8x16 Wrath

[5.2/10] Notions of reconciliation and mercy are powerful because they invoke the idea that The Walking Dead has been so invested in this season -- that there could be something different, something better, than this endless array of bad blood and killing.

That’s an antidote to the idea that might makes right, that vengeance must be had, and suggests that might can come with grace, that wrongs can be forgiven. For a season founded on the concept of war, to conflicts and alliances and the clash of civilizations, there are worse things to anchor your finale around than the idea that we can break bread with our enemies, and show them kindness when we have every reason to turn them away.

But by god, you have to earn that.

And “Wrath” just doesn't. It tries. It commits. It goes whole hog on these concepts and has character after character reckoning with making a different sort of choice, leaning into a sense of healing, and having the universe reward them for it. Rick spares Negan. Daryl spares Dwight. Gabriel regains his sight, one way or another. Alden gives up the Savior life and wants to help the Hilltop rebuild. Morgan sends Jadis to the Hilltop and seeks the dump as a place to better himself. The Saviors are to be remade as a peaceful community, part of the vaunted larger world.

But it takes every shortcut in the book to get there. Don’t get me wrong, after suffering through what feels like scores of tedious, underfed “extended” episodes, I’m not exactly clamoring for The Walking Dead to bust out ninety minutes of battling and denouement, but at best, at least half of those stories gloss over how the character gets from Point A to Point B to their pleasantries at the finish line.

To some degree, finales should get a little leeway in that regard. These are endings after all. Ideally, the show should have laid the groundwork for everyone’s journeys up until this point, so using the runtime to close out the biggest season-length arcs, while merely putting capstones on other plotlines is forgivable, if not always eminently satisfying. But for a show like The Walking Dead, which has introduced so many characters going through so many different, individual challenges, the whole back half of “Wrath” can’t help but feel like one big drive-by of each story (and that’s not counting the assorted teases for next season).

And my god, that’s before all the speeches. Maybe I would give “Wrath” a little more credit for tying of loose ends in a rushed fashion if it could do so with anything other than a series of undifferentiated, faux-profound oratories stacked on top of one another. Rick gives a speech. Negan gives a speech. Jesus gives a speech. Morgan gives a speech. Daryl gives a speech. Maggie gives a speech. Rick gives another speech (this time with Michonne).

I could even tolerate that tack if there were only some variety! Different characters should have different speech patterns, different rhythms, different verbiage. But everyone in “Wrath” speaks with the same voice, the same stilted, wannabe poetic dialogue, the same saccharine music cues trying to scaffold the emotion those painfully on-the-nose words can muster on their own. You could mix and match half of these speeches and it wouldn’t make much of a difference. It’s The Walking Dead leaning into its worst, most pontificating impulses, and indulging in grand declaration after grand declaration that sputter out of the gate and become exhausting by the end of the episode.

I have to give “Wrath” credit for one thing though. I walked into the episode expecting another epic battle, like the kind we had when Simon stormed the Hilltop. Instead, the show doesn't belabor the lead-up to the inevitable confrontation too much, and the fight itself is almost over before it begins.

There’s a few twists remaining, as Negan baits the hook to lure our heroes (which includes all of the main characters in the same strike force) into his trap, and for a split-second, you believe that the show might go through with at least letting the good guys take some heavy casualties in this conflict.

But then, it turns out that Eugene has had a last minute change of heart, and has sabotaged the bullets he made for the Saviors, Schindler-style. The climax of this 2-season-plus long conflict is not the raucous exchange of bullets, but a couple of ploys and then a fair amount of clean-up. In a show that can and does lean heavy on its action quotient, I appreciate The Walking Dead spending its final hour of this arc focused more on the ploys and choices the characters have made then on the firefights that emerge out of that.

That said, everything feels rushed, a little too perfunctory, and a little too neat. Naturally, Rick & Co. fall right into the trap just as Negan planned (though I do appreciate that the show had Negan double-bluff our heroes, so they don’t seem like complete idiots). Naturally, Eugene’s sabotage goes off without a hitch (or with exactly as many hitches as necessary), and creates the perfect opportunity for him, Gabriel, and Dwight to have their little moments of glory and redemption. Naturally, Alden gets one final shot to prove his loyalty and worth to the Savior-hating Tara, and what do you know, the Oceansiders show up to help defend the Hilltop.

It underlines the ways in which this isn’t just a season finale -- it’s the end of the larger story The Walking Dead has been telling for two and a half years now. That means it feels appropriately final (despite the obvious tease of a giant zombie horde in the distance), but also a little too neat. For an oft-messy show, I suppose I shouldn’t complain if the setups and payoffs are a tad too direct, but it leaves the end results feeling preordained rather than earned victories.

That’s especially true when, of course, this big clash of civilization comes down to Rick and Negan have a one-on-one scuffle. It’s a little tense, but also hard to get past the silliness of this broader conflict being reduced to two stubbly middle-aged guys throwing haymakers at one another. The fight ends when Rick begs for ten seconds of mercy, to give Negan Carl’s vision for the future, and then uses them to slice Negan’s throat with some broken stained glass (in a twist that is a little dumb, but at least nicely set up).

But Rick vows, in another painful, not-so-rousing halftime speech, that he’s going to keep Negan alive (over Maggie’s strenuous, well-acted objections), that this is going to be different, that they are turning over a new leaf as a people and that includes Negan.

It’s an odd choice for this show, but not for the usual reasons. It’s an instance where the episode is running on emotional logic rather than real logic, which is much more the province of, say, Friday Night Lights than The Walking Dead. The latter series tends to stumble more in terms of plot-convenient logic, where characters make confusing, ill-advised, or downright stupid choices so that the story can move along, not because the show’s aiming for particular high-minded bit of sentiment.

But here, we see Rick instructing Siddiq to tend to Negan. We see the other communities allowing the Saviors to start over as a peaceful community. We see almost everyone hit a happy ending (with Maggie and a few disgruntled collaborators the notable exception) and the show hopes we’ll stop scratching our heads as to how this is all supposed to work because we’re enjoying the joy of the destination.

Morgan is suddenly fine, or at least fine enough, that he’s ready to be apart and heal. Henry is a joyful kid again, trading smiles with Carol. The Saviors are planting things and starting over. And Rick fondly remembers his walks with young Carl, writing a letter to his dead son (in voiceover) thanking him for reminding him, and bringing him to this new world.

I can’t fault the show for landing on optimism. It makes Carl’s death into the catalyst for all these people moving past their endless war. It’s striving for something good, at the very least, the value of peace in the midst of a series that is more blood-filled and bullet-ridden but most.

It just makes no sense how we got there. I’m as much a proponent of mercy as anyone, but letting Negan live, not just in the shadow of the lives he’s snuffed out, but in light of the trouble he could cause with his big mouth alone, makes very little sense in the world of The Walking Dead. (And the show bends over backwards to try to account for it as being motivated by anything other than “we like having Jeffrey Dean Morgan in the cast.”)

Wanting to give the Saviors a second chance is a noble ideal, but just leaving a group of people to their own business, after they’ve been actively trying to kill you and, as Eugene can attest, went to absolute hell not long after the last time their fearless leader was out of the picture, seems like a really bad idea.

But I guess The Walking Dead is content to serve up a happy ending, whether or not it’s done the legwork to get its characters or communities there. This is the end of something big for The Walking Dead -- the show’s longest sustained arc; it’s biggest and most prominent guest star, and also a period where the show’s ratings and fanbase have eroded. This ending fits that, both offering a sense of finality, but also the unavoidable flaws that continue to plague the series, even as it tries to adjust.

That means skipping over any realistic path between all-out war and idyllic peace. That means florid oratory after florid oratary that land with all the grace and deftness of a severed zombie head. That means brief check-ins with every character to try to put a final stamp on a series of bumpy, less-than-satisfying arcs. It won’t be, but “Wrath” could be the series finale for The Walking Dead, with Rick having lost the people that kept him going, but started something bigger, and the show offering up some semblance of closure and grander peace to please its audience on the way out, whether it’s earned that or not.