The Walking Dead Villains: Who’s The Worst, Part 7

Richard

I know I’ve been picking on The Saviors a lot (And I’m not finished with them), but, let’s shift gears a little and focus on someone else. Someone who isn’t part of The Saviors, or a willing stooge for them. Someone like Richard.

Now, Richard isn’t a “villain”, per se. He didn’t rape anybody, he didn’t betray anyone to The Saviors, and he didn’t actively kill anybody, but, he still managed to find a place on this list.

Why? His plans.

Let me elaborate. During our relatively brief time with Richard, he proved to be a man full of convoluted plans to bring down The Saviors.

Planning to get rid of hostiles is all well and good. The problem with Richard’s plans, however, was the carelessness with which he sought to execute them.

When we first learned of his plans to get King Ezekiel to fight The Saviors, it was through an exchange with Daryl in “New Best Friends”.

There, he explained to Daryl his plan to convince Ezekiel of The Kingdom’s need to fight The Saviors, by provoking them to attack an innocent civilian. That civilian…was Carol.

That’s right, in Richard’s grand plan to get rid of The Saviors, Carol was just “collateral damage”. He intended to have Carol get ambushed and likely slaughtered by The Saviors, all for the sake of his plan.

What really earns Richard his place here, though, is when he actually executed one of his plans.

After being told by Daryl that if he wanted a sacrifice, he should do it himself, Richard tried to do just that.

As The Kingdom came to make a delivery to Gavin, Richard hid one of the cantaloupes. Richard’s hope was that, when The Saviors inevitably reacted, he would take the brunt of it.

That isn’t how it went down, however. Instead, Jared chose to shoot Benjamin, so that Richard had to watch him suffer.

Can we blame Richard for Jared’s cruelty? No, not really. However, we can blame Richard for his recklessness. Just as he didn’t think about Carol in his initial plan, Richard didn’t think about the possibility of someone else getting hurt in his second one.

So bent was Richard to get Ezekiel to see how dangerous The Saviors were, he didn’t stop to think about the potential collateral damage his plans would create. Had he put more thought into his plans, he would have realized that The Saviors might not have reacted how he anticipated, and he was putting his friends at risk.

Sadly, there’s the possibility that he did think of these risks, but, was so determined to prove his point, that he believed any casualties were for “the greater good”. That would be a dark road to go down.

Next: Don't Get Too Ambitious