A bitter moment for Carol

In as cringe-worthy of an opening "The Walking Dead" has had in a while, we see a new, darker side of Carol.

Picking up from last weeks revelation, it's clear Carol has begun to take things into her own hand.

With Rick finding out about Carol, he decides to go on medical supply run as and tells Carol to come with him.  While searching abandoned houses, they find a young couple and help them kill a walker. Rick and Carol are cautious when talking with them but decide to trust in them to help raid houses.

We haven't had an episode to catch up on Carol and it's amazing how much Carol has changed since last season. No longer positive and helpful, Carol has become a shell of what she was. She shows no remorse for killing the two infected people and even gives a dose of reality to Rick as they look for supplies.

It also shows how much she differs on ideals with the council. Recruiting new survivors was important to the council and Carol has no interest in it. Instead of waiting for Sam, she advises on leaving. She also showed no remorse in finding the woman they had met dead and getting devoured by walkers.

In a way, Carol is portraying the role of realist, as opposed to the idealists in the council. The council hopes to cure the infected and continue to grow their ranks. Carol on the other hand, believes curing the sick won't work and wants to save those that aren't sick yet.

It's like Carol has fallen into the mood Rick did last season after the death of Lori. It's probably why Rick took only her with him for the supplies run as a final test to see where she is at psychologically.

Meanwhile, the supply run with Daryl, Tyreese, Michonne and Bob hits a couple of snags along the way.

It's clear Tyreese has not fully recovered from the death of Karen as he is brash in attitude and doesn't seem to care if he loses his life fighting walkers. There are some nice moment between Michonne and Tyreese, with Michonne trying to put a little optimism in Tyreese. It's a little reminiscent of the comics, where the two fall in love, well as close to love as you can get. It remains to be seen if that happens in the show, but for fans of the comic, it's a nice note.

We also get to see what has been on Bob's mind and his need for alcohol. It almost gets the group killed and gets Bob on Daryl's bad side.

As the episode comes to a close, Rick has decided on a punishment for what Carol did. It's a bold move by Rick because of the repercussions it can cause. In his mind, Carol did not pass the test in the way she handled meeting the two survivors. Hopefully Carol will find her self on her own and go back to the positive person she was becoming.

While this episode had a nice ending, it moved very slow. Many of the scenes with Daryl and his group seemed longer then they needed to be and it made the episode drag. Unless Bob will play a significant role later in the series, I really felt the scenes with him were not needed. Still better then the average episode, it needed that extra spice and it took long to get there.

Rating:

6.5/10