage at Glenn and Maggie's decisions to let Dickolas and FPP live, believe me, I do. However, it's interesting that both men had complete emotional breakdowns and broke through their respective defensive emotional walls. That likely played a big part in Glenn and Maggie's choice and it might be the mens' saving grace. We'll see if it sticks, and they can rebuild themselves as part of the "family".

And why he's so eager to continue doing them, even though he sucks at it.

Yes, hence the Mister's need for a still. ;)

YES. The withholding of key information when logically this group should be holding meetings, sharing ALL the information about the outside (as someone said upthread) and figuring out how to find the happy place between la la land and "kill everyone all the time" is supremely frustrating. I don't want to feel like I'm watching Three's Company. I don't buy that there's no show if everyone shares information. There would still be conflict, still be room for character building etc. if both groups talked. Hell, CDB should be holding walker kill classes and Deana could figure out a way to put an effective "government" in place with their help.

I was so irrationally annoyed at that damn balloon and the utter stupidity of it, that it took me completely out of the episode. It became a symbol of the stupid, inconsistent writing on this show for me and I think the only reason I'm watching anymore is because I know what I want the show to be, and I keep hoping vainly that it'll become that. The occasional flashes of it keep me sucked in, I guess. Balloon aside, the whole episode felt disjointed and confusing. I understood everything that was happening, but none of it made any sense from a character or story standpoint. And I'm with everyone above - they need to stop trying to do romance, because they are beyond terrible at it. Sorry, Coral, I just don't care about you and Enid (what kind of name is Enid for a young girl, anyway) and obviously, the Rick/Jessie storyline is a complete fail on every level. Oh God, I'm so bitter.

I saw somewhere (can't remember where, originally) that the episode titles are a callback to Dale's Faulkner quote in season 1: "I like what the father said to the son when he gave him a watch that had been handed down through generations. He said: ‘I give you a mausoleum of all hope and desire which will fit your individual needs, no better than it did mine and my father before me. I give it to you not that you may remember time, but that you may forget it. For a moment, now and then, and not spend all of your breath trying to conquer it.’”

Mmm hmmm, sounds just like a politician. Good call. I can't tell if Maggie is desperately trying to grab some "normal", or if she's quietly watching and waiting like a less psycho version of Carol. She's been really subdued and off the last couple of episodes...the little we've seen of her, anyway.

They don't have eggs (find some chickens, dumbasses), so the conceit behind him trailing a stranger through the dark was that it had been forever since anyone had cookies, because no one knew that you could use applesauce as an egg substitute. The kid was jonesing for cookies, apparently.

I was certain that Rick was going to get roofied at that party. Their insistence that he drink seemed odd, and then Peter (who is definitely giving off abusive/controlling vibes) taking Rick's glass to be refilled and curtly shutting Jessie down when she offered to do it contributed to the vaguely threatening air of the whole party. Of course, that's probably just the writers being...well, the writers.

I can't believe Survivor is the show that's drawn me out of lurkerdom, but, here we are. I'm afraid Mike's going to have to go soon, because I dissolve into screeching, hysterical laughter every time he opens his mouth. Dude sounds *exactly* like a Muppet. We kept saying, "That can't be real. That can't be real." every time he spoke. Creepy Coconuts is not the quirky, fun weirdo they were hoping for. That guy set off my alarm bells immediately. That's a level 10 stalker freak, right there and I'm soooo uncomfortable watching him.