‘The Walking Dead’ Episode 6.9 “No Way Out” (9 out of 10) Created by Frank Darabont; Starring Andrew Lincoln, Norman Reedus, Steven Yeun, Danai Gurira, Chandler Riggs, Lennie James, Lauren Cohan; Sundays on AMC.
After a fairly lukewarm mid-season finale, tonight’s episode felt like a solid gold kick to the face—and I mean that in the best possible way. From an explosive pre-credits scene to an epic montage of unity through zombie-slaying, we got a little bit of everything that makes “The Walking Dead” great tonight. Spoilers ahead!
Who’s Negan?
The season picks up with that scene involving Daryl (Norman Reedus), Abraham (Michael Cudlitz) and Sasah (Sonequa Martin-Green) having a standoff with a biker gang who are fixing to relieve the trio of their weapons and render them to Negan. It’s a cool scene to watch—those who are familiar with the comics know Negan as one of the most brutally evil characters in comic book history. But to our three survivors, he’s just a name.
Based on the tone of the last few episodes of season six, I was positive that we would lose at least one character before this episode even started. I was delightfully shocked to see the moment that the gang leader (a sickly polite Christopher Berry) pulled his newly-acquired pistols on Sasha and Abraham quickly become the moment that Daryl immolated the whole gang with a rocket launcher. Not only was this a spectacular way to start off a mid-season premiere, but it provided a much-needed overture to an episode where our heroes start kicking ass as opposed to having their asses kicked.
The Alpha Wolf
While this episode was full of explosions and a whole lot of zombie carnage, we also got a thoughtfully constructed character arc involving Denise (Merritt Wever) and a character known as Alpha Wolf (Benedict Samuel). Recalling the last episode, Morgan (Lennie James) and Carol (Melissa McBride) got into a scuffle, allowing Alpha Wolf to escape with Denise as a hostage. Though the two occupy about ten minutes of screen time, it’s some of the most well-executed character development that we’ve seen on the show so far. Benedict Samuel dug deep into the character’s duality—the Wolf claims that he wasn’t always a killer, but the world he lived in required him to become one. When Denise calls him on his violent cynicism, it seems to make enough of an impression for the Wolf to sacrifice his arm to save her from a zombie attack. Despite the fact that Carol shoots the Wolf as soon as they reach the infirmary, his death meant a whole lot more because of these expertly constructed scenes. And props to Merritt Wever, who is making Denise into a soft-spoken badass.
That Escalated Quickly
On Rick’s (Andrew Lincoln) side of the zombie attack, he, Carl (Chandler Riggs) and Michonne (Danai Gurira) are attempting the zombie entrails poncho trick to get Gabriel (Seth Gilliam), Jessie (Alexandra Breckinridge), and her two kids out of the horde. This risky gambit ended with Jessie and Sam (Major Dodson) getting eaten, Ron (Austin Abrams) trying to shoot Rick but instead getting fileted by Michonne and Carl getting his eye shot out. A lot of people are hating on Sam for freaking out, but let’s not forget that the reason he was freaking out was because Carol got into his head way back at the beginning of the season. Her vivid descriptions of how zombies kill and eat people caused him to freeze up, leading to the eventual deaths of his entire family, so nice one, Carol. It was sad to see Jessie go—I liked Alexandra Breckinridge, and I thought she gave the character of Jessie some real gravity—but her two kids were just time bombs waiting to explode, and I’m glad that happened sooner rather than later.
The moment in which Carl gets his eye shot out happened a bit too quickly for me to really register what happened, but I think that was the point. Rick watching half of his immediate companion pool get mauled by zombies only to see that his son has been shot in the face was a lot for all of us to handle. It did, however, provide Rick with enough murder rage to start taking on the throng of zombies with nothing but a hatchet, a move that slowly started to inspire the Alexandrians to take up arms and defend their homes. Like the opening credits scene, we’ve been so used to seeing our heroes get screwed that it was exhilarating to see them finally channel some rage at the undead. Even the most irritatingly milquetoast characters like Eugene (Josh McDermitt) and Gabriel were chopping off all kinds of zombie heads, and the machine gun pacing of the film editing gave the episode a surprisingly cathartic conclusion.
Verdict
I don’t remember the last time an episode felt so short—I was so engrossed in the action that I didn’t even feel the hour-long runtime. There was no shortage of zombie carnage, we had some character-based moral quandaries, and someone finally put that rocket launcher to good use. If Glenn and Maggie (Lauren Cohan) had a more tearful and triumphant reunion, this episode would have had all of its bases covered. I know that this huge victory will be short lived, but I’m officially excited to have my Sunday night zombie fix back.