The Walking Dead - Worst 10 Episodes

With every top ten there has to be a bottom ten. The Walking Dead has had some absolutely incredible episodes, many of them in the millions of opening views. But there have also been a few episodes where there’s just not enough story or too much story, as well as too many mistakes made by the characters or creators. So here’s my take on my worst/ least favorite episodes of The Walking Dead.

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#10 - Ep 513 - Forget

With Rick and the group finally settling down in Alexandria there had to be an episode is just calm and with hardly any action in it, which is fine, we need a few episodes like that after a long journey or dangerous events. However, not much happened in this episode. Daryl and Aaron chase a horse that gets killed, Rick and some of the group plant weapons outside Alexandria, and there’s a small party that happens. Nothing big, but nothing really exciting. I am sure there are those who enjoyed the episode, I just didn’t get much out of it. Not much given, not much taken.

There is a huge thing I remember from this episode though: Carol. She gives an absolutely terrifying threat to a little boy who finds her in the Alexandria armory, one that even people who have known her as the badass of Rick’s group shivered over and made themselves question her methods. And that threat eventually leads to trouble for a few of the community.

#09 - Ep 205: Chupacabra

There were a lot of blunders made by the group in this episode, from Daryl getting thrown high off a horse into a river to Andrea not listening to the rest and almost killing Daryl when she mistakes him for a walker due to sunlight in her eyes. The search for Sophia is a bust, both figuratively with Shane reminding Rick of their time searching for lost kids before the dead arose and literally as Daryl gets a serious injury during the search. This was a mixed episode, with some problems and some iffy conflicts.

I will say I did find Glenn’s scenes pretty enjoyable, with his confrontation of Lori on her pregnancy and his admittance to Dale that he did have sex with Maggie were great highlights. Man, he was such silly man back then. Plus this episode we did get to see Michael Rooker as Daryl’s brother, Merle, return for as a hilarious and jerky hallucination.

#08 - Ep 105: Wildfire (9)

Not much to this episode, but there was enough to it that made it feel it had some meaning, but since it was in the first season that’s understandable. After the walker attack on the first camp the group has people start putting down, burning, and burying friends and loved ones. One member of the group, Jim, is found alive but bitten, with talks on how what to do with him while another member, Morales, leaves with his family for another safe place. Eventually Jim decides to leave him and die on side of the road and the group eventually reaches the Center for Disease Control. It’s a simple episode, just not enough for me as a viewer.

#07 - Ep 706: Swear

One of the several hour and a half episodes of season 6, this one focuses on the discovery of a new community by Tara, played by Alanna Masterson. This is a slow episode. While it does a decent job at explaining this new community, watching the episode I felt like this could have been done faster. I’m not saying the community is hardly explained, it tells well on why there are only women in it, why they are so secretive, and what Tara’s appearance means to them. Again, it’s just slow in how it does it.

There’s also a bit of conflict that Tara has with another Alexandrian, Heath, played by Corey Hawkins. It doesn’t feel like much conflict though with Heath believing that after killing the Saviors at the small station everyone is just looking out for themselves. Since he had not really killed a living person before he was bound to head into a low moment, but it felt strange either way. That, plus his disappearance at the end gives us no idea what’s happened to him. So in the end this episode was a bit shaky in its technique and stretched too much.

#06 - Ep 603: Thank You

The big exciting part of this episode is also its biggest problem for me. I read the comics, I knew what was going to happen to Glenn, yet AMC tried to fool us into thinking he was dead. It was convincing from the camera angle, but I knew it wasn’t to be so. What was worse is that in the Talking Dead aftershow of the episode where we find out that Glenn didn’t die in this episode there was a small piece that said he was alive for the moment. That instantly made this part of the episode feel pointless.

Now this fake death isn’t the only problem this episode has. Nicholas, a character who, after getting a beating from Glenn, starts to realize his way of survival is wrong and hurts more than helps, kills himself at the end of the episode. That death pulled Glenn down into the swarm of walkers, almost leading to his death. Definitely not a way to say thank you to someone. I was also hoping to Nicholas to last a bit longer so we can see him grow as a character and possibly have a chance of real redemption. While I understand that not everyone can deal with the realizations and guilt that Nicholas had, the way his death almost killed a beloved character felt harsh.

On positives though, the action was great and maybe if Glenn did die for real it would feel new and fresh. As Game of Thrones (at least until season 7) taught us, not everyone gets deserves a dramatic death and anyone can die at any time. Maybe if Glenn remained dead it would feel like stronger episode.

#05 - Ep 413: Alone

This episode takes place, like most of the second half of season 4, in the calm after the storm. And it shows. Sasha, Maggie, and Bob are in one group, Daryl and Beth in another. Both of them are struggling after the loss of the prison with no clear location to head to. The group of three eventually learn of the location of Terminus, which eventually leads to them reuniting with the rest of the group, but the struggle before discovering it is underwhelming. In the other group, Beth is kidnapped by an unknown car and Daryl fails to keep up, which eventually gets him in with a small group of morally questionable men.

While the beginning and a bit of the middle has some conflict to it, there’s not much growth or character development with this episode. I can say that the new group that Daryl gets in, the Claimers, are decent enough and when I first watched it I was curious about their motives. But still it’s not

#04 - Ep 613: The Same Boat

Why was this episode needed? Seriously why? Maggie and Carol get caught by some Saviors that die that episode and the two survivors never get seriously hurt. The last episode, beyond the parts that involve this episode, were great! A first attack at the Saviors and Rick and his group won and wipe the Saviors out (or so they thought). They could have used a new episode or went to the next one. But no, we see Maggie and Carol captured by a few Saviors. And it’s mostly them talking. Talking and talking and talking. Maggie talks about her pregnancy, the Saviors talk about their lives before the show, but in the end this episode, nor plot point, was needed.

The only part that really made me smile in this episode is Carol’s kills, especially the furnace scene. That was brutal and gave me hope that Carol wasn’t going soft and broken. But even then there’s a hit on weakness in her in the last scene. I’m not saying it is wrong for her to regret her killings, but with all that has happened recently, now is not a good time Carol.

#03 - Ep 412: Still

This episode is all about Beth and Daryl right after the destruction of the prison. And not much happens really. Beth learns to use Daryl’s crossbow, Daryl gets wasted on moonshine, and they burn down a building. While I did find it helped us learn a bit more on Daryl and Beth, it just didn’t feel impactful. We already know that Merle wasn’t the best old brother to Daryl and probably stemmed from an abusive family and we know that Hershal didn’t want his daughters drinking or being degenerates because he didn’t want them to turn out like he once did, so not too much was really shown.

We already know that Daryl used to be a real jerk and had a very unhappy life before the apocalypse and Beth was a rather rebellious child of the Greene family. What was done with this episode didn’t really advance too much. It just wasn’t fun.

#02 - Ep 210: 18 Miles Out

This was supposed to be simple. Nothing dangerous, just a simple drop off and leave. Leave the kid they had saved from earlier with a few supplies and head back to the farm. And yet Shane is still hook on Lori enough to try and kill Rick during the drop off. It’s infuriating! I’m not saying Shane is not all to blame in this, I more blame Lori for continually getting involved with Shane enough for him to think he deserves her more than Rick. And in the end they take the kid back and grudgingly agree to not tell anybody of what happened. Not gets solved! We’re back to square one!

And then we have Andrea, whose stupid attempts to help Beth Greene result in Beth almost killing herself! Beth realizes the error of her ways after she fails to slit her wrists, but Andrea is somehow positive, saying that now Beth knows she wants to live. You almost killed her and yet you smile at the end result then feel angry when the group says you did a bad thing! YOU DID DO A BAD THING YOU MORON!!! Couldn’t you think of a better way to help her?! You’re so stupid Andrea!

This episode is full of mistakes and not the mistakes that people learn from. The only positive I can get out of this episode is that Rick starts the group trend of using melee to stab walkers through fencing. Beyond that, it was just terrible.

Here are some honorable mentions before the #01 worst episode:

Ep 202: Bloodletting

Ep 502: Strangers

Ep 504: Slabtown

Ep 606: Always Accountable

#01 - Ep 616: Last Day on Earth

Is there really any doubt on this choice? The season 6 finale of The Walking Dead just bombed. It was stretched out, ended with a super tense, yet disappointing cliffhanger, and left a majority of the fanbase frustrated and outraged.

I think a lot of the anger at this episode could have been avoided if one of the characters died, instead of leaving both Glenn and Abraham to die in the season 7 opening. If we saw Abraham die I feel people would be even more shocked to see Glenn get his head turned into flesh pudding. It was set up anyways for Abraham to die. He straightened his back, looked Negan in the eye, and showed that he wasn’t afraid to die for his friends. Instant death sentence there, yet we had to wait months to find that out.

The buildup too for the ending, while trying to get across that Negan and the Saviors were like nobody the group had met before, was too long. I understand why it was done that way, but I feel they could have condensed it down from an hour and a half episode to a just above one hour episode. That season already had more extended episodes than any other season, maybe some of it could have been removed.

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Like any show that goes on for many seasons, The Walking Dead has suffered from some bad episodes every now and then. But as I’ve said before, there have been some fantastic episodes as well. At the moment the big problem I find the show has is its indecision in not sticking to one hour episodes. Some do deserve an hour and a half, but some that go five to ten minutes beyond the normal times can be irritating. None the less, I will be continually watch the show as it reaches one of the story’s highest levels of conflict: The War with Negan. How I cannot wait for it to start this Sunday! It’s going to be so awesome!

Coming next will be my review of the Fear the Walking Dead season 3 finale! I was going to post it on Monday, but I forgot. Whoops!