Fear The Walking Dead Theory: The Fate Of The U.S.S. Pennsylvania

This week’s episode of Fear The Walking Dead took place entirely in and around the U.S.S. Pennsylvania, a nuclear-armed submarine beached on the coast of Galveston, Texas, which Teddy intended to use to annihilate North America with nuclear hellfire.

As the episode progressed, we found out the ship held a complement of one hundred and fifty crew members, and, judging by what we saw of them, by the time Morgan and his friends arrived, the ship held a complement of one hundred and fifty walkers.

…Well…one hundred and forty-nine, actually.

You see, there’s one member of the crew (And only one) that we know survived: Riley, Teddy’s second-in-command, who just so happened to be the Pennsylvania’s weapons officer.

This week’s Fear The Walking Dead featured the USS Pennsylvania, a beached submarine. My question is: What the hell happened to it?

Isn’t that a strange coincidence? The one (Apparent) survivor of a nuclear-armed submarine just so happens to be part of a genocidal death cult. Quite the coincidence, indeed.

Fear The Walking Dead Theory: Riley Sabotaged The Pennsylvania.

Am I the only person who finds it odd that Riley seemed to be the only survivor of the ship? There were one hundred and fifty crew members, and, apparently, only the one now in the death-cult survived? Something doesn’t add up.

Now, we could assume someone on board turned, and because it’s a submarine, there was nowhere for the rest of the crew to go; they got bit, they turned—Tale as old as time.

But, there are some…inconsistencies with that. Namely, the fact that, when Dwight and Sherry tried to follow Morgan, they found several crew bunks. But, inside were about four corpses still in their beds. Not walkers…corpses.

From what we see, none of them were killed — There weren’t any head wounds indicating they were put down by Morgan or anyone else — just dead. Well, that’s isn’t entirely true: Two of the bodies had dried blood on their chins and were handcuffed together.

What? Why? Along with not making any sense, it looks like those two crew members (And possibly the others in that set of bunks) were poisoned.

Does this mean Riley poisoned some of the crew? Maybe. It certainly strikes me as odd that, on a ship where a good portion of the crew were walkers, and some tried to make a stand at the bunks, there’s a handful that just seemed dead.

Honestly, I think Riley, once it was clear what was going on at home, figured, “Screw duty. I need to get home” and decided to hell with anyone who tried to stop him, including his crewmates.

I know it might not make much sense, but, let’s really take a second look at Riley for a minute. Look at how comfortable he seems to have come with killing — Threatening Alicia, Wes, Althea, and Luciana, partaking in the cult’s attacks, threatening Grace while she was pregnant — and even the fact he’s with Teddy in the first place. I mean, you lose your family, and you suddenly join up with a guy who’s creating a death-cult? Doesn’t that strike you as odd?

I think the reason he joined Teddy was that he was already okay with mass murder, and I think he was so because he’d already done it on the Pennsylvania. I suspect that he was determined to get back home no matter what, and the rest of the crew, worried about their own families in other parts of the country or afraid of what would be waiting for them on land, refused, prompting Riley to force the Pennsylvania to land in Texas, finding some way to kill some people in the crew (Maybe poison, he was the weapons officer, after all, he probably could have had access to poisonous materials), hoping the chaos would encourage the officers to order an emergency evacuation as they floated around the Gulf of Mexico, then, once run aground, made his escape, leaving his crewmates to a grisly demise inside the ship.

I mean, assuming he is the only survivor (Which is how things look), I think it’s naive to assume that he wasn’t involved in why the rest of his crewmates were dead, and his ship beached in Texas. There are just too many coincidences for me to think there isn’t something fishy going on, and Riley, being in a genocidal death cult, smells the fishiest.

But, what do you guys think? Do you think the Pennsylvania’s beaching was under nefarious circumstances? Do you think Riley is the only survivor, and, if so, don’t you think that’s a little odd? Do you think he murdered some of his crewmates and abandoned the rest to the walkers? Let me know! I’m curious! And, if you want to hear my theories on how to survive a zombie apocalypse in the real world, why not pick up a copy of my book, The Rules: A Guide To Surviving The Zombie Apocalypse! You can also find it on Amazon here and iTunes here!