The Key To the Walking Dead Is the Stupids
Tonight on THE WALKING DEAD, everyone got stupid. That's nothing new, of course. TWD's writers have made nearly every inch of plot progression in the bulk of the show's run entirely dependent upon and occurring as a consequence of the characters being stupid. Typically not just run-of-the-mill stupid; we're talking profound cretinism so beyond the bounds of credible as to constitute an open, ongoing insult to and mockery of viewers. No one is this Stupid, and no one so unfailingly, relentlessly Stupid would survive very long in a zombie apocalypse. There are other problems with "The Key," tonight's installment, but this is the one that towers over all others.
Savior turncoat Dwight has cast his lot with our heroes. He's accepted that he'll be dead with the current war is over but he wants to help them win before he goes out. Last week, he was forced to return to the Savior fold to protect the denizens of the Safe Zone. A few eps ago, Dwight intentionally led his group of Saviors into an ambush and helped the Alexandrians kill them all, but one, a woman who witnessed his treachery, got away. When he went back to the Saviors last week, he learned that she is still missing in action but he has to figure she's going to turn up at any moment, and then it will be curtains for him. As tonight's ep opens, he's back at his apartment at the Sanctuary and the Stupids kick in really hard; Negan comes to visit him and Dwight doesn't assassinate the villain on sight. He doesn't do it while Negan stands around jawing. Negan is alone and would never see it coming but Dwight let's him talk for a while then leave in peace. Another victory for Negan's plot immunity and not even the only one this evening.
Negan's forces are going to attack Hilltop and Negan has come up with the idea of coating their melee weapons in walker grue in the hope that those cut by them will then die and zombify, so there's a sequence of the Saviors cutting up zombies and getting their knives and axes good and gooey. It's an idea that came from the comics but there, guns and ammo were, by this point, a lot more scarce and fighting with such weapons much more common. Simon barks Negan's orders to the troops: cut some of 'em and make 'em turn but don't kill them all--they're going to go back to work for us when this is over. How, exactly, are the Saviors, who are supposed to be getting low on ammo, ever going to get close enough to cut people barricaded in a walled fortress on a, yes, hilltop, particularly given that those people have guns--fully automatic weapons--to keep any attackers well at bay?...
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http://cinemarchaeologist.blogspot.com/2018/03/walking-dead-106.html