The smartest decisions in The Walking Dead: Part I

The Walking Dead Smartest Decisions: Season Four

Rick buries a bag of weapons outside of Terminus

I love this. I’m not even kidding.

Look, I know this might not sound that big, but, in terms of pure survival strategy, it’s brilliant. Think back to what was my worst decision of season four: Everyone else in the group going to Terminus and just trusting Gareth and company. It was dumb. I can’t even think of a word for just how dumb of a move that was, it was that dumb. They didn’t know them, they were pretty clearly too good to be true, and yet, Maggie, Glenn, Abraham, etc. all just strolled in the front door and trusted them. Obviously…that didn’t work out very well.

On the other hand, Rick, as they approach the back of Terminus, gathers some of his, Michonne’s and Daryl’s weapons, put them in a gym bag, and buried them somewhere outside of Terminus’s walls.

Why? For the very reasons everyone else shouldn’t have just strolled into Terminus in the first place: They were a bunch of strangers, in their own enclosed place, luring total strangers to them, and generally acting a little too good. Rick saw all of this, and, just in case something was rotten in Denmark, decided to bury some of their weapons so they couldn’t get taken and so he, Michonne, Daryl, and Carl could go back and get them later.

And, oh, how right Rick was…

This is, quite frankly, one of the smartest things anyone’s done in the entire series. Rick, knowing that he, Carl, Michonne, and Daryl were going to be the proverbial “stranger[s] in a strange land” decided to prepare in the event the people of Terminus weren’t as friendly as they made themselves appear. Whenever you’re going to a new community in a zombie apocalypse, you need to know there’s a chance they might be hostiles, and prepare accordingly. Watch them, observe them, and make sure you have a cache of weapons handy in case they are hostile, and have taken the weapons you brought with you.

You should always beware of strangers.