Andrew Lincoln as Rick Grimes and Chandler Riggs as Carl Grimes in Walking Dead Season 4 Episode 9
Warning: This Walking Dead Season 4 post contains spoilers.
Since everyone was just forced to run away, you wouldn’t expect The Walking Dead Season 4 Episode 9 (After) to resume at the prison. But episode director Ernest R. Dickerson takes you back again to remind you about the carnage that transpired there as he moves his camera that through thick smoky clouds, past The Governor’s corpse, before settling on Michonne.
It becomes clear in this opening scene that our solitary heroine will be a focus of this episode, which is great because we still haven’t learned much about her. Unfortunately our payment for spending time with her is witnessing her somber task of destroying Hershel’s zombie head and making new walker pets.
Michonne is a lonely soul, so tortured by her inner demons that she pushes everyone else away. But in this episode she realizes that isolation just leaves her with mindless shambling corpses for company, a discovery that comes when she angrily massacres a group of walkers. Although the outburst is satisfying on a visceral level, it also represents and important emotional turning point for Michonne. She needs humans to give her life meaning, particularly Rick and Carl. I’m happy that she decides to track them down.
Another gratifying part of The Walking Dead Season 4 Episode 9 is finding out more of Michonne’s back story. I’m thrilled that the show’s writers made her an upper-class person like Robert Kirkman implied that she was in his Walking Dead comics. The only thing that I think sucked about this section of the episode though, is that Michonne’s tale takes the form of dreamed hallucinations, so it’s difficult to tell what actually happened in her life.
The Walking Dead Season 4 Episode 9 also focuses on another character who is on his own: Carl. After Rick’s injuries leave him incapacitated, Carl must fend for himself, as he stars in an annoying film I like to call, Home Alone 6: Lost in Zombieland.
Understandably Carl harbors a lot of hatred toward his father for what he perceives as Rick’s failures as a leader. Carl gets pretty sassy while Rick’s still conscious and even tells him off once Rick is out cold. Yet as much as Carl wants to think he’s an adult and try to act like it, he still needs Rick. You want to smack the boy as he carelessly walks around looking for food and nearly gets bitten several times due to his lack of caution. The dumbass even loses his shoe.
As stupid as I feel that segment is, I think the episode wraps up nicely once Rick regains consciousness and reconciles with his son. The icing on the cake is a charming moment where Michonne finds them and knocks on the door. It’s cute and funny when Rick laughs and says to his son “It’s for you.”
What do you think Michonne was doing on the other side of the door? Holding comic books? Holding Carl’s shoe? Or just waving? And finally, this week’s poll: Did you hate Carl seeing on his own as much as I did?
