S07.E16: Gone

[nodorothyparker]

Streaming on AMC+. As always, proceed at your risk for spoilers before the airdate.

Airdate 06.05.22

Quote

Morgan finds a new ally who turns out to be more trouble than he bargained for.

[heisenberg]

[heisenberg]

I do have a question. 

Is the boat (Coast guard?) that we see at the end the same that Rick and Michonne went for their vacations, before abandonning their child?🤔

[kevvoi]

I don't know how it could be - Morgan appears to be somewhere off the coast of Louisiana now (at least there was a helpful sign that suggested it near the Pediatrician's office that Morgan and Madison both visited), while the boat Rick and Michonne visited was off the coast of Virginia. At this point in the apocalypse, the Padre people would have to have some serious resources to make enough fuel for the boat to get it all the way around Florida and into the Gulf.

[OoohMaggie]

The ‘phone boat’ if this is the one you mean is a mere tiddler compared to that thing.

 

And yeah……where do they get the fuel oil for that 🤔
 

I’m seeing a crossover with ‘The Last Ship’……….and don’t forget people, it’s my god damned boat.

Edited May 31, 2022 by OoohMaggie

[heisenberg]

5 hours ago, OoohMaggie said:

The ‘phone boat’ if this is the one you mean is a mere tiddler compared to that monster

 

And yeah……where do they get the fuel oil for that 🤔
 

I’m seeing a crossover with ‘The Last Ship’……….and don’t forget people, it’s my god damned boat.

Thanks! 

[heisenberg]

7 hours ago, kevvoi said:

 At this point in the apocalypse, the Padre people would have to have some serious resources to make enough fuel for the boat to get it all the way around Florida and into the Gulf.

That never have been an issue for the writers.   If Morgan, Dwight and wifey could walk 2000 miles in no precise direction and meet up...  Everything is possible, but I get your point!🙂

[kevvoi]

Fair point 🤣 I forgot about Walkerian Economics - there will be plenty of fuel, canned goods (including baby formula!) will still be good 6-7 years later, and items like gas masks are laying around everywhere.

Edited May 31, 2022 by kevvoi

[OoohMaggie]

On 5/31/2022 at 2:34 AM, kevvoi said:

Fair point 🤣 I forgot about Walkerian Economics - there will be plenty of fuel,

Don’t forget ‘The Hilltop Corn Fuel Co’ formed solely to legitimately enable Daryl to ride around on his machine 🙄

[chick binewski]

A. We can't be in suspense if you've already showed us who is wearing the hood and 2. I'm pleased there's no shortage of EPTs in the ZA.

[Mr. Sparkle]

Very telling to me that I watched this last Sunday and had to look here to remind me what happened. 

[econ07]

On 5/30/2022 at 9:34 PM, kevvoi said:

Fair point 🤣 I forgot about Walkerian Economics - there will be plenty of fuel, canned goods (including baby formula!) will still be good 6-7 years later, and items like gas masks are laying around everywhere.

Wait, do we have to add oxygen tanks to the list of things in infinite supply?

[nodorothyparker]

I guess if you're going to insist on bringing back a long supposedly dead character this isn't the worst way to do it, tying her to the mysterious Padre (this show's Terminus) various characters have been going on about looking for all season. But now we have yet another group tapping into the apparently inexhaustible supply of walkie talkies and batteries just laying around for the easy taking in the post ZA, post nuclear world. At least this bunch seems to understand  keeping their communications short and not laying out via the airwaves exactly where they are and what they're up to for anybody to hear. 

Is it bad that upon hearing that the obvious big bads for next season are taking survivors' kids because they can't keep them safe my immediate reaction was that while I know we're supposed to see the big flashing VILLAIN sign they're not completely wrong? Unless you're the original recipe's Judith, kids haven't fared very well long term in this franchise. I mean, way to go show in introducing and then killing off in the space of about 5 minutes people who have had their children stolen from them and making them look both unsympathetic and that maybe a group of shadowy kiddie grabbers is right about their general incompetence in keeping anything alive. 

I don't really have any more feeling about Madison now than I did when she left beyond thinking great, now we can add portable oxygen tanks to the list of things that will now become plot devices. They'll be everywhere in infinite supply until the plot calls for them not to be and the group has to do something ridiculously stupid or dangerous to find one.

[Mr. Sparkle]

12 minutes ago, nodorothyparker said:

I don't really have any more feeling about Madison now than I did when she left beyond thinking great, now we can add portable oxygen tanks to the list of things that will now become plot devices. They'll be everywhere in infinite supply until the plot calls for them not to be and the group has to do something ridiculously stupid or dangerous to find one.

Lol, the time period that Madison can live without the oxygen tanks will vary so frequently depending on plot device. 20 minutes or 3 days, depending on what the story needs. 

This was probably the best episode of the season, which isn't saying much. At least it got away from "save the tower for some reason! It's our only hope, also for reasons!" 

[kevvoi]

I expect Padre's economic plan is "no child labor laws" - get them trained young to fill oxygen tanks.

I suspect O2 tanks are pretty durable - as long as the valve stem doesn't corrode or get broken. Madison would likely just need to know the location of every dive/scuba shop and assisted living facility around the Gulf of Mexico to keep her supply going for a long time (and boy we might have some fun - Madison having to fend off zombie grandmas to get her O2 fix).

But yes, I agree the timing of her need will likely be very plot dependent (Chekhov's air tank!).

[iMonrey]

I don't really see the point in bringing Madison back now that Nick and Alicia are both dead. Moreover, the show has largely ignored a lot of the cast during the back half of this season. And they've gotten into a pattern of introducing a new character (Ava this week) and then more or less revolving the whole episode around that character only to see them die by the end of it. Meanwhile series regulars like Luciana, Sara, Wendell, Grace, June and Daniel sit on the sidelines with nothing to do. I could give two shits about Morgan, I don't know what this show was thinking when they decided to make him the star of it.

Now I realize a lot of these choices are driven by money and they can't afford to pay every cast member for every episode. But maybe instead of bringing back Madison and hiring yet another new actor they could've thrown one or two other regular cast members into the season finale, y'know?

Kudos to those of you who have very wisely avoided watching Talking Dead but it's a real insight into what they seem to think the fans want to see, and how delusional they are about what's actually going on, story-wise. I just don't see any hope that there's ever going to be any kind of course correction because the show runners are too wrapped up in the minutia and tone-deaf to the god-awful ratings.

[Starchild]

I am happy to see Madison back. Only thing that bothered me was all the masks. We're out of the fallout zone and people are still covering their faces? Why? 

The group of people hunting collectors (why are we supposed to dislike them? these are the kind of people our heroes would usually help) all wore hoods for what reason? When they all showed up dead I thought, finally, no more masks. But now all the PADRE people are wearing face coverings. WHHHYYYY???

[Iguessnot]

When Morgan looked at Madison after she killed Ava, I thought he was going to ask her how she got out of that hole lickety split and I thought she would say she had some elevator trick up her sleeve. I really thought that.

[iMonrey]

Quote

I am happy to see Madison back. Only thing that bothered me was all the masks. We're out of the fallout zone and people are still covering their faces? Why? 

So they don't have to pay the actors. That's why. There's no narrative reason they should have to cover their faces; presumably we're meant to think they are disguising their identities from the Padre villains, but there's no logical reason for them to do so. 

I noticed that manual had P.A.D.R.E spelled out like it stood for something. I wonder what it's supposed to be. 

[Iguessnot]

I hated how Morgan wimped out, nearly getting himself eaten over Ava. She was not pregnant, and she was as motivated as the others to retrieve her child, despite warnings from Morgan and Madison.

He felt so guilt ridden, he immediately drafted a plan to use Sherrie as bait. Really? 

[nodorothyparker]

It wouldn't be Morgan if he didn't inconveniently blink or have an attack of I don't know, regret or conscious or something when it comes time to actually make that call. I blame the damn cheesemaker.

[iMonrey]

I also noticed that Morgan didn't mention to Madison who shot Nick. Hopefully Charlie can hang on long enough for Madison to end her. Unfortunately, the way this show is, we'll probably get some sickening death bed forgiveness scene instead. Because we can't have nice things.

[BasilSeal]

On 6/6/2022 at 12:52 PM, nodorothyparker said:

I don't really have any more feeling about Madison now than I did when she left beyond thinking great, now we can add portable oxygen tanks to the list of things that will now become plot devices.

TWD likes to give characters emblematic surgical appliances, for want of a better phrase. a metal arm, a prosthetic arm made out of your old arm, and now we have  someone huffing on an oxygen tank, which is an idea ripped straight from the half life boys in Mad Max fury road, but we'll ignore that for the time being. I guess it's to  signify that  Madison is a dead woman walking, which ties into the idea that she's lost her sense of self and is 'gone', it also tells us that PADRE has a moderately sophisticated level of manufacturing in order to refine oxygen and put it in pressurised tanks for her, it also makes her dependent on them for her continued survival, and so on.

On 6/7/2022 at 2:29 AM, iMonrey said:

Moreover, the show has largely ignored a lot of the cast during the back half of this season. And they've gotten into a pattern of introducing a new character (Ava this week) and then more or less revolving the whole episode around that character only to see them die by the end of it.

They do seem to have developed a pattern of this redshirt of the week trope, it just makes it really obvious what's going to happen.

Madison turns up and appears to have morphed into the child catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, for some reason. PADRE is just another secretive group doing creepy mad shit because, well, you know, because the apocalypse, and we have a finale that's a damp squib with just two of the main characters and no action. It's sad that the show runners have managed to turn this round from being the strongest part of the TWD universe to being a total clusterfuck in the space of a single season.

Fear has built up a large extended ensemble cast of characters who were all largely relevant and served a narrative purpose until this season where they've literally just stood around doing nothing. Half a dozen or more solid character actors have spent the entire season hanging around the set and picking up their cheques just to stand around in the back ground like extras.

What really sinks the series, and sets it apart from all the other walking dead content that's gone before it, which let's be honest has given us plenty to moan about in terms of shit plot lines and terrible acting, is that they can't seem to be bothered to get the zombies right any more.

The one redeeming feature of a shit TWD episode has usually been that there's a decent set piece zombie action sequence in there somewhere that makes watching worthwhile. Yeah the plot is rubbish and the characters inconsistent and the villain's motivation makes no sense but look! over there! Zombies, i mean walkers, how cool is that, eh?

Not only has fear picked up all of traditional TWD's worst habits, it's forgotten how to create good zombie content, which is kind of the whole point of the show.

I can't believe they're making another season of this.

[OoohMaggie]

4 hours ago, BasilSeal said:

Not only has fear picked up all of traditional TWD's worst habits, it's forgotten how to create good zombie content, which is kind of the whole point of the show.

There hasn’t been any good, believable Zombie content for many many years, Zombies just don’t and haven’t posed a credible threat for those many years. Every interaction for a long long while with the undead has been forced, nothing has happened naturally or believably. At the end of the day, the current Walker is no more of a threat to a persons safety than being struck by lightening.
This is why the spin-offs are looking to introduce the ‘advanced’ Walkers, those that can run, show aggression, pretty much what Darrabont envisioned way back when. If little Judith can deal quite happily with the current Zombie offering, there really is only one way they can take it. Whether they will quite match 28 days we’ll have to wait and see, I really hope they do because I’d love to see Maggie having to deal with several of those MF’s 😮

[Iguessnot]

Did Alicia's exit catch the writers by surprise? Maybe that had much better storylines written, but Alicia decided to bow out and everything went asunder. I'm thinking production was about to start and they had to rewrite the whole season at the last minute. I really don't know how else to rationalize the season I just watched. It really had the "Jesus take the wheel" quality. 

[BasilSeal]

14 hours ago, Iguessnot said:

Did Alicia's exit catch the writers by surprise? Maybe that had much better storylines written, but Alicia decided to bow out and everything went asunder. I'm thinking production was about to start and they had to rewrite the whole season at the last minute. I really don't know how else to rationalize the season I just watched. It really had the "Jesus take the wheel" quality. 

I've always been a big defender of this show, it's been the better and most coherent offering  in terms of theme and narrative out of all the TWD shows. not any more though. This season has fallen off a cliff quality wise. maybe they were hampered by constrains imposed by the pandemic? i don't know, but it's poorly written, confused, confusing and incoherent. to add insult to injury, the stream i'm watching has the show runners doing a sort of zoom show and tell at the end where they tell you how great the episode was and how proud they are of it and all the clever things they've done to make it work. it has all the charm of a precocious toddler proudly showing the contents of its potty to it's parents' dinner part guests.

[heisenberg]

On 6/7/2022 at 5:37 PM, iMonrey said:

we'll probably get some sickening death bed forgiveness scene instead.

And it will be strecht to one or two episodes like if we care...

[heisenberg]

On 6/11/2022 at 10:31 PM, Iguessnot said:

It really had the "Jesus take the wheel" quality. 

😂

[heisenberg]

11 hours ago, BasilSeal said:

I've always been a big defender of this show, it's been the better and most coherent offering  in terms of theme and narrative out of all the TWD shows. not any more though. This season has fallen off a cliff quality wise. maybe they were hampered by constrains imposed by the pandemic? i don't know, but it's poorly written, confused, confusing and incoherent. to add insult to injury, the stream i'm watching has the show runners doing a sort of zoom show and tell at the end where they tell you how great the episode was and how proud they are of it and all the clever things they've done to make it work. it has all the charm of a precocious toddler proudly showing the contents of its potty to it's parents' dinner part guests.

The lazyness of the writers kicked in.  If you want to go into a nuclear fallout do your homeworks!!!! 

It's like that for most of the industry these days. 

For example, actors and writers that takes over legacy series, then are "proud" to say they don't know anything about it. 

"It's a fresh start" they say to excuse their poor work.

Done the right way a nuclear fallout could have been pretty cool in FTWD, but...

[nodorothyparker]

6 hours ago, heisenberg said:

Done the right way a nuclear fallout could have been pretty cool in FTWD, but...

The buildup to the bombs dropping was reasonably well done. John Glover's character was a great if short-term addition even if the motivation was kind of like "Wait, we've already reset the world with the ZA and it didn't make people any better. What makes you think they'll be better in a ZA WITH nuclear fallout?" Still, I was fairly interested to see what they could do with Walking Dead: Fallout Edition.

But yeah, the resulting season has been a mess. Between radiation that's a huge lethal thing except when it isn't apparently depending on what exact spot you're standing on, repeatedly introducing new characters only to kill them off in the same episode while half the regular cast languishes somewhere just off screen, and making Strand a season-long campier than camp villain that Alicia's interminably long exit basically neverminded, it's felt more like an endurance test than entertainment.

I've defended this show too because it's had a more likeable cast of characters who at least seemed to want something beyond just endlessly warring against whoever they came across to see who could be the biggest badass. But this season has been rough.