After the last episode’s attempt at humanising the only villain this show has, the showrunners quickly decide to ignore their progress. The episode begins with little Meghan questioning if The Governor, now calling himself Brian, is evil and by the end of episode we get our answer.
This is an improvement on “Live Bait” and manages to do more with The Governor. Essentially it makes the last episode redundant and makes the characterisation of The Governor seem a little jilted. This could be intentional as the man is clearly insane. Perhaps this was the twist in The Governor’s story and the showrunners thought they had fooled the audience into thinking he had changed.
However this episode is more accomplished in attempting that bait and switch. Using Martinez to highlight the apparent change in attitude from The Governor is a succinct way of telling the story “Live Bait” tried. The audience knows that Brian will eventually revert back to The Governor, but the show attempts to at least make the whole idea engaging in this episode. They build up the safety of Martinez’s new camp and show how things are going well. However they aren’t as good as they could be in The Govenor’s eyes.
The Govenor’s true return is portrayed well by David Morrissey. Morrissey is a strong presence and he is given some great material to work with. The systematic take over of the camp by the Governor is fun to watch. His moral justification for his actions only heighten his crazy, however the scary aspect is that he can be interpreted as right in his motivations.
This may not have been the blood filled action melodrama The Walking Dead is accustomed to, but it is a solid look at a character who has been poorly mishandled. The Governor’s return last week was a rocky start, but this episode puts things back in order and promises a confrontation between him and Rick that could spell certain doom for a lot of the cast.
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