“Dumb bitch must’ve gone out looking for him.”
–Daryl, with this week’s succinct one sentence recap of this episode.

Rick: Texas Ranger

I know it makes no sense to start reviewing a show in its second season, but I just caught up with it during its hiatus and fell totally, completely and irrevocably in love with it and saw that since there were no reviews being written on this awesome show, I’d do the honors!

In keeping its viewers entertained and on the edge of their seats (or falling off their beds, in my case) The Walking Dead wastes no time!

This week’s episode picks up immediately after last week’s shocking cliffhanger/character development/layer-age of Rick pulling a gun out in the quickest of quickdraws and shooting the nosy, intimidating(??? I guess) guys in the bar in a way that would put any old Western actor to shame!

The producers thought to give Lori some more screen time right away after she ran over a Walker last week, even though anyone with eyes could’ve clearly seen it from miles away! They don’t move that fast, Lori. Astigmatism, maybe?

Lori basically is testing her horror-bimbo screaming skills as she struggled in a flipped-over car while a Walker tried to eat her. It did something for my adrenaline though, and also my twisted love for violence when the Walker literally tried to push his face through a tiny hole in the glass to get to her. She scrambled, all trying to get away which gave me a few laughs, but then the Walker got a nice hold on her hair and ripped her back, so she grabbed something pointy (I could’ve sworn it was a pen) and stabbed it in the face and he died (again?). She tried to run away, then ANOTHER Walker popped up out of nowhere! Unfortunately, he too failed to do the job that I would’ve paid big money for. So Lori lives. But more importantly: the gore and the special effects on this show are just A+, aren’t they?

Flash right back to Rick, Glenn, and Hershel who had a total of about five minute’s time to process what had just happened when a car rolled up, so the men instinctively crouched down and listened as the guys outside screamed for Dave and Tony who, oops, Rick just shot. They guys ran up to the bar door and hovered around for a bit, “whispering” their plans and this kind of killed the mood for me. Why didn’t they just walk right in? Rick could’ve had another Texas Ranger moment. Oh, well.

Back at the Little House on the Prairie, the others finally realized that Rick and Company were taking an unusual amount of time to get back, which everyone knows in TV Land means imminent danger, but whatever, they had a nice meal and Shane decided they’d go after them in the morning, helpfully reminding Carl that his dad was one of the toughest sons of Bs out there. Awww. Then they realized, hey Lori’s gone too! The search party unites.

Bar Adventure Time! The guys, not the ones we care about, started talking about how they didn’t want any trouble as they continued to fire their guns. Right. Rick spilled the beans that Dave and Tony shot first, then tried to reason with them but they just did what they did best: pulled their triggers! Thus sending us hurling into a good, exciting, old-fashioned American shoot-out scene! Bullets everywhere, breaking glass, dodging and hurtling men, ugh, what could be better?

Daryl continued to reinforce my love for him by casually delivering the line at the top of this review when Carol expressed concern for Lori’s whereabouts. He’s just a peach. Then Shane decided to resume his regular role as Alpha Male and drove off looking for his best friend’s woman, which made me all tingly with feels due to my love for him.

Guns loaded and safeties off, Rick, Glenn and Hershel were still on the lookout for Those Guys, having managed to make their way out of the bar into the back alley. They spotted one of them on top of a pharmacy building across the street, loading him gun some more, when Those Guys pulled up in their van, all, “We gotta go!” Honestly. That’s what they say to a man on top of a building. So they make him jump off then when he surprisingly DOESN’T land on his feet like a cat, they pretty much just shrug, give him a “sorry, bro!” then drive off. I really don’t like Those Guys.

Rick made his way over to the fallen man, while Hershel tried to save another fallen man (? maybe I wasn’t paying attention but where the hell did he come from??) who was about to be covered in snarling Walkers, literally just inches from his poor body. The Walkers get to him though, and take munches out of his arms and even his face (he lost his nose! Did I mention how sick these special effects are? Ugh, why can’t The Vampire Diaries hire these guys?). Hershel decides to leave him there as bait, making me hate him even MORE, and they go to Rick, who’s staring at a guy whose leg is impaled onto this spiky fence. Ouch is an understatement. They then decide to sever this dude’s leg while literally Walkers are coming from every single direction ever.

This is one of those time crunch scenes I love, where every second counts and I end up falling off my bed from the holy shitness of it all. Eventually, Rick just shrugs and tears this guy’s leg out of the fence. This is a pretty cringe-worthy scene if there ever was one!

Alpha Dog meets Dumb Bitch and tells her it’s time to hit the road, and she’s like “not without Rick” because she would so obviously be so much help in the situation Rick is in. Did this chick have her head checked? Shane lies to get her to come home and we come across one of the moments I like to call moral coin-tosses, where it’s both bad and good, just depends on which side you look at it from. File under: angst for later.

Carol goes to see Daryl, which is probably the dumbest decision anyone could make without having a reason for it, and he bites her head off and spits on it and all she really said was like, two words. He’s ridiculously hostile but Carol just gives him this look like, I understand, and it’s a nice scene, to me, because she like gets him and cares for him and he just hates everything and doesn’t wanna be cared for. Well, maybe it’s not so nice.

Then Lori, the Queen of All Lies, gets on Shane about, get this, lying. They have a heated debate on whether or not what they had was “real” or not, and then Andrea and the girl whose name I won’t bother to learn because I’m still just going to call her Rose have a nice story sharing time over the girl who’s basically in a coma’s body, and then Dale decides to get on Andrea’s back about how crazy Shane is and how he’s secretly evil. Dale is the TV equivalent of the homeless man on the side of the street with the sign saying “THE END IS COMING” and won’t accept any money or food, but will just spit bible scriptures at you. I.E., annoying. Andrea does the smart thing and ignores him.

The action and the shooting and the screaming has considerably died down in these scenes but what I love about this show is how it can go from violent action to angsty conversation and still make you want to watch without even rolling your eyes once!

Rick is back! Everybody hugs him then Rick’s like “btw, got some luggage” and they’re all like, “why,” and Rick’s just like, “we’ll let him go.” I guess that’s a reason? More angst occurs among Hershel and Rose, and Carol and Daryl, but then Andrea and Shane have what I think is a sweet moment and they realize that she is the Beta to his Alpha. Oh yes, I’m shipping it. “I should’ve left with you when I had the chance.” Perfect ship bait.

Rick and Lori are shirtless and he’s happy and everything is fine, so Lori takes this opportunity to make everything about Shane and how awful and horrible he is and Rick hilariously says, “What’s he done now?” Lori then makes it out to seem like Shane is an obsessive, aggressive, “delusional” psychopath that is forcing himself into her life and like he’s going to eat her baby or something and she’s being a huge trouble-starter.

What’s worse is Rick starts to believe it. The episode ends with the camera closing in on Rick’s darkening, pondering Serious Face and some kind of creepy, murdery music and then fade to black.

To make a long story short, although we’re well past that point, this episode had all the ingredients to result in a nail-biter: action, a shoot-out, inevitable brain-hungry growling zombies, gore, angst, and scary foreboding! I’m counting the minutes till next week to see what lies in store for Shane, the fallen man, and our dearest Rick, who seems to be getting edgier and edgier with every passing minute!

See you next Sunday!