The Walking Dead: You Can’t JUST Be a Farmer, Carol

War is coming to The Walking Dead, and it will pull in EVERYONE. Whether she likes it or not, Carol will get pulled in, too.

When the second half of The Walking Dead Season Seven kicks off, everyone will be on the path the to war: Alexandria, The Hilltop, The Kingdom, The Saviors, everyone.

All of the communities under Negan’s thumb (That we know of, anyway) will come together to form a united front against him and his army of thugs. We may even see a few communities not under Negan’s control join in the fight, too.

Now, obviously, this decision to go to war wasn’t an easy one to reach. Rick, most notably, had to see Negan and Arat murder Spencer and Olivia in order to realize just how unsustainable the deal with The Saviors was; Morgan, similarly, had to see Roman be seconds away from executing Carol to realize that he had to be willing to take a life to defend one.

Why do I say this? Because the person who may be the hardest to convince of the need to fight The Saviors is Carol.

War IS Coming

The fact is, war with The Saviors is inevitable because their arrangement is inherently unsustainable.

They convinced Ethan to try to kill Gregory to get his brother Craig back after they deemed The Hilltop’s latest drop “light”.

In “Hearts Still Beating”, Richard asked Morgan and Carol to convince Ezekiel to attack The Saviors because he feared exactly that sort of behavior. And this fact was brought home to Rick when Aaron was beaten up for no reason, and Spencer and Olivia were killed.

In all of these cases, The Saviors, basically, chose to renegotiate their arrangement on a whim, with little to no reasoning; It’s no wonder Richard feared such a thing, it something that’s clearly part of their M.O..

The point here is that there was really no way for Alexandria’s arrangement with The Saviors to end in any other way but war. The only other alternative was for The Saviors to continue changing the rules and probably killing more people in the process to “send messages”. There’s no way Rick would let that stand. He couldn’t.

Will Carol Join The Fight?

While Carol has made it clear that she doesn’t want to kill anymore, we’ve seen that won’t stop The Saviors, and, in turn, sort of hasn’t stopped Carol, either.

In season six’s “East”, Carol was confronted by a band of Savior scouts who were clearly intent on using her as a hostage against Rick (She could have even gotten “Lucilled” instead of Abraham or Glenn).

Rather than let herself be taken and used as such, Carol retaliated, killing four of the five scouts in fairly short order. Clearly, as much she abhorred doing it, Carol understood the need to use force to stop The Saviors and didn’t hesitate in doing so.

Would she do so again to stop The Saviors? Would she act to protect the innocent people of The Kingdom or Alexandria? Or, would she distance herself further in order to avoid the war as best as possible?

Without the threat of The Saviors being immediate (At least to her), would Carol be willing to fight them? If her reaction to Richard’s request is any indication, I think the answer is a resounding “No”.

War Is At Your Doorstep

Over the second half of season six, Carol chose to divert from the rather violent path she’s walked since season four, attempting to abstain from lethal violence as much as possible. To this end, she’s tried to distance herself from anyone she could care about, for fear of having to kill to protect them.

However, it seems like not even that can prevent the brewing conflict from knocking on Carol’s door; Richard asking Carol and Morgan to convince Ezekiel to attack The Saviors preemptively proved that.

While Carol balked at the idea, as the preview for the second half of the season shows, Rick does meet Ezekiel. The Kingdom will end up joining the fight, and it’s almost impossible, I think, for Carol to avoid Rick, who’ll probably ask her to help.

Will Glenn And Abraham’s Deaths Change Things?

While Carol has been recuperating and then residing in the area outside of The Kingdom, she has been completely out of the loop with what’s been going on with The Group.

What this means is, Carol is completely unaware of the gruesome deaths of Glenn, Abraham, Spencer, and Olivia, and the kidnappings of Daryl and Eugene.

Will learning these events change her mind? Will knowing that even Olivia got gunned down convince Carol that vanquishing Negan is the only way to stop the killing? Or will she attempt to get even further away from the conflict?

Carol’s “You can’t JUST be a farmer” – Moment

As I mentioned earlier, Carol is adamant that she wants to avoid killing, avoid being who she was, as much as possible.

For example, she tried desperately to avoid killing the Savior scouts she met leaving Alexandria, hoping to convince them to let her go. The Saviors wouldn’t have it, but, Carol still tried.

After recovering from her injuries, Carol has tried to carve out a solitary life for herself, away from The Kingdom and Alexandria, free from the conflicts of either. In a way, she reminds of Rick after The Group repelled the second attack by The Governor in season three.

Rick was very content at the start of season four, happily farming with Hershel and Carl and desperately trying to distance himself from the “Crazytown” Rick he’d become after Lori died. He was trying so hard to be free from the violence, that he even stopped wearing his gun outside The Prison’s walls.

However, as people began getting sick with The Flu, dying, turning, and attacking others, Carol reminded Rick that, no matter how much he might want to, he couldn’t avoid the violent world they now inhabited; As she so succinctly put it “You can be a farmer, Rick. You can’t just be a farmer.”

I believe someone, perhaps Rick himself, needs to give Carol a similar pep talk. While her objective is admirable, the circumstances are quite unique.

The Saviors are an even more dangerous threat than The Wolves were. The Saviors are more numerous, better armed, and much more coordinated than The Wolves; As Carol herself learned, The Saviors won’t care about her goal of not killing, they will either try to kidnap her, extort her, or kill her. In order for The Group and their allies to succeed, they’re going to need everyone they can get to defeat The Saviors, including Carol.

Whether she likes it or not, the war will envelope Carol just as it has everyone else, the question is, will she dictate how she affects the war, or will she let it dictate to her?

Regardless, in her own way, Carol can “Be a farmer”, but, like Rick before her, she can’t just “Be a farmer”.

Next: Fear The Walking Dead, Passage, Parts 1-8: Things To Note

Do you agree? Disagree? Do you think Carol will join the fight against The Saviors? Or, do you think she’ll adhere to her vow not to kill? Let me know in the comments!

And, of course, if you like this and want to hear my thoughts on how to survive the zombie apocalypse, why not pick up a copy of my book: The Rules: A Guide To Surviving The Zombie Apocalypse! You can get it on Kindle here and on iTunes here!