The Walking Dead Season 8, Episode 7: "Time for After"
by Phil AkinWarning: This review may contain spoilers for this episode and previous episodes of The Walking Dead.
Wow. This episode. It’s clearly just biding its time until the mid-season finale. There are a couple problems with this episode, and they all come from bad writing. The main problems are Daryl, Tara, and Morgan. The other problem comes from Eugene, and since this was a rather Eugene-heavy episode, that problem bleeds throughout the whole episode. The only semblance of a saving grace for this episode comes from Rick and his time with Jadis and the Scavengers, but even those scenes have their bad moments.
Image from Den of Geek
The problem with Eugene is that for being such a smart character, he’s incredibly stupid. Sure, he’s with Negan now, but he will probably go back to being with Rick and his group later this season. Maybe Dwight will convince him to rejoin that group. He tells Dr. Carson that he wants Gabriel to live, yet blames Gabriel for everything. When he is about to tell Negan about Dwight and his betrayal, he chickens out once Dwight shows up in person. When Dwight offers him a chance to help AHK, he refuses and tries to lure the Walkers away with an iPod. When Eugene picks up the iPod from the coffin, he has a flashback to when Sasha emerged as a Walker from said coffin. This of course does nothing to change his mind to help Dwight. He “needs” alcohol to deal with being at the Sanctuary, yet does nothing to fix his situation. He could have killed Negan last season, but chose not to. Granted, Negan has plot-armor for the time being, but the point is that all of Eugene’s problems stem from his piss-poor attitude.
Moving on to Daryl’s little group. I said it last week and I’ll say it again; Daryl will more than likely become an antagonist to Rick, and this episode only further cements that idea. Daryl has had a streak this season of openly disobeying Rick. It began with killing Morales, and continues with ramming a garbage truck into the Sanctuary. Daryl, Tara and Morgan all want the Saviors dead. You can’t blame them for wanting that, but really only Negan and Jared need to die. There are innocent workers at the Sanctuary, and plenty of people like Dwight do not want to be there and are willing to help Rick’s cause. Others like Gavin could probably be swayed to join Rick or one of the other communities.
Image from AMC
But of course, Daryl, Tara and Morgan have tunnel vision and have to go off and do their own thing. Surprisingly, it seems for a moment that Michonne is going to join them on their clearly stupid crusade. Thankfully she backs out at the last minute. However, she isn’t completely innocent. Out of all people who knew how important this plan is, Michonne does nothing to prevent Daryl from ruining it. What’s even more surprising is that Rosita was the one who left first! How did we get to the point where Rosita of all characters, the one who took a shot at Negan and got Olivia killed as a result, is the moral compass of the group? While Rosita doesn’t really do anything to stop Daryl either, at least she has some common sense. Wow, I can’t believe I just typed that sentence.
One of best scenes this week is when Rick is fighting off a Walker and two Scavengers. He grabs the leash that the Walker is on and beats the Scavengers with it, then rips off the zombie’s head and pins Jadis down right next to its chomping jaw. It’s nice to see Jadis in a helpless situation, as she is incredibly annoying and way too cocky. Not to mention she keeps running the “sleeping with Rick” gag into the ground every chance she gets. The plan seems to be going well until Rick finally sees what Daryl has done. Will Rick lock up Daryl? Can the plan still survive or is it finished? Hopefully we’ll find out next week.
