Maggie is back, and she’s got some stuff to deal with.
BY: JACOB POLITTE
Online Editor
The Walking Dead: “Home Sweet Home”
Season 10, Episode 17
Airdate: 2/28/2021
After a long layoff, we’re back with a few Walking Dead firsts. This is the first seventeenth episode of a Walking Dead season ever, as well as the first episode of the show to be filmed on digital cameras instead of film. It is also the first real episode of the show to be fully produced following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
You can tell that the pandemic has affected the production of this show just based on this episode. “Home Sweet Home” features a smaller cast of characters and a story that keeps the featured group separated at many points. Despite the obvious effects of the pandemic, the episode is still quite a fun hour for many reasons.
“Home Sweet Home” is, quite appropriately, a feature episode that marks the true return of Maggie Rhee to the show. Gone since the end of “What Comes After” way back in 2018, we haven’t really known what she’s been up to. While there are no flashback scenes, Maggie does explain what happened; after spending a few years with Georgie and mostly failing to have consistent success, Maggie took her son to live in a community in Knoxville, Tennessee until that community was overrun by another group called “The Reapers.”
While she ended up returning back home, to the only place she could think of with the remaining members of her group, she isn’t necessarily prepared to see Negan out in the open, seemingly free of all restraints. She even admits that the reason she couldn’t come back sooner was that she “couldn’t have Negan take up more space in her head.” And that was when he was confined to a jail cell.
While it’s been almost a decade since he murdered her husband, and has largely redeemed himself since through numerous heroic actions… he still beat her husband’s head in with a barbed wire baseball bat right in front of her. That’s not really something anyone should just forget about, no matter how long it has been. Maggie is right to be upset.
Negan is a much different person now than he was, but he rightfully knew that if Maggie ever came back, this situation would arise. While the tension doesn’t explode in “Home Sweet Home” it’s definitely starting to simmer, and looks to explode before season’s end.
Also interesting is Carol’s seeming affection for Negan. I do think if she was in the clearing where he killed two of her people way back in Season 7, she wouldn’t be acting like this. Daryl, while being able to not want to kill Negan on-site, still doesn’t really like the guy, even if they can work together to fight off a threat. No one should probably ever fully forgive or trust the guy.
One last thing about Negan: his backstory will serve as the true season finale of Season 10. Set to air on Apr. 4 and titled “Here’s Negan” as a tribute to the comic mini-series, we’ll finally meet his wife, Lucille, and find out what led him down the path that he traveled. Also slated to make appearances during that hour? Carol and Maggie. There are a lot of other fun stories planned for these next few weeks, but I’m very intrigued to see how the Negan situation plays out, especially given that everyone seems to be now living under one charred roof.
Yes, charred. It seems like Beta and the Whisperers left a parting gift before their defeat… they wrecked Alexandria after its evacuation late last season, tearing down some of the fences and burning part of it up.
SCATTERED OBSERVATIONS:
– It’s nice to have Maggie, and by extension Lauren Cohan, back on the show again. It didn’t take her long to find her groove again, and while it’s not exactly like she never left, she has one of the more compelling stories to grapple with going forward.
– Lauren Cohan did a great job selling her deflated and sad demeanor looking at the Hilltop ruins.
– Speaking of which, I’m surprised that there seems to be no plans to rebuild the Hilltop. In the comics, it was literally rebuilt in record time following the assault.
– Connie’s sister Kelly tags along for this journey and the show is actually getting me to really like her. It also didn’t hurt that Maggie felt bad almost immediately after she yells at Kelly for going out to look for her sister.
– I do wonder how Connie’s fate will be addressed. We do know she’s alive after the events of “A Certain Doom.”
– I like Maggie’s remaining companions, Cole and Elijah. I do not like that they had Elijah unmask this early.
– Lydia had nothing to do, and I’m genuinely concerned that since the Whisperers arc is done now, she won’t have anything else to do either. I hope I’m wrong, because Cassady McClincy is capable of some fine acting.
– They really picked an actor for Hershel Junior that could believably look and sound like someone spawned from Steven Yuen. Absolutely perfect casting.
– I just hope that when the show reaches its final episode, Hershel isn’t a complete jerk like he turned out to be in the comic series.
– One very big criticism: that body grenade that the Reaper set off should have killed them all, or at the very least injured them greatly. They were all standing way too close and couldn’t have moved away in time to take absolutely no damage. I’ve never handled one, but even I know grenades don’t work like that.
– Another thing that took away from the episode, although it’s not like much could have been done about it: almost everyone looks different than they did in “A Certain Doom.” I’m not sure how much time passed in the show since the events of that episode, but it couldn’t have been more than a few days at most. Maggie’s hair looks a bit shorter, and Lydia looks like she went to a salon at the episode’s end. Even Negan looks a bit different. Again, it’s not that big of a deal, but it is noticeable enough.
– As stated in the recap, the show changed the manner in which they film scenes; they now film on digital cameras. It was a change that was brought on mainly due to pandemic reasons; before, film would need to be switched out every few minutes to maintain the grainy look. There’s not really a lot of time to do that now. The change also looks to be permanent, and many fans who watched this episode are put off by it. Personally, it makes no difference to me.
– Overall, I’m very happy to have The Walking Dead back. It’s been far too long, and I’ve missed these characters and this world. There are still 29 new episodes left to enjoy before it all ends, and I have faith in Angela Kang and her team to finish strongly.
