The Walking Dead: World Beyond: Who ISN’T The Worst?

1) Dr. Lyla Belshaw

Okay, if you already saw my “Who’s The Worst?” article, you got a little of this already, but, for those who didn’t (Or haven’t seen season five of The Walking Dead) let me recap: The first episode of that season, “No Sanctuary”, features Rick Grimes’s group escaping the clutches of the people of Terminus (If you don’t know, somehow, I won’t spoil anymore), who, are…bad…to put it mildly.

However, the member of that group who stuck out the most to me was Martin. Martin wasn’t especially violent, or cruel, or anything like that, but, what struck me about him was how utterly callous he was. When he was talking to Tyreese (Who was watching him while Carol helped Rick and the others), he told Tyreese that he didn’t really care about what happened to the rest of Terminus (“They’re just assholes I survive with”, he said). This, we’d learn, was not unusual, as, when things break down, you see several members of the community just abandon each other, rather than help them escape walkers, but, what made Martin different is that, as he was talking with Tyreese, he gave you the impression that…he didn’t care about anyone, at all.

Martin came off like a person who could watch his own mother being eaten by walkers, and just shrug his shoulders, grab his stuff, and walk away without a second thought. For the first seven seasons of the show, Martin was, in my opinion, the most irredeemable villain in The Walking Dead — Worse than The Governor, worse than Ed, worse than the Wolves, worse than Negan — until Simon’s turn in season eight.

The reason I say all of this is because…I don’t get that same vibe from Dr. Belshaw.

Don’t get me wrong, her nonchalance as she saw her friend, Dr. Abbott, being experimented on as a walker (Even just casually eating a sandwich as she watched him fidget in his restraints), puts her dangerously close the red zone of villainy, “Martin Territory”, but, she isn’t Martin.

While we don’t see too much of her, we do see her have some very normal, very human moments with Iris and Hope’s dad, Dr. Leo Bennett: Sharing dinner together, drinking wine, having a good laugh about Dr. Belshaw’s terrible lentils, you know, normal stuff.

This shows that maybe, she isn’t the soulless machine I thought she was. I mean, we see her saying to herself (In preparation for telling Leo that Hope is being brought to the facility) that the Civic Republic projects humanity’s demise within thirty years without a cure for the zombie virus, so, it’s possible that what we saw as a cold, clinical ignoring of a friend being used as a test subject, is just her having to seal away her emotions in pursuit of a goal she and, presumably, Dr. Abbott shared: Eradicating the zombie virus, and giving humanity a chance.

The mere fact she wants to save humanity at all gives her more empathy than many a good villain from the Walking Dead universe.

Is she the most redeemable villain of the first season of World Beyond? No. But, seeing her have these very human moments, showing that, at least on some level, she cares about other people means she does have room to redeem herself.

Here’s hoping she does in season two…