***SPOILER ALERT***
The Walking Dead, what a show, what a couple of episodes. I'll do a proper season review at the end of the month, this is a bit of a pre-review if you like. If you're watching the show in the UK and are reading this before the 16th March 2012 then you may not want to continue because I'm going to talk about the most recent episode. It aired in America yesterday and is (in my opinion) one of the finest episodes of any show so far this year. Last week we witnessed the shock and brutal death of Dale. It was so unexpected and that is what The Walking Dead is all about this year.
When you are adapted from something as The Walking Dead is then you need to be careful. You need to stick to the source material while also offering something different. I've read the comic books (or at least I'm in the process of doing) and there are many differences. I don't think that liberties have been taken though as things such as Otis being sacrificed by Shane and Dales death have only gone onto round off certain characters and make the story better. In the comic books Shane is shot dead by Karl after the 6th issue (very soon in the grand scheme of things). Actually as a side note, Robert Kirkman (the creator of The Walking Dead comic) has always said that his biggest regret is killing Shane off that early. That is something that the writters of the TV show took on board and as such the character of Shane has been brilliant. His clashes with Rick have been amongst the standout scenes in recent weeks. Otis is a character that actually survived in the comic books. Shane was killed before the group even got to the farm so he couldn't leave Otis for the walker as he did in the TV show. Another big storyline that was tackled in the early part of Season 2 was the disappearence of Sofia and the subsequent hunt for her. That in turn showed how good a character Daryl is as he was given an episode on his own pretty much. It also provided us with a truly shocking scene as Rick was forced to shoot Sofia in the head. She was in Hershels barn and was now a 'walker'.
Despite these big moments, The Walking Dead is still a relitively slow show. There are a lot of scenes of talking and some episodes are a bit Zombie lite for a show about a Zombie Apocylypse. The Walking Dead is a show about the living though, it's about the characters and how they react with each other. They have been thrust into this most absurd of situations and they are forced to do things in order to maintain that that most of us take for granted, survival.
Maybe the reason why recent episodes seem to have exploded is that we became used to the slow character building nature of the show. I mean, I've commented before on this very blog that The Walking Dead's genius is it's ability to suprise. I've also commented that no one feels safe in the show. The Walking Dead proved both of those points within the past 2 episodes as two main characters were killed in gruesome fashion. The first was Dales shock death at the hands of a walker last week. Okay, so it was Daryl who technically did the deed but that was after said walker tore Dale open. Dales death was a true suprise in that I doubt anyone really it saw coming. This week it was the turn of Shane to meet his maker, killed by Rick. In the comic books Shane has a confrontation with Rick and tries to kill him before Karl appears and shoots Shane dead. In the TV Show the confrontation still happened but it was Rick who (after tricking Shane into lowering his gun for a second) stabbed Shane in the heart. Karl appeared soon after and still shot Shane although at this point Shane had Zombiefied. If Shanes death had been expected (an advert for the DVD boxset confirmed it) then his reanimation had not been. Of course the first Zombie couldn't have been bitten so it was entirely feasible that the all the dead came back. To have it confirmed was still a bit of a shock though.
So, as we head to what looks like an amazing finale next week, what can we take from this series of The Walking Dead? The characters have grown and the story has moved on in dramatic ways. Sure, the survivors have been at the farm for the most part but that has worked. We have also seen a fair bit of foreshadowing. The scenes involving the shootout at the bar have given us a glimpse at a different threat Rick and his people will face, that of other survivors. Karl has perhaps grown the most and the fact that he has to live with Dales death will surely only lead to a more interesting character arc. Daryl has also grown and with Shane out of the way he has a chance to shine. All in all this has been a great season for The Walking Dead and I have such high hopes as the show continues into it's 3rd season.
