[Warning: This essay contains spoilers for all of The Walking Dead and The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live through Episode 3.]
Although episode 3 is the weakest of the show so far, it’s not saying much given how elevated this series is.
The Ones Who Live has proven itself an exciting, justifiable continuation of The Walking Dead, especially by giving Rick and Michonne a new dynamic that’s keeping the series fresh. In particular, this comes in the form of how they feel about escaping the CRM. While both of them want to return home, Rick is confronted by Jadis regarding his inevitable attempt to escape the organization alongside his wife. She tells him that, if both of them end up escaping, she will tell higher-ups like Major General Beale about Alexandria. While Rick threatens to kill her, she informs him that she has a contingency plan in place where the CRM will learn of the Virginia communities if she dies. This leads to an episode where Rick does everything he can to push Michonne away. Not because he doesn’t want to escape with her, but because he sees no options that will allow both of them to live.
This episode helps to illustrate Rick’s hopelessness as it goes, showing why the mental hole he’s stuck in is so large. Aside from the general power of the CRM and what he suspects they did to Omaha, we also learn of just how widespread their plans are. In a flashback, Jadis reveals the CRM have a 500-year plan to bring humanity back to how it was before the zombie apocalypse. Everything they’re doing now—only about 10 years into the apocalypse—is meant to preserve humanity’s future. In particular, the future of those in the Civic Republic. Because their plans are working over the span of decades or centuries, killing anyone who finds out about the group isn’t a big deal for them. After all, it’s about their self-preservation. This episode did a good job to illustrate that, showcasing why Rick is trying to keep Michonne at arm’s length even though he still loves her.
This is compacted by the complex betrayal he faces from Pearl, the only friendly face he’s had at the CRM. Due to Okafor’s death and Beale’s slight distrust of Rick, the Major General decides to promote Pearl to have a larger role in the CRM. Whatever it is she learns during her briefing, it’s enough for her to decide that Okafor’s plan of changing the CRM from within isn’t worth it. That whatever the militarized group has in store, it’s big enough and important enough to warrant siding with them. Despite having such a distaste for the group, Pearl’s quick shift into becoming one of their loyalists shows that, whatever she learned, it’s a game-changer. Perhaps even something Rick himself would understand the purpose of. While it’s still unknown what exactly she was told, it adds a layer of uncertainty and new mystery to everything going on. It makes it unclear what will happen once Rick and Michonne inevitably learn this information, and how it will alter their trajectory moving forward.
However, it seems like nothing is going to deter Michonne from getting back to Alexandria, her husband by her side. During the middle of the episode, it looks as if Rick has a fool-proof plan for escape. Managing to get Michonne her sword back, he clears a path for her to get on a small boat and navigate to Alexandria, even killing a Walker that could be construed as her for any CRM officers that wonder where she’d gone. However, he leaves a note for her explaining that he can’t go, as it would put their entire family at risk back home. While at first he believes she’s gone back, she winds up returning. From here on out, there’s tension between the two throughout the entire episode, as Rick tries to get her to leave in every way he possibly can.
But things continue to take a turn when Pearl notices there’s an unspoken connection between the two. While she ends up letting Michonne (going by the moniker “Dana”) into her and Rick’s inner circle, it seems like there’s a moment where she wants to kill Michonne. She draws a knife while speaking to her, prompting Rick—standing just behind Pearl—to draw his sidearm. It’s a tense moment that, given the number of deaths in the series so far, made it seem as if Rick really would have to kill his former ally. However, he’s spared from doing so when Michonne’s answers to her questions prove satisfactory. This also nets her the ability to tag along with Rick and Pearl on a mission in Montana (I think), clearing out Walkers for a Summit meeting of CRM leaders. This gets highlighted a lot here, making me think something very big is going to happen at this meeting. Perhaps even something destructive, given the fiery logo of the spinoff.
Throughout the Walker clearing, it’s obvious Rick is torn between two worlds. While he kisses Michonne during a quiet moment alone and walks in front of Pearl’s gun to make sure their possibly new enemy doesn’t kill his wife, he also tries his best not to get too close to her. Not just because he doesn’t want Pearl to know their connection, but seemingly because he doesn’t want to feel their connection anymore. The way Rick behaves in this episode, it’s clear he’s trying to push Michonne away. Not just because he wants her to go back to Alexandria on her own, but also because he doesn’t want to feel hurt by what he feels is their inevitable future separation. Because of how hopeless he is about the situation, it causes him to snap. In a scene that’s less heartbreaking and more “oh God, why did you think saying that was a good idea,” Rick tells Michonne the love between them is over. It’s obvious to both the audience and her that he’s only saying what he’s saying out of fear he’ll lose her. But she doesn’t intend to see them separated anytime soon.
In what can only be described as the most jaw-dropping ending in The Walking Dead’s history, Rick and Michonne are being flown back to a base camp on a CRM helicopter. While riding through a storm over a body of water, Michonne opens the door, grabs Rick, and jumps out. The narration that plays is a voiceover of her speaking to Judith, something that’s been going on periodically to highlight her mindset throughout the episode. Here, she says she doesn’t know if they’re going to make it back. Caught between desperation and hopelessness, Michonne’s final act this episode emphasizes just how much she’s willing to try and bring her husband home. But it also underscores the coin toss nature of their situation. There’s a very real possibility that they’re not going to make it home. That the CRM is, indeed, too powerful for them to run from on their own. However, there’s just as equal a chance that they will, desperately risking everything they can in order to return back to their kids without the group following them. And it’s a risk Michonne is willing to take.
This episode was a little slower than the last two, delivering not as many memorable character moments. I also found it to be plodding at times, especially whenever Pearl reminded the audience that she is, in fact, not Okafor. Beyond that, though, The Ones Who Live is still going strong as the best spinoff so far in The Walking Dead universe. It’s also made me less worried about the possibility the show will end on a cliffhanger, since the story seems like it will pick up the pace in the back half. Consider me intrigued to see where all of this is going, and what will happen to our intrepid lovers next.
Hopefully not a shit haircut.
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