Where did Carol get her extensive collection of sensible ladies’ wear? And how are her collars so neatly pressed in the zombie apocalypse? It’s all just so contrary to everything I know about the end of civilization. Maggie, too. She’s sporting a pressed button-down that is less wrinkled than I’ve been on any job interview. Ugh, even Li’l Asskicker has a North West-level wardrobe.

And trading recipes on the porch? Please. There’s no way that this town survived on its wits. “You can tell the difference between walkers and humans just by sound?” Um, what? You can’t? How are you still alive?

The highlight of the episode? Daryl eatin’ spaghetti. Oh, Daryl. Stay gold, Ponyboy.  And it’s heavy-handed metaphor time, with Michonne hanging her sword on the wall like she just purchased it off of QVC and Rick getting his hand stamped One of us! One of us! One of us! 

How many more episodes until things go really bad in Mayberry? I’m guessing one. Maybe two. But no more than three or this’ll turn into just another season on the farm. Also, there are only three episodes left, so…flaming zombies, or something.

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The episode begins with the Governor beating the crap out of Milton in an effort to get him to nut up. Blondie is still chained to a bad kind of chair with a shmear of too-neat-and-too-bright-to-be-real blood on her forehead. The Governor orders Milton to kill Blondie, but instead of carrying out those very specific and simple orders, Milton turns the knife on the Governor. Milton is too slow and feeble and gets a knife to the belly. Now the Governor can lock Milton in the bad chair room with Blondie and wait for him to die, turn into a zombie, and rip Blondie to pieces. Easy peasy, no need to worry that she might escape, or Milton might live, or someone might rescue her….

Over at the prison-themed bed and breakfast, everyone’s packing up their stuff to make a run for it. Carl, who is now twenty-seven, finds his father’s old sheriff’s badge. The camera lingers on it in a meaningful way, and I’m sure if the sheriff’s badge could speak it would give Carl a long, drawn-out lecture about responsibility. I love that Michonne is carrying her crap in a milk crate, like she’s moving out of her freshman year dorm. Michonne forgives Rick for trying to send her to her death, and then thanks him for taking her in because all women are helpless and need saving. I liked her a lot more before she found her voice. Everyone piles into their surprisingly clean vehicles, except for Daryl who hops on his zombie-proof motorcycle.

Meanwhile, the Governor is getting everyone all revved up for battle. Tyrese and his wife whose name I never bothered to remember because women are useless in the zombie apocalypse say that their fight is against the biters so they’re staying behind to defend the women, children, and the elderly.

To the war we’ve been promised all season! The Governor takes his caravan and storms an empty prison with machine guns and rocket launchers and all sorts of heavy duty equipment which is just about the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen. How about sending someone in to confirm Team Rick’s location? Or at least make sure someone is still inside the prison? Once inside, Team Woodbury finds the prison cleared out of everything useful…except a book that I assume is some sort of bible, opened to a highlighted passage that reads:

29 And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.

Very, very profound stuff, but it does not deter the Governor who decides to move his crew deeper inside of the prison.

Milton tells Blondie that in the tussle, he dropped some tools behind her that she can probably reach with her foot and escape. He tells her to stab him in the head when she gets free so that he can’t turn. But Blondie decides to waste precious time by talking to Milton about things that are much less important than escaping from the bad chair, and Milton dies before Blondie escapes. I guess adrenaline kicks in because Blondie immediately frees her hands to fight Zombie Milton.

It turns out that Team Rick was hiding, waiting to ambush Team Woodbury. They scare Team Woodbury off a little too easily, considering how heavily armed the Governor’s crew was when they entered the prison. Carl even gets a kill in when an escapee in the woods won’t drop his weapon fast enough for the kid’s liking.

Team Rick wants to take the fight back to Woodbury, and we get our first glimpse of Li’l Asskicker in about three episodes. She is surprisingly quiet considering she’s an infant in the midst of gunfire. Hershel explains to Rick that Carl didn’t actually have to shoot the kid who was running through the woods, but rather “he gunned that kid down.” But Hershel doesn’t have a leg to stand on because it’s the goddamned zombie apocalypse and Team Rick has been shooting fish in a barrel all day long. Disciplining Carl for shooting someone is a little too “I learned it from watching you!” anti-drug PSA, so Rick skips the lecture and just moves on with his wretched life.

During Team Woodbury’s retreat, the Governor pulls the caravan over and shoots his own people for being frightened little girls. Despite being heavily armed, nobody thinks to shoot the Governor. Everyone is dead except that guy who made nice with Daryl during the peace talks and some other guy. Then, either as a sign of mercy or to save his own ass, the Governor starts to shoot all of his victims in the head so that they won’t turn. He runs out of bullets right before shooting a woman who was playing dead (because in The Walking Dead, women are scared and must hide instead of fight), then piles his diminished crew in a car and drives off.

Daryl, Rick, and Michonne are off to Woodbury. When they happen upon the Governor’s massacre, they’re a tad confused. Luckily there’s Karen, the one woman he left alive, to explain things. When they get to Woodbury, she tells Tyrese that the Governor is a killer (duh) and Rick’s crew saved her (eye roll). They then go in search of Blondie because…why? Oh right, because women need saving on The Walking Dead. They find Milton dead, and Blondie with a zombie bite wound. Yes! Pours a glass of Champagne….We finally get rid of her! Michonne decides to stay with her in the room while everyone else waits on the other side of the door for a gunshot. But, dammit, we don’t actually get to see Blondie’s dead body, so there’s still a chance that we will be stuck with her in Season Four.

A big old caravan filled with Woodbury’s decrepit elderly and a few children drives into the prison, so I guess we’re also stuck with the prison for Season Four.   The only person who seems happy about the reinforcements is Hershel, who now has a peer group.

Wow. So, yeah. That was far less satisfying than the flaming barn zombies from last season’s finale, and it leaves us in exactly the same place—Rick’s crew in the prison fighting the Governor’s crew in Woodbury. Sigh. I’ll see you all again in October.

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As if this season of The Walking Dead wasn’t boring enough, tonight’s episode was all about heart-to-hearts. Talking. Just two people, talking. There was Merle and Poor Man’s Jamie Lee Curtis, Daryl (who has sort of a weird boy-band-meets-Bowie haircut happening all of a sudden) and Glenn, then Merle and Daryl with a sappy “I just want my brother back,” and a prayer session between Hershel, his daughters, and the same God who created zombies. We also get a mercifully short talk between Rick and Lori, and oh! Glenn has a talk with Hershel where he asks for Maggie’s hand in marriage.

Speaking of things that are stupid, Michonne falls for the old “we have to secure the borders” trick and wanders around the prison alone with Merle. He easily takes her down (along with a half dozen walkers) even though Michonne would never, ever make such a rookie mistake.

To make it even more ridiculous, Merle somehow drags an unconscious Michonne out of the prison without anyone noticing. Once she wakes up, they’re on the road to Woodbury so that he can turn her over to The Governor.

They arrive at a motel where Merle breaks into a car to hot wire it for the rest of the trip. Unfortunately, he sets off a car alarm or, as they are known in the zombie apocalypse, the dinner bell. Merle suddenly becomes the most careless human on the planet and doesn’t realize his mistake until he is neck deep in zombies. Miraculously, he gets the car moving and the unlikely pair head off to Woodbury.

The most unintentionally funny part of the show is Glenn shopping for a wedding ring, which involves scouring the prison yard for zombie fingers. A diamond is forever!

After more talking than we’ve gotten out of Michonne this whole season, Merle gives Michonne her sword back and lets her out on the side of the road. She runs into Daryl because hey, it’s a small world, and explains that Merle let her go. He then runs off after his brother.

Merle is drinking the world’s last bottle of brown liquor in his newly acquired car with the music blasting, presumably to attract zombies but maybe because he just really likes that song. He leads the zombies to Woodbury, Pied Piper-style. Merle does a barrel roll out of the car right in front of the gate and heads into one of Woodbury’s conveniently spooky barns. The guards hear the ruckus and go on a zombie shooting spree while Merle picks them off one by one (with a little help from the zombies). I find it so interesting that all of the zombies are dressed in somber greens and grays, as if nobody ever died in a fuchsia ball gown.

The Governor finds Merle in the spooky barn and kicks the crap out of him…and did he just bite off Merle’s fingers? Merle gets in a few good jabs and stabs in before The Governor shoots him in the chest. Goodbye, Merle.

Family meeting at the prison! Rick explains how The Governor offered to leave them alone in exchange for Michonne, and how he was going to do that to keep them safe. But, he conveniently changed his mind after he sent Michonne off with Merle so it’s probably too late but it’s not Rick’s fault because he’s sorry so don’t blame him, okay? Rick steps down as leader while he’s making a speech to the group, so take it with a grain of salt. Oh hey! Here’s Michonne! What great timing.

Over in Crazytown, Daryl finds a blood and guts buffet, including his zombie brother chomping on a carcass. Zombie Merle ambles towards his crying brother and receives a boatload of pent up anger in the form of stab wounds to the face. Goodbye, zombie Merle.

So, maybe next week we’ll get this whole war thing we’ve been hearing so much about? Sort of like last season when we were waiting for everyone to leave the farm for, like, seven episodes.

Image courtesy of amctv.com

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