S03.E15: Things Bad Begun/S03.E16 Sleigh Ride

[Gobi]

The rumor is that Abraham will be the crossover character, showing him before the events of TWD.

[Nashville]

9 hours ago, Gobi said:

The rumor is that Abraham will be the crossover character, showing him before the events of TWD.

Wouldn't surprise me much; Cuddles is relatively popular.

[valandsend]

Did the tumor come back to life after it was removed?

[Nashville]

15 minutes ago, valandsend said:

Did the tumor come back to life after it was removed?

If it did, we're gonna name it 'Daniel'.

[piequinn35]

I watched the last 3 eps last night, half watching... I know Madi killed Nick's true love with a hammer, Nick/Daniel probably dead??

Victor and Alicia, do they have any other better tv show than this one?

Madi, off to the next camp to destroy yayyy :D

[Gobi]

Just guessing here, but I think most initial contracts for stars of a TV show are for three years. If that's true, then contract negotiations are going to determine who lives and who dies.

[oakville]

3 hours ago, Gobi said:

Just guessing here, but I think most initial contracts for stars of a TV show are for three years. If that's true, then contract negotiations are going to determine who lives and who dies.

It's ridiculous that the show would play hardball with the cast . If we judge the character's Q rating by the forum, Madison is the least liked character, so fans wouldn't care if she lived her died. I think Alicia,Daniel & Strand are more popular & better actors than Madison & Nick

[raven]

Killing Troy wasn't originally the plan at the beginning of the season.

So if that whole scene seemed out of place (it did to me) well that explains it. 

Though I enjoy some things about the show, there is a lot that is frustrating.  The show is pushing Madison as the central character and it's not working.  This quote from here capsulizes it for me pretty well (there are some spoilers for The Walking Dead in the article):

Quote

However, in this case, fans of Fear the Walking Dead are not buying into Dicken's Madison character the way audiences rooted for family man Rick Grimes. Complaints in comment sections and across Twitter often cite the Madison character as the show's weak point for reasons ranging from Dickens' performances to the poor choices from the character and, in some cases, they have been valid points.

There is no question the writing for Madison Clark improved in Season 3, however, along with Dickens' performances. The character put the people skills promised in the weaker early seasons of Fear to work when conquering both Broke Jaw Ranch and Daniel Salazar's dam. She formed an interesting, intriguing, and potentially twisted romantic relationship with Troy Otto.

Then, Madison (the character Fear the Walking Dead most needs fans to get behind) killed a character most fans were either loving or loving to hate.

For me, it isn't even so much that Madison killed Troy (though I would rather he have stuck around), it's when she did it and why, after essentially giving him a pass for worse deeds earlier in the season.  I have zero investment in Madison and differing levels in the other characters.  I'm already annoyed by the Proctors.  The show hasn't given me a reason to root for Madison and they would be smarter to make her a villain if they insist on keeping her. 

[Ailianna]

I just got around to watching, and the only thing I have to say probably feeds into the whole Madison should be killed off theme.

At one point, she asks Nick what kind of mom she is.  (Or if she killed him, what kind of mom would that make her.)  So at the end, she crawls up on the shore, looks around, looks at the people getting water and the Hola girl and a body floats past her in the river--AND SHE NEVER EVEN LOOKS AROUND FOR HER KID!!  And that's exactly what kind of mom she is.

[nodorothyparker]

Yeah, the whole justifying that Troy "deserved" to die by the outgoing showrunner is weak.  That argument could be made about most of the characters on either show in this franchise if you really want to get nit picky, which is why I tend to find those kinds of discussions tedious in the first place.  My question is did it make sense for the character at the time and I didn't come away with a resounding yes after previously watching more than one Clark give Troy more than one pass for other things that were just as bad if not worse.  I feel like the show wanted me to see Madison finally smacking Troy down with a hammer to the head as some kind of badass Rick Grimes taking care of business move but instead it just made her look even more self serving because she only decided to kill him when there was no longer anything to gain by using or manipulating him to keep a toehold on the ranch.

For all the squicky maybe three-way with the Clarks stuff he seemed to be projecting, Troy as a character at least had some potential, whether it be to go full bore crazy or morph into some Dixon brothers amalgamation, and his wacky high jinks with Nick made that character more tolerable to watch as well.  In contrast, I feel absolutely nothing for Madison beyond a general annoyance that the show is seemingly hellbent on putting her front and center as the bestest whatever. 

[raven]

I've resigned myself to the whole point of TWD universe being that people will inevitably morph into murderers and do terrible things to stay alive, so the whole so and so is a bad person argument is silly for sure. 

So I'll just agree with everything you said @nodorothyparker and add that Daniel Sharman at least can act, which is more than I can say for Kim Dickens, at least in this show.

Since it seems like she's going to be around, at least confine her to scenes with Colman Domingo, he makes her better.

[nodorothyparker]

If they're going to insist on keeping her, I would also be fine with limiting her to scenes of Strand yelling at her for being stupid.  That's about the only time I've found her remotely entertaining the last couple of episodes.

[SnarkyTart]

8 hours ago, raven said:

There is no question the writing for Madison Clark improved in Season 3, however, along with Dickens' performances.

The writer must have been watching a different show than the one I saw.

[Nowhere]

I'm in the minority but I've found Fear the Dead way more interesting than TWD and the characters slightly less annoying. Considering the timeline of events, Rick is only just now waking from a coma while Nick, Madison, Troy have been kicking ass. 

I cannot stand Madison. She fucks everything up and she is a legitimate psychopath. How dare she kill Troy over the horde. The ranch was HIS. We can debate whether it belonged to the natives but in Troy's mind, he grew up there and it was his ranch, NOT MADISON'S! She seems to think she can walk in and take over any place she wants. 

Troy and Nick were the most interesting dynamic and it's over now. Why would they kill off the most interesting character they had? His past, coming to terms with Nick killing his father, losing the ranch to the natives (thanks Madison), and yet still forming a bond with Nick and putting all their dirty deeds out of his mind. His character had true potential. 

What was the point of Alicia's new friend? Just to lead her to the gang of sexual predators. Those guys seriously creeped me out and it was uncomfortable. 

I liked the drug thing with the heads but again, what was the point in the scene? 

Btw, if my son told me he was going to kill himself, I'd be like, "No, you get on that fucking raft and I'll kill myself!" But in true Madison fashion, she says bye to her child like, "Aww damn. I really liked that kid. Oh well. At least I have the girl to pretend to love." 

The only characters I care about are Nick and Strand.

Daniel is a grumpy asshole and he has no reason to hate on anyone. He's a dick and I was hoping Strand killed him. But no. He has nine lives so I guess he and Nick will be alive next season. I'm crossing my fingers for Nick, the only truly likeable character. But Daniel should go ahead and give up the ghost. Nobody owes him shit and he goes around like everyone should have been protecting Ophelia like she's queen fucking bee. She's not. Everyone is trying to survive, Daniel. Nobody gives a flying rat's ass about your daughter. 

[Nowhere]

And another thing, on Talking Dead they barely gave Troy a memorial, like he was nothing. then they gave a really sweet memorial to the dam? Like wtf? It was in approximately 2 episodes. Who gives a shit? It's inanimate. The Troy actor must have gotten on somebody's bad side. 

[Ohwell]

40 minutes ago, Nowhere said:

Daniel is a grumpy asshole and he has no reason to hate on anyone. He's a dick and I was hoping Strand killed him. But no. He has nine lives so I guess he and Nick will be alive next season. I'm crossing my fingers for Nick, the only truly likeable character. But Daniel should go ahead and give up the ghost. Nobody owes him shit and he goes around like everyone should have been protecting Ophelia like she's queen fucking bee. She's not. Everyone is trying to survive, Daniel. Nobody gives a flying rat's ass about your daughter. 

As much as I hate Madison, and I truly do, next on my hate list is Daniel, the Torturer.  Assuming they won't kill Madison because she's the "star" (ugh), I want them to kill Daniel in the opening episode next season.

[Nowhere]

Just now, Ohwell said:

As much as I hate Madison, and I truly do, next on my hate list is Daniel, the Torturer.  Assuming they won't kill Madison because she's the "star" (ugh), I want them to kill Daniel in the opening episode next season.

Same.

[slf]

I can see why AMC might take a look at Troy the Racist Murderer and think, "y'know, maybe not right now." Maybe American tv can go a few years without pushing some racist white asshole on us as "interesting" and "complex"? If the most that can be said about the guy after an entire season - one in which he's been given more material than characters that've been on the show since the first season - is that he has potential...he doesn't.

“I think it was in that moment [where she kills him] she realizes that I tried to do the right thing, I tried to offer charity and I tried to offer kindness and I let him go and now because of that the ranch is gone, the dam is compromised, and I think that’s the moment where Madison comes full circle."

I actually buy that. Yeah, Madison and the others stupidly spared Troy time and time again and people are asking, "so why kill him now?" Because: sparing him didn't work. He brought the horde down on the ranch and got everyone, including his own brother, killed anyway. So why continue to spare him? At that point you're just keeping around a whackjob who absolutely will turn on you.

4 hours ago, Nowhere said:

How dare she kill Troy over the horde. The ranch was HIS.

Yeah but her kids were at that ranch. Your house may be yours but if my kids are there and you set that house on fire with them inside and almost kill them then I'm probably putting a hammer through your skull. Personally, I don't think Troy had more of a right to do whatever to the ranch and it's inhabitants than Madison did to take over leading that place. What right did Troy have to experiment on people? None. If surviving had meant taking someone's home from them by force we have every reason to believe Troy would have done it. So, "it was my ranch" was just self-justifying bullshit.

Edited October 23, 2017 by slf

[Nowhere]

4 minutes ago, slf said:

I can see why AMC might take a look at Troy the Racist Murderer and think, "y'know, maybe not right now." Maybe American tv can go a few years without pushing some racist white asshole on us as "interesting" and "complex"? If the most that can be said about the guy after an entire season - one in which he's been given more material than characters that've been on the show since the first season - is that he has potential...he doesn't.

“I think it was in that moment [where she kills him] she realizes that I tried to do the right thing, I tried to offer charity and I tried to offer kindness and I let him go and now because of that the ranch is gone, the dam is compromised, and I think that’s the moment where Madison comes full circle."

I actually buy that. Yeah, Madison and the others stupidly spared Troy time and time again and people are asking, "so why kill him now?" Because: sparing him didn't work. He brought the horde down on the ranch and got everyone, including his own brother, killed anyway. So why continue to spare him? At that point you're just keeping around a whackjob who absolutely will turn on you.

Yeah but her kids were at that ranch. Your house may be yours but if my kids are there and you set that house on fire with them inside and almost kill them then I'm probably putting a hammer through your skull. Personally, I don't think Troy had more of a right to do whatever to the ranch and it's inhabitants than Madison did to take over leading that place. What right did Troy have to experiment on people? None. If surviving had meant taking someone's home from them by force we have every reason to believe Troy would have done it. So, "it was my ranch" was just self-justifying bullshit.

I don't remember the racist part of Troy. I remember he did and said a lot of fucked up shit. But it's a tv show. Not real life. He had an interesting storyline. He could have been more and I liked the bromance. Sue me. 

Madison isn't queen of the ranch like she thinks and if you or Madison came into my home where my family and children are, the hammer would have been taken to her skull before she had the chance to screw everything up for the ranch like she did do. I'm saying this from Troy's perspective, of course. The natives claim to the ranch was valid if I remember correctly, however it wasn't Madison's place to fix everything. 

[slf]

7 hours ago, Nowhere said:

I don't remember the racist part of Troy. I remember he did and said a lot of fucked up shit. But it's a tv show. Not real life. 

I do. He singled out poc for his zombie experiments back at the base; Travis was one of his test subjects. Not to mention the countless racist comments he made? I'm not sure what this being a tv show has to do with it...?

7 hours ago, Nowhere said:

Madison isn't queen of the ranch like she thinks and if you or Madison came into my home where my family and children are, the hammer would have been taken to her skull before she had the chance to screw everything up for the ranch like she did do.

She didn't invade the ranch, she and her kids were brought there. In the end, the worst thing Madison did w/r/t the ranch was not hammering in Troy's skull sooner- if she had: no horde.

[rmontro]

On 10/22/2017 at 4:17 PM, Ohwell said:

As much as I hate Madison, and I truly do, next on my hate list is Daniel, the Torturer.  Assuming they won't kill Madison because she's the "star" (ugh), I want them to kill Daniel in the opening episode next season.

It's a shame because I used to like Daniel.  But this year they've had him treat all his "friends" like garbage, just because they had the misfortune of being acquainted with his daughter, I guess.  Seems like part of the agenda to make sure that none of the characters on this show are remotely likable.  Yet Scott Gimple calls the Clarks "the family that we love".  The guy is delusional.  

[Nashville]

1 hour ago, rmontro said:

Yet Scott Gimple calls the Clarks "the family that we love".  The guy is delusional.  

Maybe Gimple was dictating to his phone, and autocorrect garbaged the "...to hate" at the end.

[rmontro]

On 10/24/2017 at 8:21 PM, Nashville said:

Maybe Gimple was dictating to his phone, and autocorrect garbaged the "...to hate" at the end.

Lol, maybe it was supposed to read "the garbage that we hate".

[Nashville]

11 hours ago, rmontro said:

Lol, maybe it was supposed to read "the garbage that we hate".

I was thinking more along the lines of "the family that we love to hate" - but yours works, too.  :>

[ganesh]

I can't say I was particularly interested in much this season. The finale was kind of blah. I don't get why they always have everything unravel because everyone just stumbles around. 

"Proctor" John is a terrible bad guy. I have no idea what his agenda really was. He was in a wheelchair. Just push him down the stairs!

I suppose Daniel returning to his bad ass military self was interesting, but I feel like Strand was barely even around. He used to be capable and calculating, and now he's was just bumbling.

The entire "Troy" plot was effectively useless and a complete waste of time for me. 

I actually do think blowing the dam was the right call because the "bad" guy can't horde the water and therefore renders his hols meaningless. I don't know that everyone would be fighting over the water, but in this show universe it's like everyone is at each other's throats all the time.

[SimoneS]

Just watched this episode. I am glad that Crazy Dog and Walker made it out alive. I chuckled when Crazy Dog stood up after Walker said they mightn't make it and said "north then." He wasn't have any crazy rescue plan. He wanted out of there. I noticed that Walker was sitting at the head of the table next to Madison in the Christmas hallucination. I wonder if they were intending to do a romance between them.

So Proctor John has spinal surgery eased by Alisha's voice and is walking around like nothing happened the next few days. Right, show.

Edited August 13, 2018 by SimoneS