As much as we all wanted an update on Glenn this week, TWD writers and producers weren't going to give us any answers so soon after his maybe, possibly, not likely demise. What we get instead is a Morgan episode that takes us back through his journey from crazy town to catching up with Rick's group in Alexandria. This episode is story telling at its best and I'll do what I can to relay everything we found out about our resident pacifist in "Here's Not Here."
THEN
Morgan begins the episode doing his best Castaway impression and intensely talking to himself. He's even made fire. Morgan has also made a habit of zombie hunting in the woods, beating Walker heads with the butt of his machine gun and burning the bodies in large piles. Neat. Two living guys are on their own journey nearby and they don't last long -Morgan stabs one in the throat immediately and then strangles the other while yelling "You don't know!" Again, crazy town.
Morgan comes across a strung up line of empty cans (Walker alarm) and sees a goat tied to a post near a couple of cabins. Of course he goes right in to steal the goat, but a voice calls out and tells him to leave the animal because it's not his. Morgan answers this by firing his machine gun toward the area the voice seems to be coming from, which in my mind is a little reckless given the huge sound it makes. However, the voice asks Morgan to put the gun down and come in and talk. Morgan sneaks around the cabin with his gun raised, and a peaceful looking dude knocks him out from behind.
Morgan's captor is Eastman, played by John Carroll Lynch (who I love), and he has Morgan locked in a cell right near his kitchen. Morgan wakes up, but before Eastman can even begin to make friendly conversation, Morgan yells "kill me!" continuously. I mean, CONTINUOUSLY. Eastman tosses a small book called "The Art of Peace" into his cell and heads outside to kill a Walker threatening the goat...whose name is Tabitha. Heh. Morgan had asked Rick to kill him as well back in the "Clear" episode but had no success there either. What's his deal?
Eastman provides Morgan with food and Morgan becomes more quiet as time goes by. He often looks out the window and sees Eastman practicing with a staff which, as we know now, is Morgan's weapon of choice. Eastman gives conversation another chance after a little while and he tells Morgan he's a forensic psychiatrist from Atlanta. He asks Morgan what he did before and what he does now. "I clear. Walkers. People. Anything that gets anywhere near me. I kill em. I clear." Eastman's reply? "That's the biggest load of horseshit I ever heard." HA! He notices Morgan's wedding ring and asks Morgan if there's a wife and/or kids...and he immediately realizes where Morgan's family is. "You saw it happen. That's how this began. Your body's here but your mind is still there." Eastman says he believes everyone can heal in some capacity and he's there to help Morgan if he wants it. He says the door is open and it literally is. Eastman had unlocked it and gotten rid of the key a while back and Morgan never even thought to check it. "You stay or you go. Those are the choices. I will not allow you to kill me."
Morgan opens the cell door and slowly steps out, glaring at Eastman. He then lunges at Eastman but Eastman is the better fighter. He quickly has Morgan pinned down on the floor with Morgan once again saying "kill me." Eastman shows mercy though and reminds Morgan of his two choices. Morgan goes back into his cell and sits on the floor. Eastman leaves the cell door open...but Morgan slams it shut.
Over the next couple of days Eastman mentions taking a big trip but can't quite come up with a destination. He leaves to scavenge some supplies and Morgan stays behind (still in his cell though the door is unlocked) and begins to read "The Art of Peace." He's interrupted when he hears Tabitha freaking out because nearby Walkers are apparently craving goat. Morgan runs outside, takes out the Walkers, then drags the bodies off to what looks like a Walker cemetery Eastman has created. Yup, Eastman always checks the bodies for ID so he can mark their graves with a name. Dude has an interesting balance...he knows he has to kill the Walkers but he still treats them like people afterwards. Eastman thanks Morgan for protecting Tabitha and hands Morgan the staff that we've seen him wielding in recent episodes.
What follows is almost a Karate Kid mentoring sequence where Morgan learns how to use his weapon, but in a very calm and meditative manner. Eastman also tells Morgan that he needs to value his own life so that he may think about the lives of others. "To accept everyone, to protect everyone, and in doing that, protect yourself." The two become good friends and Morgan essentially becomes human again. One night at dinner he finally asks Eastman why he has a cell in his home. The poor guy tells a story about a criminal he had interviewed in the pre-apocalypse days. Eastman knew this person was a clear psychopath and his job was to make sure these types of criminals do not get parole. The guy attacked Eastman during the interview and Eastman defended himself - didn't kill the guy but was able to subdue him. The psycho went back to prison but broke out....and killed Eastman's wife, daughter, and son. WOW. The guy then walked down to the police station and turned himself in, saying the only reason he broke out was to destroy Eastman's life. Eastman built the cell with the intention of getting revenge by kidnapping the psycho and watching him starve to death. He didn't though. "I have come to believe that all life is precious."
Eastman determines that their "trip" should be to the nearest islands but says they are still short of supplies (no kidding). Morgan had left a bunch of his own provisions in one of his cleared areas the day he came across Tabitha. He takes Eastman there to pick up his tarp, canteen, etc. and Eastman sees the signs Morgan had painted around the burned Walker bodies: "Clear," "Pointless Acts," and "Here's Not Here." He asks Morgan who he lost and Morgan talks briefly about his wife and son before a Walker approaches. Morgan is not the same now...he hesitates...and when Eastman pushes him out of the way of a bite, Eastman is bit himself. Damn it. I SO liked this guy. Morgan is pissed too - he's angry that Eastman stepped into his (not so) fight with the Walker, and he's livid that he's inevitably going to lose his mentor now. They begin to fight themselves and Eastman has the upper hand. Morgan hits the ground and says "kill me" again. Eastman drops his weapon and grabs the Walker body to take to the cemetery.
Morgan doesn't follow right away. He's out to kill some Walkers now and in his quest, he comes upon a young couple clearly struggling to survive. Old Morgan would have just killed them immediately. New Morgan saves them from a Walker and heads home. Unfortunately when he arrives, Tabitha is being devoured by a Walker and this just puts me over the top. Eastman's a goner and the goat gets its insides torn out too? UGH! Morgan finds Eastman at the cemetery, breaks the news about Tabitha, and finishes digging the new grave. He looks up and notices that one of the "headstones" has the name of the man who killed Eastman's family. Turns out Eastman did nab him on one of the prisoner excursions where they do garbage clean up and flower planting on the side of the road. He watched him starve and it took 47 days. Eastman then found himself in a similar place Morgan had been in when he arrived. "What I did to him, it didn't bring me any peace. I found my peace when I decided to never kill again." Eastman went back to Atlanta to turn himself in and realized the world had essentially ended.
Morgan gets Eastman back to the house and Eastman says Morgan is welcome to stay at the house after he dies. He encourages Morgan, however, not to stay and to go out and find people to share his life with instead. He gives Morgan the lucky rabbit's foot his daughter had given him quite some time ago, and then Eastman says he's got a gun locked away and he's "ready." The next screen shows Morgan all packed up and leaving the house...walking past Eastman's grave in the cemetery and finding the sign for Terminus, "a community for all."
NOW
That recurring guy from the Wolves that Morgan encountered in the Alexandria slaughter is sitting against a wall in one of the houses. Morgan did not kill him after all. Instead, Morgan told him Eastman's story as well as his own story. The Wolf looks up at him with a thoughtful face and asks "You think it could work out that way with me?" You can see Morgan's spirit life a little as he says yes, but it's short lived. The Wolf tells him "I'm probably going to die. But if I don't, I'm going to have to kill you Morgan. I'm going to have to kill every person here. Children too. Those are the rules. That's my code." Morgan leaves the guy tied up and locked up and heads off toward the sounds of other Alexandrian's in trouble.
Whew. I typically groan when we've got a cliffhanger on our hands end we end up with a character backstory episode to keep us guessing in the meantime. This, however, was a fantastic 90 minutes even though I was incredibly sad when the episode ended. Knowing that Morgan had been traveling alone for so long, obviously Eastman's time was going to be limited from the get go. But seeing where Morgan's new found "we don't need to kill people" thing came from helped me be slightly less mad at him for spending so much time trying to talk things out with the Wolves. Slightly. I think my biggest take away from the episode was Eastman pulling the drivers' licenses from the Walkers and making sure they had marked graves. We've seen Hershel keep zombie friends and family locked in a barn and we've seen crazy ass Lizzy think that Walkers are there for play dates, but we haven't seen an approach to the Walkers' human lives quite like this. The whole thing was very touching and I appreciate Morgan's effort....even if that Wolf is a douchebag...and even if I hope Carol finds him in the locked basement next week!
No comments:
Post a Comment