First of all, I hate this gimmick. It's an insult to the audience. Who shot J.R. was a great gimmick. That was 30 years ago. Now we expect a story to be told. And who the hell wants to spend the summer watching trailers of Father Gabriel talking to Spencer. There are three huge problems with this cliff-hanger. One is that it's absurd to think that Negan could resp ond to the loss of 50 of his men by only killing one person. Secondly, people will leak who was spotted on the set during the summer. And the biggest problem is that by process of elimination, there's not a lot of suspense in who Negan picked.
My premise is simple. Negan needs to show the group and the audience that he is a bad ass. That leaves women and children out. So Carl, Maggie, Michonne, Sasha and Rosita are out. That leaves six possibilities. Eugene and Aaron just don't look that scary so I'll leave them out. That leaves 4 possibilities:
1. Rick. He is safe. Not because he's the lead character but because if I'm Negan, I absolutely want this imbecile to be in charge of my biggest threat. I thought he was dumb all season but tonight he really outdid himself. He managed to look genuinely surprised that the Saviors kept turning up at all the dead ends. And then he really seemed to think he could carry Maggie through those woods without getting caught. Dumbass.
2. Darryl. Also safe. AMC gave him a reality show which is probably there way to pay him what he's worth to the network while locking down the female demographic over the summer.
3. Glenn. Well if they were going to repeat the comic story, then they probably would have told us that tonight.
4. Abraham. He looks and is tough. He was present for almost all of the Savior deaths and he puffed out his chest as if to volunteer for the task. The death of any of the other three characters would have been a big deal. People would have talked about it more than the cliffhanger. Abraham? Not so much.
So I think Abraham is the victim. But don't worry about waiting six months to find out. Someone will spot him with or without that mustache by then. Which is why this cliff hanger was dumb.
Another Complaint.
The Morgan and Carol story line was not well managed this season. Tonight it became obvious that they were building to put Morgan in a situation where he has to kill someone. It was a cop out to make the choice so simple. Of course he shot the man who was about to shoot an innocent woman laying on the floor defenseless. If they wanted to make this a bigger deal for Morgan, they should have made it a closer call. Even Eastman the cheesemaker told Morgan that he would not let Morgan kill him. So yes, killing to prevent a different killing is moral. That's the first day of Intro to Moral philosophy. This show really should be more complex by now.
One Silver Lining.
But first, one more complaint. ;-) Think about the last 2 episodes. What was advanced in terms of story? I guess Carol and Morgan had some resolution. But apart from that all we built up to was seeing Negan. Everyone knew that Negan was coming. So this was 2 and a half hours of air time to tell us nothing we didn't already know.
But what an entrance! Jeffrey Dean Morgan was great. Ten minutes of monologue building to a bullshit cliffhanger. But he kept it all fresh, fascinating and terrifying. This peace of casting might even be the makeup we need for the Governor. So as mad as I am by the finale, I'm already looking forward to Season Seven. So my protests are meaningless in the marketplace.
Early Thoughts on Season 7.
The creators have put themselves in a bind for how to promote this season. I think Morgan and Carol will wing up in a place called the Kingdom which will probably take up an episode or two but it's hard to say for sure what the central conflict will be. I think the season will be political. Rick will be plotting a war to kill Negan but he won't have the manpower to make that happen. Maggie and Michonne will be instrumental in that political process, as will Jesus and the people at the Kingdom.
But I really hope we get some good deaths. It's crazy that we went an entire season without losing anyone that we really care about. Doctor Denise had potential but she didn't get to make much of an impression. I could care less about Jesse and her idiot children.
So next year I'm hoping there's death and a tiger. Google it.
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