When we last left Team Ricktator and Woodbury, Rick was probably getting called by telemarketer or people wanting him to vote and Merle was unsuccessfully doing one-armed push ups.

Open and Merle and Co. are Michonne hunting. Which is nice because she is leaving them body part messages so it seems like they have a real give and take. A real Laurel and Hardy, those two, if Laurel and Hardy existed during the zompocalypse.

The message says, “Go back” and Merle calls this a “Bitergram.” I’m loving this episode already.

Merle, in recognition of the cleverness of her methods (she used a literally back to communicate “back”) sword golf claps at this.

The new girl in Merle’s hunting group is being a pansy so Merle gives him a tone check and tells him to deal with it.

“What’s your last name?”

(Something Italian)

“I’m going to keep calling you Neal.”

Imagine if we could have spent the last two seasons with a lot of Merle and less of Dale’s eyebrows. How much more fun would that have been?

Merle is walking around like, “Michonne, seriously what are you even going to do? Jump out and hack us all to death when you are outn…”

And that’s basically what she does. She kills them all to death except for Merle and Italian Neal because we need more of Merle’s sultry racism and Italian Neal’s pansiness evidently.

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Back from commercial and Rick is taking his phone call and the voice doesn’t sound familiar, but it supposedly is coming from someone who is in a fortified place that is safe. Is it real? Is she real? Is Rick’s hair for real, you guys?

It’s breakfast and Carl does not seem interested in his oatmeal and Rick shows up like he didn’t just spend the last 6 hours hacking off body parts. He checks on everyone but  doesn’t mention the baby and neither does anyone else. Herschel wants to have a deep bro talk but Rick storms off all like, “Haha ok Hersc TTYL.”

Back at Merle’s Last Stand, Italian Neal isn’t doing so great but Merle rallies him to the moment by stabbing some dead heads as a morale booster. Obvi.

Back at Woodbury, grown kids are playing Duck Duck Goose so I mean that’s weird. And The Governor and Andrea basically flirt more like they arethe zompocalypse version of Jim and Pam.

Back at the phone station, Rick takes another call. It’s clearly subconscious, right? A place where everything is perfect, nothing is bad etc? And all the questions are perfectly posed to get at the burning issues in Ricktator’s soul. ALSO THERE SHOULD BE NO ELECTRICITY FLOWING.

Back at Woodbury, WOW who’s the new girl? She’s cocky and seems insane which is fantastic. Reminds me a little of what would happen to Annie from Community if thrust into the zompocalypse. Wow, sorry. Tons of TV comparison references tonight. Just wait until I figure out who Donkey Lips from Camp Anawanna is.

Andrea and Bizarro Annie from Community see a zom and she’s basically the worst shot ever and Andrea has to handle the situation and that makes Bizarro Annie kind of pissed because Andrea didn’t follow the rules.

The Gov and Andrea have a DTR about Zombie MMA and Andrea wants to be a wall Watchlady or something and learn how to shoot like Katniss. Well at least SOMETHING is remaining from Old Andrea. I was afraid she was going to become Woodbury’s only Socialite.

Rick is tooling around the phone station and Herschel makes a HUGE show of how difficult it is to navigate a maximum security prison with one leg. UGH, Herschel. We get it. Your leg got bit off. LET IT GO.

Rick unveils the secret caller theory to Herschel and Herschel is like, “Well, I do only have one leg but this seems super implausible.”

Merle and Italian Neal are on the scent of Michonne but she sneaks up on them because she’s Michonne, but yet she’s kind of sneakily easily disarmed by a man with a sword hand. I don’t know. I’m not going to quibble with logistics of this exchange as it takes place during the zompocalypse and somewhere else Rick is getting phone calls.

Anywho, Italian Neal gets hit AGAIN, Merle gets dazed and all this happens while a mini-crew of zoms amble in and wreak havoc. Michonne guts one with her sword just in the nick of time, but it’s a super unfortunate angle and the zom’s body basically vomits on Michonne and all its major intestines end up on Michonne’s face and this is officially a NIGHTMARE IMAGE for anyone who intended on ever eating again.

Darryl , Carl and New T-BoneDawg go to clear out some corridors (apparently there are a million corridors in this prison btw) and Darryl bonds with Carl over how both their mothers totally died violent deaths. There are major shades of Shane / Carl in this scene But in this version, Carl is no longer impressionable. He’s fully aware of life and his role in things and almost shoos away Darryl’s modicum of comfort, but thanks him for the effort nonetheless.

The Gov is making more slashes in his super OCD Se7en notebook and Andrea shows up and they have a check yes or no conversation basically. I don’t know. This is kind of the worst watching this. Every encounter is like the equivalent of them being on the phone and trying to hang up but they keep telling each other, “You hang up.” “No, YOU hang up.”

Back with Merle and Italian Neal, they have a talk and Merle really tries to learn his last name but then he kills him so I don’t think he really cared, but Merle is complicated so who knows. UNRELATED: Doesn’t Merle seem like someone who would say ‘Italian’ like “EYE-talian”?

Rick has another phone call and the lady knows his name BUT RICK NEVER TOLD HER HIS NAME CUE DRAMATIC GASP CRESCENDO MUSIC.

The Gov and Andrea hit the point where we’re expecting a romcom montage where they do stuff like go to baseball games and ice skate and share a plate of spaghetti and slurp on the same noodle and inadvertently kiss. Also feels like we need to start the countdown to sexytime for these two, right?

UH OH ACCELERATE THE SEXYTIME CLOCK because they are totally doing it in the Gov’s garden.

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Michonne is continuing to spy on glenn and Maggie and RECORD SCRATCH Merle shows up! HOLY PLOT POINT CONVERGENCE!! He tries to talk Glenn into letting him come back to camp with them or something but Glenn is like “No way” and Merle is like ok, “I’m going to draw on you and take Maggie hostage” and Glenn is like, “Ok do that and I totally won’t do anything about it.” SO MERLE DOES.

Here’s my major problem with this sequence: Maggie and Glenn had guns on him yet Merle was able to draw, fire a shot, and take Maggie hostage without anyone firing a weapon?

Darryl, New TBoneDawg and Carl have a run in with a zom and there’s evidence of Carol still being alive or something because she stabbed a zom in his neck goiter. CLASSIC Carol. Also, New TBoneDawg finds some new shoes.

 

Rick takes another phone call and this voice sounds familiar and turns out it’s Lori WHAT and the other voices were the voices of people who have died in the past WHAT and Rick realizes he’s going crazy.

Cut to SEXYTOWN population 2: Gov and Andrea and Andrea is showing some leg, but BUZZKILL Merle shows up with news about Italian Neal dying and how he has abducted Glenn and Maggie which I guess excites The Gov because he returns to Andrea with intentions on returning to SexyTown POSTHASTE and we know this because he throws off his robe and is like, “ME. YOU. SEXYTOWN. NOW.”

Rick returns to the cellblock and finally holds his daughter.

Darryl finds Carol, FINALLY after a ton of hesitation because I guess he thought she had turned?

Rick sees something weird by the fence and it’s Michonne with tons of baby formula and standing with the zoms and they are uninterested because to them, she’s bascially like a plate of nachos, but one that another zom has already sneezed on.

Last thing…

I have a new zombie serial novel (Those That Remain) out on Amazon currently. You canclick here to read the first chapter for free and subsequent chapters are only $0.99. I would love it if you would check it out.