Ratings are sliding for The Walking Dead and a big chunk of viewers are sounding off on social media; while it’s far from a consensus, it’s safe to say many have been disappointed with the way this uneven season has been flowing (remember Ezekiel? You’d be forgiven for forgetting already). A stubborn insistence on overlong momentum-killing bottle episodes may have caused this push back, or it might still be the fall out from a very unnerving, upsetting and painfully drawn out character death from the premiere. Whatever the main issue, we can be thankful for episodes like “Sing Me a Song”, which starts to set things up rather nicely for what should be an entertaining mid-season finale.
Negan overplaying the affable sociopath archetype, grandstanding almost every single moment he is on screen, is something we’re just going to have to deal with. It helps that Jeffrey Dean Morgan is a pleasure to watch, despite the repetitive sheen that pervades his intonated dialogue, but the more the man remains on screen the clearer it is that Negan played the way he is just isn’t having the effect Robert Kirkman may have intended. The big bad is charming for sure, but the jovial side of him has become far too predictable, and while it may add a much needed sense of humour to the script (that scene in “Service” where he calls Father Gabriel “creepy as shit” was gold) it makes him a bit predictable, as far as one-on-one interactions go.
The above is an issue that’s strung through “Sing me a Song” seeing as a large chunk of the longer-than-normal episode is spent at the Sanctuary where we get a look at Negan’s control over The Saviour from another angle, through the eyes (eye) of Carl. However, we do begin to see a different texture to Morgan’s portrayal of Negan as a result of his dynamic with Carl, best displayed in an excellent scene full of tension where Negan sits Carl down and makes him take off his bandage.
This is perhaps the biggest and most important storyline for Carl to date, kicking off with an awesome cold-opener that first involves the young gunner tricking Jesus into bailing from the truck so he can take on Negan by himself. Of course, things don’t go down like that and even though Carl uses an assault rifle (was that Abrahams?) to kill two of The Saviours, he is swiftly tackled by Dwight and, in another mind game, adopted by an all-smiles Negan who hides his anger to mess with Carl.
Much like “The Cell”, the episode serves as world building for The Saviours, and arguably this walk-through is much better executed. Negan playing the “cool dad” to Carl and “trying” to impress the kid by flexing his power over his own people brings out some kind of messed up warmth to the character, at least somewhat moving away from the constant gloating to show just how effective Morgan can be when the monster is scaled back and he takes a more calculating and patient approach to instilling fear. Perhaps this is best framed by his insistence on rules and acting as if he doesn’t want to enforce them, but needs to. In some kind of way this grounds Negan as the leader Rick can never be, maybe even the leader Shane could have been. It’s an odd characterisation, but having shades of tenderness and sympathy (no matter how fake it is) for his people (free veggies, no points necessary!) and Carl puts Negan on the right track to becoming the complex villain he was intended to be.
As should have been the case in previous weeks (and every other time a less-than-engaging bottle episode appeared; “Here’s Not Here” and “The Grove” excepted) the episode takes a breather from the Carl-Negan dynamic to move other characters into place for the mid-season finale. Rick is off on an extended supply run with Aaron at an ominously abandoned ranch; Michonne (who is whistling the same tune Omar Little from The Wire would when he had a plan) is killing walkers and stacking them up to create a roadblock; and Spencer is willingly trying to find supplies for Negan while Rosita forces Eugene to craft her that bullet he promised all those weeks ago.
With Spencer and Rosita we are basically re-treading the same territory here, the script hammering them into place. Spencer is openly critical of Rick’s leadership and is again showing signs of a possible defection. Rosita is furthering her plan to go on the offense against The Saviours, focusing on stockpiling ammo from the ground-up. Oh, and Father Gabriel? Well he’s just thrown in there so Seth Gillam actually has something to do.
It turns out that all four of these threads are being set up for payoffs. First, Rick and Aaron come across a lake full of walkers, with their mission to get to a lonely houseboat seemingly stocked with supplies, the episode understandably ends at that predicament, which has some exciting potential seeing as we haven’t had to deal with an inventive walker situation since the horde that tore through the front end of last season.
Second, there’s Spencer who is now back at Alexandria where Negan is, full of all the “fuck Rick” rage that just may lead to him interacting with the big bad wolf. Third, Rosita now has a bullet and is also in the vicinity of Negan (which she reminds us of near the end of the episode). The fourth one is a bit trickier; as it turns out, Michonne was piling those bodies in order to stop a lone (how convenient) saviour at sword-point and force her way to Negan. How this plays out is anyone’s’ guess, but for comic readers it may be alluding to a character named Holly, which would make things very interesting from here on out.
Add to all this the fact that the end of the episode has Daryl receiving a note reading “go now”, Jesus is ninja-archetyping his way around the outskirts of the Sanctuary, and Negan has forced himself into a babysitting role for Judith back in Alexandria. Unlike the aforementioned “Service”, “Sing me a Song” justifies it’s 90 minute runtime and throws so many moving parts at us that I’m more than confident next week’s mid-season finale will restore some faith in this blockbuster series.
Review Score: THREE AND A HALF STARS (OUT OF FIVE)
Highlights:
- Lake of walkers!
- A somewhat softer side of Negan (you know, apart from that whole hot iron to the face thing).
- Carl going rambo on The Saviour (albeit only two).
- Jesus kept as a wild card for mid-season finale
- Insight into Negan’s relationship with women (and it’s not pretty).
- Michonne’s plan.
- “Hey neighbour, why don’t you come by later. We might grill out”.
Lowlights:
- Some of Carl’s comic book lines just didn’t work for TV, but that didn’t stop the writers.
- Spencer’s hatred for Rick felt like over-exposition (but it felt good when Father Gabriel shut him down).
Stray Thoughts:
- Surely Rosita isn’t going to attempt to kill Negan with just one (or it might be a few) bullets.
- Spencer is going to try to suck up to Negan obviously. Got to hand it to him, the guy has guts!
- I really hope the mid-season finale doesn’t rush through what may be an awesome lake full of walker sequence. I’m really hoping they don’t kill off Aaron though.
- The tension was actually there this time! Welcome back tension, we missed you.
Episode MVP: Carl
The Walking Dead screens in Australia on FX at 1:30pm AEST every Monday, with a repeat screening at 7:30pm.
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