The Walking Dead 615: East [recap and poll]

There we all sat, on the edges of our seats, waiting for something horrible to happen. It IS The Walking Dead, after all, and calm never lasts. Never mind the fact that there was nothing to make us really gasp until the very end… So, what did you think of this episode? Read the recap below and then take our poll and leave your thoughts!

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Last week, a routine run went very badly, and thanks to Dwight and his crew, we lost Denise. Everyone, the fans included, edged closer and closer to the brink of insanity.

At the beginning of this week’s episode, we start with the world’s shortest, most deceptive intro ever, which was pretty much the same thing they’d been teasing us with for the past week. There’s a car that appears to have been attacked. Their are giant spikes poking through the car! There’s a rosary on the ground, and we only know of one person with one of those… And blood is dripping from somewhere. There’s muffled voices… and then the title screen. Really?

Next, we close up on Carol’s letter. It’s a flashback, though, because Carol’s sitting in a bedroom, stitching what looks like a jacket and packing things into a backpack, which she slips under the bed when Tobin comes looking for her. He had hurt himself working on building the new guard tower, he tells her, and he has been to the infirmary.

Tobin starts talking about Denise. Almost immediately, his voice just becomes noise in Carol’s head. She can’t listen to him talk about her – one more person they’ve lost. Since we already know that she’s leaving and why, we know why she can’t listen to him talk about her just then. What’s heartbreaking is that Tobin seems to have no idea what his words are doing to her. For God’s sake, Tobin, she’s been through enough! I know someone else who would know better, but I digress.

Tobin apologizes for bringing it up and Carol says she’s just feeling badly, thinking about Tara and what her reaction will be when she finds out about Denise. He kisses her.

Next we see Tobin asleep in the middle of the night and Carol sneaking out, her backpack on her back. There’s a cheerful song playing in the background, and the montage leads into the morning. Rosita’s on guard by the wall. Carl is in the armory, examining a gun, then takes it. Maggie and Glenn are in the shower, where Glenn can see a huge bruise on her side. She’s still feeling the effects of her captivity, both mental and physical.

Daryl is holding Denise’s “Dennis” keychain. Elsewhere, Sasha comes down the ladder by the wall at the edge of Alexandria and Abraham walks up to her, smiling. They’re talking, but we can’t hear what they’re saying over the music. Abe goes up the ladder.

The montage with the cheerful song ends, and Rick and Michonne in bed, asleep. Michonne wakes up and takes a bite of an apple that was beside the bed. Rick wakes up and she shares it with him. He stays snuggled behind her as they talk. Rick makes it clear that he doesn’t mind being late that morning, but Michonne doesn’t want to mess with Maggie’s schedule, not wanting to piss off the pregnant lady. 

Before they separate to get ready for the day, Rick says this won’t be like before. “The world’s ours, and we know how to take it.” He’s is very confident that things will be fine, and Michonne agrees. Rick, even in TV shows it’s common knowledge that saying things like that invites trouble…

Maggie and Glenn are loading the guns not far from the main gate of Alexandria when Michonne approaches them. The three of them see Daryl approach the gate on his motorcycle, saying he’s going “out.” He refuses to tell them where he’s going, just leaves. Almost immediately, Glenn and Michonne are in the truck ready to follow him. Abraham wants to join them, but Rosita tells him to cover her watch because she knows where Daryl’s going. Sorry Abe, maybe next time.

Tobin shows up at Rick’s house with Carol’s note. Suddenly the two men are storming across Alexandria. Sasha tells the men that she had been on watch during the night but hadn’t seen anything. Morgan asks to see the note. Sasha thinks Carol probably left during the shift change. Morgan says he’s going to find Carol, and Rick goes with him. They drive off.

Carol’s driving down the road in a small car with spikes sticking out in every direction. A pick up truck approaches her, and she sees three men standing in the back of the truck. As they pass each other, they fire at her, which causes her tire to go flat. They sit and watch her. She’s breathing heavily, holding the rosary as one of them points his gun at her.

She begs them not to hurt her, and the man pointing the gun at her tells her to come out, which she does. She tells them she just has the car and a knife “for the dead ones.” However, the man tells her she has information, about where she’s from and where she’s going. She claims to be Nancy from Montclair, but says that she keeps moving so she’s not really from anywhere or going anywhere.

The man says they agree that she’s not going anywhere, but he says that he knows she’s from Alexandria. He can tell because she’s driving the car with spikes through it, which they have in Alexandria. He says they were just on their way to Alexandria, and can give her a ride back. He figures that the people in Alexandria will let them in if she’s with them.

Carol appears to be hyperventilating, reminding me once again of when she got so emotional in The Same Boat a few weeks back. She says it doesn’t have to be this way. She doesn’t want to do what she’s about to do, but has no choice.

Suddenly all four men are mowed down – she had a gun in her sleeve. For a second, nothing moves. Suddenly, one of them jumps out of the truck, unharmed, and comes after her with a gun. She hides behind the car then takes one of the spikes, spearing him through the middle from the other side of the car.

She checks his pockets and gets his gun, then tells another man hiding behind the truck, the one who had been holding the gun on her, to come out. He rushes out at her with a knife. We see and hear blood dripping but nothing else – what a great place to put a commercial!

In Alexandria, Maggie comes into the house where Enid is standing by the shelves of food. Enid tells Maggie to rest while she takes her shift for a few hours. Maggie tries to protest, but Enid insists.

“It’s not what we thought it was. Hilltop, the Saviors. It’s bigger.”

Meanwhile, back on the road, Morgan tells Rick he didn’t have to come. Rick says they have to try, that the tire tracks pointed east, so they go east. Morgan says the Saviors compound that they had gone to was to the west. Rick tells Morgan he doesn’t know Carol. Morgan says he got to know her, a little. Rick asks Morgan why he’s doing this. Morgan says there is no right, just the wrong that doesn’t pull you down.

Another, slightly older, of the men Carol shot comes to, in pain, in the truck. He sees his injured and dead friends. The one who’d been the spokesperson is lying on the ground, dying. The older man gets out of the truck and walks away from the truck, presumably hiding in the trees beside the road as Morgan and Rick approach in their car. The two men stop to look at the aftermath of the fight that’s left in the road, and notice Carol’s car.

They don’t see Carol anywhere nearby. Rick asks the dying man on the ground where she is, and when he can’t talk, Rick doesn’t hesitate to stab him in the head. Morgan has a big stick, and Rick finds a spear like the ones they had at Hilltop, and picks it up. He says the men were Saviors. A walker is eating one of the dead men on the ground. Morgan finds blood on one of the spikes sticking out of Carol’s car and says she could’ve been hit.

Rick says he’s proud of her for taking down four men. Morgan has found more blood on a trail leading into the field beside the road. Rick observes that most of the guns are gone, and that she could’ve taken them. He also voices the fact that she could’ve died there, even if she isn’t there anymore. They start out across the field on the trail.

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Rick says they were close to Alexandria. He has now realized that their raid on the Saviors’ complex didn’t “end it.” On the contrary, Morgan says, they’ve started something.

The older man, who we now believe is a Savior, comes back from his hiding place in the trees. He picks up the rosary and holds onto it, walking into the field as well.

A walker is eating remains of people along a train track. Rosita and Glenn walk up towards it. She says it’s where Denise died. Glenn wants to know which way Dwight and his men went when they left because that’s where he thinks Daryl will go.

Daryl is walking through tall grass. He hears a noise and shoots. The arrow lands in a tree right beside Rosita. Michonne and Glenn are with her. Daryl yells to them that he’s going to do what he should have done before.

Glenn says they need to get back and figure it out from home, that it’s gonna go wrong out there. Michonne promises him she’ll “square it,” if he’ll just come back. But Daryl says he can’t, and walks away. Rosita says she can’t either, and follows him into the trees. Glenn and Michonne turn around and go back in the opposite direction.

Glenn and Michonne agree that they need to find out more. He says they got stuck with each other, and figured it out together. He seems to be talking about the group in general, but he doesn’t specify. “It’s not what we thought it was. Hilltop, the Saviors. It’s bigger.” Suddenly they hear whistling and when they look around, they realize that they’re surrounded by men with guns. Dwight is one of them. He simply says, “Hi.”

Morgan and Rick see a little blood in the grass. Morgan asks Rick if he’s out there because Carol is his friend. Rick says he’s there because she’s family. Morgan says he knows what happened at the prison, and asks if he’d have killed her if she did now what she had done back then. He says that no, now he would thank her. Morgan points out that he didn’t kill her back then, and that she came back and saved them all. “People can come back, Rick,” Morgan insists.

Suddenly Morgan and Rick start running toward something. They had thought that they’d seen Carol, but it was just a walker. The woman couldn’t have been dead more than a day, they agree. They keep walking up a hill through tall grass toward a farm.

There’s a man killing a walker, a little ways away, but he ducks behind a building when Rick points a gun at him. The man says he won’t come out, that he’s looking for his horse.

Suddenly a group of walkers appears. One almost bites Morgan, but Rick gets it first. They find another spear from Hilltop like the one on the road. Morgan tells Rick about the Wolf who he’d spared, that he could have killed him. He repeats that all life is precious. Rick looks disgusted. Morgan says he put the Wolf in the basement because he believed that the man could change.

Morgan says Carol found out what he’d done and the Wolf escaped, taking Denise hostage. Then the Wolf had saved Denise, and Denise was there to save Carl. “It’s all a circle. Everything gets a return.” Morgan isn’t sorry that he let the Wolf live. He tells Rick to go home, that he’s needed back there. Rick says he’s not leaving while Carol’s still out there. Morgan repeats that he has to go. He tells Rick not to come looking if he doesn’t come back.

Before heading back to Alexandria, Rick tells Morgan that Michonne did steal his protein bar. Morgan says that he already knew.

Abraham closes the gate behind Rick, who has arrived safely back. He says that Morgan is still out there and asks about Michonne, who he learns is not back yet. Abe asks if he’s afraid to go back to letting somebody close. Rick says he is. Abraham tells Rick that he is, too. They stare through the bars of the gate, waiting for the others, and see nothing moving.

Enid knocks on Maggie’s door. When she answers, Maggie hands Enid something and tells her to come in, saying she needs some more help. Seconds later we see that Enid has cut Maggie’s hair very short. Enid asks her why she wanted it so short, to which Maggie replies that she has to keep going, and doesn’t want anything getting in her way. Then suddenly Maggie tenses up. For a second Enid is afraid that she cut her hair too short, but then Maggie collapses on the floor, screaming in pain.

Glenn and Michonne are sitting on the ground, tied up with their backs against trees. Daryl and Rosita approach through the woods from a distance and see them, but Dwight gets behind Daryl, gun raised, and an older man pulls a gun on Rosita.

Suddenly it appears that Dwight fires at Daryl point-blank, though we can’t tell for sure where he’s hit. All we see is a lot of blood splatter against the screen … all we hear is “You’ll be alright.” He’d better be, Dwight, or you’ll have herds of Daryl’s angry fangirls to deal with.

Speaking of Daryl’s fangirls, I swear I could hear them screaming all around the world from my house.

Next: The Walking Dead: Whose death would hit Alexandria the hardest?

And that, ladies and gentleman, is how they leave us this week. In other words, everything is nicely set up for something horrible to happen next week. So what did you think? Please take our poll and leave your thoughts!

So we’re down to one more episode and we still haven’t seen Negan. You know what that means… Next week, he’ll be on for sure. Or as sure as we can be with The Walking Dead, anyway. I’ll just be over here, hiding in the corner and hoping against hope that all of my favorite fictional characters will still be “alive” at 10:00 next Sunday night…