The Walking Dead: Season 5, Episode 3

The Walking Dead

Episode Title: “Four Walls and a Roof”

Channel: AMC

Director: Jeffrey F. January

Writers: Angela Kang and Corey Reed

Genre: Drama, Horror, Thriller

Runtime: 44 min

Rated: TV-14

Original Air Date: October 25, 2014

Lots of things going on in this episode. It looks like my fears regarding Gabriel were unfounded, he's just a coward, nothing nefarious going on there. Bob quickly divulges a major complication to Gareth and his followers, but it looks like we still won't know if bitten meat is dangerous meat. Most of the episode flowed pretty well, and that is with the enormous group Rick has assembled. This fact had me excited for the prospect of keeping the survivors together for a while, and not fracturing this season into a bunch of episodes focusing on three or four of them at a time. Unfortunately the ending ruined that for me.

Speaking of the ending, it dawned on me after this episode that Maggie is a horrible sister. I can't recall much of a fuss she's made over Beth going missing. It seems like lackluster writing to have a character so completely ignore their sole surviving blood relative, and at the end of “Four Walls and a Roof” Maggie and Glenn leave with Abraham's group, seemingly writing Beth off as dead without the smallest bit of emotion.

Rick is awesome right now. Gareth falls into Rick's trap perfectly, and finally they handle things the way they need to be handled. Rick, Sasha and Abraham go to town on the cannibals, Rick keeping his promise as to how he would kill Gareth was a nice moment. There were brief looks of horror on Maggie, Glen and Rosita's faces, but no “how could you?” recriminations asserted themselves and it seems like they believed that what was done was necessary.

Conclusion: Rick and Co. finally handle a deadly threat with an equal amount of force. I'm glad to see the cannibal arc finished and to be moving on to the next big thing. Bad writing of the Maggie character has ruined the sympathy that the end of season four had engendered in me, she now seems entirely unrealistic and impossible to relate too. I hope the splitting up of the group is handled differently this time around, because I didn't find the two episodes per group formula at the end of season four to be very satisfying.

Rating: 7.75/10