Negan and knee-jerk reactions

Christian Serratos as Rosita Espinosa - The Walking Dead _ Season 7, Episode 8 - Photo Credit: Gene Page/AMC
Christian Serratos as Rosita Espinosa - The Walking Dead _ Season 7, Episode 8 - Photo Credit: Gene Page/AMC /
facebooktwitterreddit

It’s abundantly clear that Negan plays by his own rules. As a result, he’s not a big fan of people like Daryl and Rosita stepping out of line. Hence the consequences.

There have been two moments in the first half of Season 7 of The Walking Dead where split second, knee jerk reactions changed the course of the group’s futures: The first was when Daryl broke away from the group and attacked Negan after he killed Abraham; the second was when Rosita took a shot at Negan and triggered a fatal chain of events.

In both of these cases, Negan’s reaction was swift and his punishment was harsh. However, none of what happened would have happened if not for Daryl and Rosita’s knee-jerk reactions.

Daryl couldn’t help himself when he attacked Negan after Negan killed Abraham. Daryl’s attack led to Glenn’s death and Daryl’s subsequent capture.

Rosita has been hell-bent on revenge since Abraham’s death, and seeing Negan gut Spencer was the last straw. She fired her one shot and hit Lucille instead of Negan, so Negan ordered Arat to kill someone. Arat chose Olivia, and no matter how Rosita begged for them to kill her, the punishment was that someone else would die for her actions. Adding insult to injury was that Negan decided to take Eugene prisoner because he was the one who made the bullet. (As we have seen so far, Negan appreciates talent when he sees it, and having a bullet maker in his arsenal would be valuable, so Eugene isn’t necessarily at risk of death unless he refuses to cooperate)

Daryl didn’t know what would happen, but you would think that Rosita would have learned from Daryl’s mistake. Abraham taught her to be a good soldier, and he would have been PO’d to know that she reacted the way she did and that her actions led to Olivia’s death and Eugene’s capture.

That brings the body count to two, with Eugene as a third “victim” since he was taken prisoner as a result of Rosita’s actions. That’s two people who died who wouldn’t have if not for other people’s actions.

More from Undead Walking

Negan warned that there would be consequences for disobedience. As a method of punishment, it certainly sends a message. Unfortunately, Rosita missed the message and as a result, poor Olivia lost her life and Eugene was taken away.