Fear TWD: John and June’s wedding is a moment of good in the apocalypse

The wedding of John and June in the season 5 finale of Fear the Walking Dead is a sign that good things can and should still happen in the undead world.

Happy moments are few and far between in the world of Fear the Walking Dead. In most scenarios, we are in constant fear for the safety of our survivors due to the many threats they face. Walkers and other human beings seem to keep the characters of both shows constantly on the run. This results in many of the normal activities that humans enjoy being skipped or done away with. Fortunately, there are small moments of respite when our characters actually get to take a break from the doom and gloom to celebrate the fact that they are still alive.

The end of season 5 features a moment that was really needed for the characters and viewers. After a rough patch for our survivors as they searched for a home and tried to move away from Virginia’s Settlers, John and June tied the knot in a beautiful ceremony at Humbug’s Gulch. It may seem like a strange time in the story for the wedding given the very active threat, but John and June needed to express their love for one another. When you aren’t guaranteed tomorrow, today is when you have to make things happen.

In this franchise, weddings aren’t really something we have ever seen. Take Maggie and Glenn for example when they became engaged in season 3. We never saw a formal ceremony and they instead opted to simply jump straight into marriage. Rick and Michonne are another case of this where traditional weddings aren’t something that most people think to do in the apocalypse. It’s totally understandable given the circumstances why a big ceremony couldn’t be had, but John and June wanted to go through with it all, having their loved ones and a rabbi present to be part of the ceremony.

When you think about the larger franchise as a whole, this wedding isn’t the only normal event we’ve seen. Just recently, an inter-community fair took place on The Walking Dead, and while that went horribly wrong and resulted in death, it was an enjoyable and peaceful event for the survivors for a short period. Being that this story is what it is, these good moments tend to turn very bad just as soon as the characters start enjoying themselves. This really makes it difficult for them to take part in similar activities out of fear of things going bad again.

Seeing something like a wedding ceremony is bizarre in this franchise and can come across as being slightly out of place. This is mostly due to the fact that we aren’t used to seeing our characters engage in “normal” activities such as this. We have become so accustomed to seeing them covered in blood as they slay walkers and people. Every day is a battle for survival and they don’t normally think or have time to do things that were considered normal in the old world. Doing these types of things helps our characters to remain grounded in some sense of humanity and it reminds them that there is more to life than just death.