The Walking Dead Review: Episode 803 – Monsters

TV Description: Conflict with the Saviors leads to unintended consequences for the Hilltop, the Kingdom, and Alexandria; morality proves tricky in wartime.

[Warning: Spoilers Ahead]

PREVIOUSLY ON THE WALKING DEAD

Aaron and his group makes their move against the Saviors, trapping and killing them as they draw in Walkers to finish the rest off. Meanwhile Morgan, Tara, and Jesus capture a group of Saviors at the old satellite station. While those are going on King Ezekiel and Carol hunt down fleeing Saviors before news of their attacks reach bigger outposts. The plan fails, but the king still believes they can win the day. And lastly, in a dark reveal, Rick encounters an old acquaintance from Atlanta who has joined the Saviors.

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Out of all three episodes this season, Monsters is so far the best. The plot was steady, the bad artsy parts are minimal (though still there), and it’s not just action, but good story mixed in. There were some good moments, some bad moments, some middle moments, but things are becoming more in stone instead reliant flashy transitions, flashbacks, and dreams to try and explain stuff. While the Saviors in Rick and Aaron’s area are defeated, along with the two groups that Ezekiel fought and the ones caught by the Hilltop, the guns that the group was after are really in a new location, so it’s next episode will be a race against time to get them before they reach Negan’s headquarters.

So my first thing to get out of the way is Morales. He dies this episode. A small part in the previous episode and around half this episode he’s alive, so it’s no wonder people are angry over this. I can agree there was potential in this, but watching the after show, Talking Dead, I saw Morale’s actor, Juan Gabriel Pareja, saying that while he’s sad that his character came back for a small bit and was a villain, he was pleased enough to be able to finish his character’s story properly. That’s a good positive to get out this episode, but even with that I’m still in the middle on Morales getting killed this quickly because Morales was monologuing a bit too much, had his back to an open door, and maybe he wasn’t the best character to corner and spout anger at Rick. Maybe a character like the mother of the baby, Gracie, could be a better replacement. Morales could have been a great character, whether he remained with Negan or joined Rick. But maybe it’s one of those examples that not everyone gets to live.

That argument is still talked about this episode, but thankfully not that much. Jesus is still into making sure the Saviors his group captured are treated fairly while Tara, Morgan, and Maggie are more inclined to killing them. Morgan does kill one of the Saviors when a few try to flee after a walker attack, but Jesus stops him before it more die. This is when we get a duel we’d didn’t think we’d get to see: Morgan vs Jesus. And wow, it was awesome. Great choreography, some good lines in between, and there was a win and loss for both sides: Jesus won the fight, but also lost when he realized there is truth behind killing the Saviors and Morgan won in his argument, but lost the fight. What’s even more surprising though is that Morgan leaves the group to do more soul searching. Will he be back soon? What will his journey give him? And will he be able to recover and gain back some of his mental stability? Whatever the case, I sense another just Morgan episode to come eventually.

But now we must discuss a few iffy parts in this episode, starting with Ezekiel. His role, despite being advertised as major, in this episode isn’t that big. He and his group do take out two groups of Saviors, but it now makes me question his leadership skills in battle. I mean he doesn’t have too much, he was a thespian and zookeeper before the walkers and has only gained his position through having a tiger as a pet. That mostly makes his abilities on the battlefield small as he is not as experienced in fighting as the other leaders. Instead he’s more of an inspirational figure, which isn’t always bad, but in this situation it can be. For the battle he has, none of his soldiers, as he promised, die. But in the final scene of the episode his team gets ambushed by a mounted machine gun and several of his soldiers jump on him to stop the bullets. So not bad, not very strong of a leader. I still love him though, Khary Payton does an epic job at making Ezekiel feeling, look, and act like a king, which is just the type of character Ezekiel is. It just makes him memorable.

This in contrast to the not very memorable character we’ve lost in this episode: Eric, Aaron’s boyfriend. Now I do like how Eric decides to and fight with the other Alexandrians and tells his boyfriend to leave him and get back into the fight, it’s great to see him thinking of the greater good. But we never really got to know him, only really knowing that he was in a gay relationship with Aaron. That’s not much to go on. What’s worse is that while Aaron is of course heartbroken by Eric’s death, no tears are shown. Seriously, could not even add some eye drops or something to help out? I can believe the facial expressions and manner in which he talks, but Aaron just needed those tears to make it feel real. We do have an interesting development at the end of the episode though, with him getting the baby, Gracie, from the previous episode. They’ll be going to the Hilltop to live, now that the fight is over.

Speaking of the Hilltop, guess who just got back to there: Gregory. That cowardly, backstabbing fool. While his part in the episode is small, he does say one of the show’s funniest lines: “I did not eat those pancakes!” Oh god now I laughed when I heard that. But anyways, so he does plead to be back in after Maggie gives an angry and justifiable shouting at, even saying he’s learned from his mistakes and now fully supports Maggie. And amazingly she lets him in then. Still doesn’t fully trust him, but she let him in still. We did see Gregory at least say that the captured Saviors cannot stay in the Hilltop after Jesus made a puppy dog face that looked like he was saying, “Pleaseeee can we keep em?~” Those Saviors have been violent before and their potential harm to the community inside the walls, so that’s a good call from Gregory. But he has a lot to make up for. It’s a start, but plenty more is needed to balance things out. And maybe that’s what this episode is, the start of balancing out the season’s quality.

Overall Analysis

Again, this is so far the best out of season 8 of The Walking Dead. The plot was clearer, there was less artsy stuff, and we had a good time watching some of the action and character. The Morgan and Jesus fight was definitely the best part of the show and I feel their group had the best arc in this episode. We do get some good scenes with Ezekiel and Maggie, but Rick and his team don’t have much to them. Rick might be calming down and remembering he has to be just and not just seek Negan’s end, but it’s getting a bit tiring to keep going about this moral issue. I mean even Daryl is showing initiative and kills Morales without a second thought because he was pointing a gun at his friend’s head. Yes, the Savior’s have to be stopped. Yes, we have to first start by getting the guns so the Saviors can’t defend against the walker horde that’s invaded their main base. But we can worry about saving any of them later. Let’s get through the first step as best as we can. So in the end, we’re getting better in episodes, but there’s still a few things that need to be removed or just shown clearly for them to be really awesome.

And what about Gabriel and Negan? Seriously, what about those two?! How much longer do we have to wait to find out anything on what happened to them? Come on AMC, can we please get something of those two soon? Pleeeeeeeeeease.