“The Walking Dead” dies as it lived, and some folks stop by to say hello
BY: JACOB POLITTE
Managing Editor
It’s very strange, finally being at the end.
The Walking Dead is over. It died as it lived: full of action, full of dialogue, and botching a perfect ending by throwing in something fun and interesting, but mostly unnecessary.
In all seriousness, “Rest In Peace” was likely the best series finale that a long-running, sometimes uneven show like this can hope to have. The group overcomes the threat of the massive variant walker horde and overthrows the Commonwealth with surprisingly little fuss. The only truly big death was Rosita, who may have been given the most dignified death in the entire history of the franchise. More on that later.
With Living Colour’s “Cult of Personality” playing in the background, the walker horde is lured into the affluent Commonwealth estates, and when the record finally stops playing, a series of elaborate explosives are triggered from Pamela Milton’s home, blowing the entire estates to bits and saving everyone.
Pamela Milton is arrested after everyone turns on her and she almost allows herself to be bit by the walker formerly known as Lance Hornsby.
Negan also appears to have genuinely learned something, and rather sincerely apologizes to Maggie for what he did to her and to Glenn in “The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be.” Maggie appears to be rather stunned, but grateful. Their last scene together, where Maggie thanks Negan for his apology but says that she can’t bring herself to forgive him, was a fantastic moment that was well-earned.
What happens to Negan is a mystery (for now) as Daryl watches him walk away from the house where everyone has gathered for a celebratory dinner. He isn’t seen on camera again.
At dinner, everyone is happy. Rosita especially just wants to take in the moment, but then she reveals that she was bitten. She begins to be weaker, and is led to a bedroom where she can see her child and everyone who comes to visit her one last time.
Eugene is the last visitor. If you were to tell me years ago that the primary emotional anchor of the series finale was the relationship between Rosita and Eugene, I likely would have laughed in your face. But both Serratos and McDermitt put in perhaps their greatest acting work ever in their final scenes together, and it was the first time in quite a while that this show has gotten me to tear up.
In the aftermath of these events, here is where everyone ends up at least one year after:
- Ezekiel somehow ascends to the Governor position, and Mercer is his right-hand man as the Lieutenant Governor. I’m not exactly sure how Ezekiel wound up where he did, but Mercer helping to run things and eventually become his successor is a good ending for both of their stories.
- Lydia and Elijah appear to be a part of some apocalyptic Pony Express, and also appear to know where Negan is, as he has them deliver a package to Judith: her compass that she gave him to use back in Season 9’s “Adaptation.”
- Maggie has gone back to Hilltop, and that community is back on its feet.
- Aaron and Gabriel appear to be leading Alexandria, and Gabriel is taking care of Rosita’s child.
- Eugene has a child with Max, and names her Rosie.
- Connie still is working for The Commonwealth Tribune.
- Carol has taken Lance Hornsby’s old job, although what her actual title is called is not revealed. That being said, she seems to be doing rather well in the role. Also of note: her hair is back to its Seasons 1-8 look. She also, along with Ezekiel, ends up being responsible for Rick’s children at the series end. All appears to be well now and there are no threats on the horizon, but those kids better watch out.
- Daryl and Carol find out from an arguably delirious Judith that Rick is still alive and that Michonne went to go find him. Daryl doesn’t immediately leave to go find them, which Judith was afraid of, but he does venture out into the unknown at the series end to look for other communities, promising that he would bring them home if he came across them.
The Walking Dead ended almost perfectly with Daryl riding off into the sunset. “Rest In Peace” will absolutely go down as a Top 10 episode of the show, and that’s not a bad note to leave things on considering the state this show was in during Seasons 7 and 8. And if the episode ended with Daryl riding off, it would have felt perfect because it felt earned.
Then Rick and Michonne showed up on screen and kind of messed that perfect ending up.
It was great seeing them both again, especially Rick. The finale would not have felt complete without them. That’s not the issue. The issue is that tonally, it throws everything off. It felt like a different show, which it’s going to be. But this would have been served better being an extended post-credits scene instead of the last thing before the credits rolled.
Michonne is clearly fairing pretty well, with some fancy battle gear and being relatively clean. Rick, however, is pretty disgusting. The man looks like he’s spent quite a few years living on the streets of Philadelphia (where he is revealed to have been), and is walking the apocalyptic wasteland barefoot for crying out loud
While we know what Michonne is doing, Rick’s fate has been a total mystery. Here’s what I can summarize about what he’s been up to within the Civic Republic military:
- These scenes are taking place at different points in time. Michonne has the backpack that he threw onto the boat after she found its contents in “What We Become.”
- If you watched World Beyond Season 2, you may recognize the jacket Rick is wearing, as well as the weapon that he’s carrying. Silas Plasket wore the same kind of jacket and had the same kind of weapon while working at a Civic Republic Cull Facility in New York state. The goal of these Cull Facilities was to use music and lights to attract the dead en masse, blow them up with explosives, and then put down any surviving zombies. While it’s unknown if the Civic Republic controls all of Philadelphia, it’s possible that the city has a Cull Facility of its own, and that Rick was working it in at some point.
- Rick is referred to as “Consignee Grimes” by a man over the intercom. That could be a special CRM military term for people, but the term usually means that the person is a recipient of something. What that “something” is isn’t made clear… but Rick really didn’t want that iPhone to be on him when he got caught. Something about that is strange, and it may be important later.
- The Civic Republic is unaware of the often horrific actions of its military, who are a rather antagonistic force. Usually, when someone tries to escape a cull facility they are severely punished, and sometimes even killed. From the tone of voice of the man on the intercom, it doesn’t sound like this was Rick’s first escape attempt. Jadis, although now quite the high ranking villain in the CRM herself, may have convinced them that Rick was too valuable to be killed.
And so The Walking Dead ends with Rick smiling, almost psychotically, at the approaching helicopter that’s lowering to catch him. While it was really great to see him again, I’m not sure it needed to be the final image of the show. Otherwise, “Rest In Peace” was a much better ending to The Walking Dead than a lot of people probably expected it to be.
SCATTERED OBSERVATIONS AND NEWS UPDATES:
– The GCI in the exploding Estates neighborhood was insane. For a show known for its cost-cutting and low budget, it’s rather impressive how impressive it looked.
– Most of the show’s music this episode was done with recordings from a live orchestra, including the theme. It was epic.
– When “Cult of Personality” started playing, I imagine that CM Punk was very happy watching from his home in Chicago. When he’s not getting into fights in locker rooms because he works with a bunch of children, I know he really enjoys this show.
– Gabriel being the one to try and open the gates to save a bunch of people was a parallel to his not letting his congregation in at the start of the apocalypse, and the show didn’t draw attention to that parallel.
– I’m glad Rosita died because there was no way she could have realistically made it out of falling through a pile of walkers completely unscathed.
– The fountain at the end with the names of everyone who died was a nice little thing.
– Rosita’s death was rather peaceful, but Luke’s was bloody and rather traumatic. His entire group acted their asses off and really made that scene work, especially because I don’t care about Luke since he’s been off-screen for so long.
– Luke’s girlfriend from Oceanside also got eaten right after the opening credits. I don’t care.
– Speaking of Oceanside, their fate is just never revisited. I don’t believe it was said that they got wiped out, but I could be wrong.
– Uh, where did Virgil go? He seemed pretty integral to the plot at one point because he was the only person other than Judith who knew why Michonne left, and they just never revisited that or re-used him again after “For Blood.” If that was the case, he should have died back at the house with all the feral people.
– Judith is gonna have to have so much therapy to get through all these adults abandoning her.
– Rick could really benefit from taking a shower when he gets back to Philadelphia.
ONE FINAL NOTE:
And that’s a wrap on The Walking Dead, as well as these reviews. While I will be watching all of the upcoming spin-offs, I don’t think I’ll be reviewing them.
When I started these reviews back in 2018, I was expecting to crap all over the show much more than I ended up doing.
I was expecting a show that historically never really took criticism all that well and refused to change to really give me some garbage material. Writing is sometimes so much easier when you hate something.
Instead, Angela Kang pulled off something rather remarkable: she took a show on its deathbed and about to lose its main character and turned it around. The last three seasons of the Walking Dead have been really fun and really easy to watch. There hasn’t been a whole lot to crap on. Everyone involved stepped up in a really big way. Whatever Kang does in the future, I’m very glad that she steered this thing back in the right direction and gave it a great final few years.
As for me, it’s been a pleasure covering this show. But I’m glad it’s over. I have a lot more responsibilities with The Montage now than when I started writing these reviews, and it’s time for me to focus more on that side of things. I will be reviewing a new show for The Montage in a few months: HBO’s “The Last Of Us.” But I don’t think those reviews will be as extensive or detailed as these can be at times. And I doubt I’ll write about The Walking Dead again.
So this is it. Thank you all for reading.
