[4.4/10] I am a sucker for the trope of people seeing visions of their loved ones in an hour of need, even from works that aren’t that great. I bit when The Curious Case of Benjamin Button did it. I bit when House M.D. did it. And hell, I even bit when The Walking Dead did it with Tyrese. There is an inherent power to a more impressionistic approach, where the faces of people we’ve lost or grown estranged from come to comfort us when things look their darkest.
But I felt almost nothing during “What Comes After”.
That’s because The Walking Dead’s full-throated but half-hearted farewell to Rick Grimes is the ur-example of forty-five minutes of sound and fury signifying nothing. Say what you will about The Walking Dead, but it normally puts its best foot forward for these big moments. Sometimes they still leave me disappointed, but normally you can at least see the aspirations of something greater, a chance to be a cut above seized, even in the show’s more underwhelming premieres, finales, and goodbyes.
And to be fair, you can see the show attempting to pull out all the stops as it sends Rick off. “What Comes After” features return engagements from past players, a larger horde of extras giving chase than usual, and some ethereal scenes set in old locales, or with grim but spiritual tableaus of those who’ve passed and those who might still pass. It’s clear that The Walking Dead is aiming to say something with all of this, which makes the episode’s failure that much more miserable.
With the chance to put a period on the story of Rick Grimes, to sum-up his character and journey from beginning to end with some new insight or breakthrough, “What Comes After” instead offers the audience an ellipsis, and the same reheated themes the show has been chewing on for nine seasons now without anything new to say or show for it.
Rick spends ninety percent of the episode wandering around in his state of half-delirium, muttering to himself or the ghosts he envisions, that he needs to find his family. That could be a chance for some meaningful echoes of Rick’s original mission, the one that started his journey, which seems to be what The Walking Dead is trying to evoke here. Instead, Rick dreams up a rescue from his friends, and weakly but warmly declares that they’re his family, a point so hackneyed and tired that the show itself has already heavily underlined it at least twice by now.
That’s the biggest problem with “What Comes After.” The episode grasps at profundity, but only manages to circle around the same platitudes this show has been chasing for nine seasons now, and it does so with the series’ typical painful, overwritten dialogue. Rick’s exchange with Herschel loses any force when it falls headlong into the same “I could have done more or done different” territory that the show’s gone over umpteen times by now. Sasha’s return, and an unreal landscape of bodies can’t make up for yet another dose of the same “the people we’ve lost give us strength” pablum. There is nothing new here, and the old is delivered with the worst of the show’s tics and excesses.
Only the return of Shane creates a sequence with any real juice. In that scene, the show couches the same faux-meditative mumbo jumbo in the easy on-screen rapport between Andrew Lincoln and Jon Bernthal. It’s the only scene in the whole episode where the characters feel like real people, and not vessels to deliver well-worn, ponderous notions.
Shane’s advice to his old partner here isn’t new. Lord knows that The Walking Dead has endlessly ruminated on whether Rick should be vengeful or merciful to survive in this environment, an idea Shane was once his lethally pragmatic counterpart for. But that scene conveys that idea with a personal connection, with a conversational tone, that slips the magnitude and purgatorial import of what’s Shane’s imparting in a less blunt, more unassuming fashion, which ironically gives it more power than similar attempts in the episode.
But “What Comes After” wants you to know that Rick is dogged, that he will never give up, that he will put his life on the line over and over again to stay ahead of the horde and keep his people safe. The metaphor is, once again, not particularly subtle, as Rick’s efforts to outrun and redirect the walkers after him checks in as a representation of his path throughout the series. The show even plops him on a horse again, to create another set of bookends between this and his first appearance. But aside from some neat framing and imagery here and there, it comes off too hamfisted to do any real thematic work for the episode.
You get the sense that the folks behind The Walking Dead know this. There’s a liberal dose of silent reaction shots, of somber piano and mournful strings, in “What Comes After”. It’s as though the show knows that it’s not able to evoke a powerful emotional response on its own, and so has to strain through every image, sound, and trick in the book to try to convince the audience to feel something that the script alone can’t manage.
This is Rick, for chrissake! Lord knows I’ve never been as fascinated with the character as the show seems to be, but he is the protagonist of The Walking Dead, even as it evolved into more of an ensemble show. Having his swan song evoke something in your views ought to be a layup, filled with the accumulated weight of nine years of stories with him largely at the center. I’d be lying if I said I expected Rick’s purported last episode on the show to be a homerun, but I also didn’t expect it to be such an unmitigated dud, so bereft of real feeling or anything meaningful to say that it wastes the exit of its most prominent character.
And then The Walking Dead doesn't even have the guts to actually kill Rick off! The show was already playing with schmuck bait when it left our hero impaled and surrounded by walkers at the end of the last episode, and nevertheless managed to free himself, hop back on his horse, and ramble on for hours more. But as if that weren’t enough, it gives us an already contrived sequence, where Rick aims to lure the walkers over the unstable bridge, so that his dying act can be to save his people from the horde.
Then, the bridge stays sturdy enough to support the zombies, and you know, I actually liked that choice. There’s a bitter irony to it that felt like the first time in “What Comes After” was getting at something deeper here. Instead, it’s just a setup for Rick to do one more stupid hero trick, and blow up the bridge with his trademark revolver, directed at some conveniently placed dynamite, while his friends are close enough to help but not close enough to save him. Insert slow motion shots of grief, and more sad music, and the untimely and unsatisfying but noble end of Rick Grimes.
Except it isn’t! Nevermind the shoehorned-in confrontation between Maggie and Negan. Nevermind the corny “My name’s Judith Grimes” tag the episode chooses to go out on (presumably in an attempt to hook viewers who might plan to exit the show at the same time Rick does). Nevermind the underwhelming path the episode takes to get to Rick’s big self-sacrifice. The fact that Rick miraculously survives, and that Anne is able to save him, three minutes after we’re supposed to be devastated by Rick’s death, is downright insulting.
It wipes away whatever meager emotional impact that explosion and aftermath at the bridge was able to muster. It’s a cop out for a show that crafted this episode to be its self-reflective, final take on Rick Grimes. It turns an already limping finale for the show’s main character into fingers-crossed, mealy-mouthed statement that ultimately says nothing.
This may very well be The Walking Dead’s worst episode. There have been duller episodes than this one. There have been episodes with even more unlikely or headscratch-inducing developments. But never before has the series swung so hard and struck out so miserably. Rick Grimes is gone, and the character died (or at least fake died) as he lived: in a story with oodles of potential, that never manages to get out of its own way, and wastes its audience’s time with weak-willed nonsense until the credits roll.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2018-11-14T23:49:24Z
[4.4/10] I am a sucker for the trope of people seeing visions of their loved ones in an hour of need, even from works that aren’t that great. I bit when The Curious Case of Benjamin Button did it. I bit when House M.D. did it. And hell, I even bit when The Walking Dead did it with Tyrese. There is an inherent power to a more impressionistic approach, where the faces of people we’ve lost or grown estranged from come to comfort us when things look their darkest.
But I felt almost nothing during “What Comes After”.
That’s because The Walking Dead’s full-throated but half-hearted farewell to Rick Grimes is the ur-example of forty-five minutes of sound and fury signifying nothing. Say what you will about The Walking Dead, but it normally puts its best foot forward for these big moments. Sometimes they still leave me disappointed, but normally you can at least see the aspirations of something greater, a chance to be a cut above seized, even in the show’s more underwhelming premieres, finales, and goodbyes.
And to be fair, you can see the show attempting to pull out all the stops as it sends Rick off. “What Comes After” features return engagements from past players, a larger horde of extras giving chase than usual, and some ethereal scenes set in old locales, or with grim but spiritual tableaus of those who’ve passed and those who might still pass. It’s clear that The Walking Dead is aiming to say something with all of this, which makes the episode’s failure that much more miserable.
With the chance to put a period on the story of Rick Grimes, to sum-up his character and journey from beginning to end with some new insight or breakthrough, “What Comes After” instead offers the audience an ellipsis, and the same reheated themes the show has been chewing on for nine seasons now without anything new to say or show for it.
Rick spends ninety percent of the episode wandering around in his state of half-delirium, muttering to himself or the ghosts he envisions, that he needs to find his family. That could be a chance for some meaningful echoes of Rick’s original mission, the one that started his journey, which seems to be what The Walking Dead is trying to evoke here. Instead, Rick dreams up a rescue from his friends, and weakly but warmly declares that they’re his family, a point so hackneyed and tired that the show itself has already heavily underlined it at least twice by now.
That’s the biggest problem with “What Comes After.” The episode grasps at profundity, but only manages to circle around the same platitudes this show has been chasing for nine seasons now, and it does so with the series’ typical painful, overwritten dialogue. Rick’s exchange with Herschel loses any force when it falls headlong into the same “I could have done more or done different” territory that the show’s gone over umpteen times by now. Sasha’s return, and an unreal landscape of bodies can’t make up for yet another dose of the same “the people we’ve lost give us strength” pablum. There is nothing new here, and the old is delivered with the worst of the show’s tics and excesses.
Only the return of Shane creates a sequence with any real juice. In that scene, the show couches the same faux-meditative mumbo jumbo in the easy on-screen rapport between Andrew Lincoln and Jon Bernthal. It’s the only scene in the whole episode where the characters feel like real people, and not vessels to deliver well-worn, ponderous notions.
Shane’s advice to his old partner here isn’t new. Lord knows that The Walking Dead has endlessly ruminated on whether Rick should be vengeful or merciful to survive in this environment, an idea Shane was once his lethally pragmatic counterpart for. But that scene conveys that idea with a personal connection, with a conversational tone, that slips the magnitude and purgatorial import of what’s Shane’s imparting in a less blunt, more unassuming fashion, which ironically gives it more power than similar attempts in the episode.
But “What Comes After” wants you to know that Rick is dogged, that he will never give up, that he will put his life on the line over and over again to stay ahead of the horde and keep his people safe. The metaphor is, once again, not particularly subtle, as Rick’s efforts to outrun and redirect the walkers after him checks in as a representation of his path throughout the series. The show even plops him on a horse again, to create another set of bookends between this and his first appearance. But aside from some neat framing and imagery here and there, it comes off too hamfisted to do any real thematic work for the episode.
You get the sense that the folks behind The Walking Dead know this. There’s a liberal dose of silent reaction shots, of somber piano and mournful strings, in “What Comes After”. It’s as though the show knows that it’s not able to evoke a powerful emotional response on its own, and so has to strain through every image, sound, and trick in the book to try to convince the audience to feel something that the script alone can’t manage.
This is Rick, for chrissake! Lord knows I’ve never been as fascinated with the character as the show seems to be, but he is the protagonist of The Walking Dead, even as it evolved into more of an ensemble show. Having his swan song evoke something in your views ought to be a layup, filled with the accumulated weight of nine years of stories with him largely at the center. I’d be lying if I said I expected Rick’s purported last episode on the show to be a homerun, but I also didn’t expect it to be such an unmitigated dud, so bereft of real feeling or anything meaningful to say that it wastes the exit of its most prominent character.
And then The Walking Dead doesn't even have the guts to actually kill Rick off! The show was already playing with schmuck bait when it left our hero impaled and surrounded by walkers at the end of the last episode, and nevertheless managed to free himself, hop back on his horse, and ramble on for hours more. But as if that weren’t enough, it gives us an already contrived sequence, where Rick aims to lure the walkers over the unstable bridge, so that his dying act can be to save his people from the horde.
Then, the bridge stays sturdy enough to support the zombies, and you know, I actually liked that choice. There’s a bitter irony to it that felt like the first time in “What Comes After” was getting at something deeper here. Instead, it’s just a setup for Rick to do one more stupid hero trick, and blow up the bridge with his trademark revolver, directed at some conveniently placed dynamite, while his friends are close enough to help but not close enough to save him. Insert slow motion shots of grief, and more sad music, and the untimely and unsatisfying but noble end of Rick Grimes.
Except it isn’t! Nevermind the shoehorned-in confrontation between Maggie and Negan. Nevermind the corny “My name’s Judith Grimes” tag the episode chooses to go out on (presumably in an attempt to hook viewers who might plan to exit the show at the same time Rick does). Nevermind the underwhelming path the episode takes to get to Rick’s big self-sacrifice. The fact that Rick miraculously survives, and that Anne is able to save him, three minutes after we’re supposed to be devastated by Rick’s death, is downright insulting.
It wipes away whatever meager emotional impact that explosion and aftermath at the bridge was able to muster. It’s a cop out for a show that crafted this episode to be its self-reflective, final take on Rick Grimes. It turns an already limping finale for the show’s main character into fingers-crossed, mealy-mouthed statement that ultimately says nothing.
This may very well be The Walking Dead’s worst episode. There have been duller episodes than this one. There have been episodes with even more unlikely or headscratch-inducing developments. But never before has the series swung so hard and struck out so miserably. Rick Grimes is gone, and the character died (or at least fake died) as he lived: in a story with oodles of potential, that never manages to get out of its own way, and wastes its audience’s time with weak-willed nonsense until the credits roll.