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The Walking Dead, Season 5 Episode 1

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The gang, well, most of them, are now at Terminus and reunited. Just how is this going to turn out? Let’s find out…

Starting out with a visit to the recent past at Terminus, we see Gareth and some other Terminans (catchy, no?) debating their motives.

Back to the present, Rick and the gang are making some bad ass makeshift weapons as they wile away their time in the restricted and dark, ominous trailer. The group moves with purpose and in silence and steady themselves as the Terminans draw near. The roof surprisingly opens instead and a smoke bomb is dropped in. Rick’s gang is drug out and we see through hazy eyes that they are prepping humans for meals. With Rick’s group all lined up at a metal trough, gagged and bound, things aren’t looking good as plastic covered men swing bats and sharpen knives. In a horrific scene we see the Terminans bashing them over the head then slitting their throats, one by one. Just as Glen is next, Gareth walks in and stops it. Rick ends up striking a deal with Gareth, who saw Rick hiding his bag of weapons before they came in, to show him where they are. This buys the group a little more time, but you can see the crazy in Rick’s eyes and know it’s not going to be that simple.

Tyreese, Carol and Judith are still walking along the tracks on their way to Terminus when they encounter a sizeable group of walkers. Nearby gunfire attracts the walkers, and Carol and Tyreese wonders if it is coming from Terminus, leading them to wonder if they should go at all. Carol decides they need answers, but will be cautious. We are seeing a different Tyreese. He doesn’t want to kill walkers, and he’s more timid, possibly traumatized. Carol can’t stand up for herself, Judith and Tyreese without his help, surely. And would the gunfire they heard be from when Rick and the gang had their Terminus welcome showdown?

Carol and Tyreese happen upon one of Terminus’ gems putting out what looks to be explosives or fireworks, and hear him talking on a walkie about Michonne and Carl. Carol pulls a gun on him. Finally some hope that not all of the group will fall into Terminus’ clutches. They tie up the bad guy, and Carol heads out, smears some zombie blood on herself, and angles toward Terminus. Tyreese is left with the Terminus henchman, who tries to strike up a conversation – a morbid and twisted conversation – but also tries to persuade Tyreese to leave with Judith in his car. Carol makes it to Terminus in time to see Rick and the gang being rounded up and carried away. The guards at Terminus start freaking out at the horde approaching, and Carol shoots out a tank and fires off a rocket firework, effectively blowing up the gas and taking out some of the zoms. In a creepy and not at all hopeful moment, we see many of them start to get up and shamble on ahead.

Tyreese sees a big, black smoke cloud in the distance. The hostage keeps going on with his bleak predictions that seem to be getting to Tyreese.

Gareth goes to find out the source of the explosion, leaving Rick and the others still bound and gagged. In a more memorable moment, we see zombies walking inside Terminus engulfed in flames. That has to be chilling. They gnosh on bodies as they are roasting away. Rick has used a sharpened piece of wood to cut through his ties and kills their captors and frees the others. The rest of the group in the trailer are trying to figure out what to do, but Carl is certain his dad is coming back for them. Maggie also holds course and keeps making weapons. Michonne can see that walkers are all around them outside. Amazingly, Carol keeps her cool as she walks along with the horde, making her way inside the compound. Rick and the others ee a grim scene with carved out bodies hanging on meat hooks around smokers. This place is like a nightmarescape. They open another trailer and find someone who is unstable. This crazy man gets bit quick, naturally.

Carol finds a room containing what looks like mementos from all of Terminus’ victims. It’s very holocaust reminiscent, which just adds to the overall horrible feeling I get from Terminus. She zeroes in on Herschels’ watch and Daryll’s bow, making her way out quickly.

Terminus has now spiraled into a war zone, and Rick and his group must fight their way through gun-toting Terminans and a lot of zombies to find the others. As Carol is crossing through the eerie candle-lit room with the names, Mary confronts her and a cat fight ensues. Watching the two seasoned ladies having it out was pretty great, actually. Carol comes out on top, of course, and Mary tells her of Terminus’ true beginnings. It was originally a sanctuary, but later it was compromised by a particularly bad group. They were raped, beaten and abused. It’s clear she’s completely lost it, and when she won’t answer Carol’s query of where Rick and the gang are, she shoots her in the leg. Mary begs her to shoot her in the head, but Carol doesn’t. Mary tells Carol that Terminus became what it had to be, and that it survived because of it, but Carol isn’t having it, and opens the door to let in a hungry group of walkers to have a go at Mary.

Back with the hostage, Tyreese sees walkers coming at them, and the hostage takes the opportunity to try to kill Judith. He really feels that Judith shouldn’t be alive in this world and that she is a burden. He tells Tyreese to leave the cabin, to let her go, that he’ll do it for him. The crazy thing is, Tyreese does just that.

The Terminus hostage thinks he’s in charge when the zombies outside turn quiet and Tyreese busts down the door. He has killed all the zombies around them, quite gruesomely, and turns his anger and frustration on the hostage, beating him fiercely.

Back with Rick’s estranged group in the holding trailer, Eugene tells them of his experience at the Human Genome Project. He worked on fighting diseases with diseases. He feels that he can tweak the virus with a virus, it sounds like, or possibly change it to eliminate the zombies. Infect the zombies? It just might work.

Rick releases the group and they all fight to leave Terminus, Eugene at the center. Using some gnarly movies, the group makes it to the fence as Rick shoots Gareth. Once they clear the fence, they go back to retrieve Rick’s bag of guns. Rick wants to go back and kill the Terminans, but the rest of the group doesn’t agree. Up behind them comes Carol, and Daryll and her have a touching reunion as he runs to her. The quiet, happy, and emotional moment has Rick showing a tender side as he realizes she was the one who set the day in motion, seemingly clearing any bad blood between them. It was such a relief when they all walk toward the cabin and see Tyreese holding Judith. Rick naturally runs to her, holding her while Carl stands by, petting her in disbelief. I’m not big on sap, but this was a long time coming. I’m glad to see them reunited, and the group back as a whole and stronger than before.

Tyreese admits to killing their hostage, and Rick decides they all need to leave and get as far away from Terminus as they can. The lot of them are back on the move as the episode draws to a close, but not before Rick alters a Terminus sign, leaving it to say, aptly, “No Sanctuary”. Before we leave, we see how bad Gareth and the Terminus group had it when they were terrorized. Not sure why they put this last, but it leaves it open for Gareth, and how we don’t really know if he’s dead, and we might not have seen the last of him.

It was a good season premiere, with both tense and action-packed scenes, and also some tender moments. I liked having them all back together, as it takes a little edge off, but as it goes with TWD, things will probably get so much worse. I don’t like how Beth wasn’t even mentioned and we don’t have any idea what happened to her. Hopefully we’ll find out something soon.

What did you think about tonight’s episode? Are you glad they left Terminus and that it seems to have fallen?

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Posted by on Sunday, October 12th, 2014. Filed under Dark TV, Headline. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

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