The Walking Dead: Internment (S4: E5)

Rick arrives back at the prison to immediate queries from Maggie about where Carol is. He tells her the truth. Maggie says she couldn’t have done it, but acknowledges it was the right thing to do. Rick tells her she’s done harder things. He asks her not to say anything and promises to talk to Hershel.

Inside, the sick are getting sicker. Hershel is having trouble keeping up. Bodies keep appearing, and I guess they’re trying to be sensitive to the survivors because they’re carting them to a private room before sticking knives through the heads. (Glenn and Sasha are helping despite the both of them looking like they could be corpses at any moment.) WHAT? I mean, if I’m a lone man tending the sick and any dead body is itching to become a walker, I’m not wasting time finding an empty room before taking care of business. Just as I was questioning Hershel’s sense of compassion (noisily, to my boyfriend) (I would be a heartless, long-lived bitch in the event of an apocalypse), he handily provides an explanation for the insanity: some guy he talked to yesterday that just died said sadness will kill people faster than sickness. That might be true, Hershel, but a WHOLE MESS OF ZOMBIES are gonna wipe out the cell block faster than a little melancholy.

Rick immediately checks on Carl, who says he wants to help. Carl also makes a point about already being exposed to the sickness, and how Rick can’t shield him from all the bad stuff. Rick says he feels it’s his job to try anyway, and tells Carl to shut up before hustling back outside to help Maggie brace wooden beams against the increasingly bendy fence.

Inside, Hershel tries to tend to Dr. S, who tells him to knock that shit off because he’s too far gone and there are patients who could really USE the help. Hershel, ever the optimist, brushes him off and tries again. Dr. S tells him about the guns stashed in his cell, just in case things go very wrong, and then starts bleeding from his eye sockets.

Glenn has to help Hershel dispose of another body, and asks unhappily if Hershel has ever stabbed one in the head. Hershel says he watched Sasha do it earlier, which I guess counts? Glenn gets much, much sicker and goes to rest.

Soon it’s time to lock people into their individual cells (WHY, I ask, are they not always locked in unless they’re being treated?). Hershel is going down the row (another question: why can’t they close themselves in?) and sees a boy “sleeping” on the bed behind his dad and asks the dad if the kid needs checking on. The dad answers no kind of forcefully (RED FLAG, HERSHEL) and Hershel moves on.

This is when everything goes to hell. Another guy dies, and Hershel is wondering whether to stab him right in the middle of the rows of sickly onlookers when the guy wakes up a zombie and the dad from the cell comes out with a gun trying to be helpful but ends up getting his arm gnawed on by his dead kid, and CHAOS. Zombies, everywhere! GUNSHOTS.

Outside Maggie and Rick hear the shots being fired, and Maggie gets twitchy. Rick tells her to go check on them, but she insists he needs help bracing the fence. He tells her he’ll get help, but she needs to go. She runs off to save the day.

Rick gets Carl to help him work on the fence, but the beams start breaking and HOLY SHIT, a zombie mob rushes through. Rick and Carl run for it, into the interior area of the prison and safely behind another fence which RAPIDLY begins to give way. They grab a stockpile of guns and prepare to fight for their lives.

Inside, Lizzie is leading a zombie along like a little puppy (helping or training a pet, who can tell?) when she trips and the zombie falls on her and starts snapping it’s jaws next to her face. Hershel barely saves her, but still CANNOT shoot the zombie in front of her, and leads it away to put it down.

He finds Glenn dying, unable to breathe on his own, and goes to find the zombie with the breathing apparatus still attached. He’s fighting for the bag when Maggie puts one through the zombie’s head (good aim, girl) and it’s over and thankfully nobody important died.

Rick and Carl successfully quell the onslaught of walkers. There was a moment, during the fight, when Rick ran out of ammo and Carl tossed him a fresh cartridge. It looked like he was surprised, and for a second he was thinking of Carl as an ally instead of a little boy who needs protecting.

Daryl and the supply crew return, just in time to save whoever didn’t die or end up zombie food. Daryl immediately asks about Carol, and Hershel tells him to talk to Rick. “She’s okay, but talk to Rick.”

Aaaaand, of course they’re drawing that particular confrontation out for another week. Do you think Daryl will understand, or be furious, or maybe even go looking for Carol?

We also see Hershel resting in his cell. He’s reading his Bible and starts to cry. Is Hershel losing faith? Is he, who I personally think is the foundation of this group, beginning to give in to despair? (Was that comment about sadness killing people some kind of foreshadowing bullshit? DO NOT KILL HERSHEL, AMC.)

LASTLY, we see a long-distance view of the clean-up at the prison, and guess who has a front row seat? THE GOVERNOR.