10 Questions We Have After This Week’s Sad, Confusing ‘The Walking Dead’

The 14th episode of the sixth season of The Walking Dead, “Twice as Far,” began in a loop, illustrating to us that, after killing off what they believed to be all the Saviors, Alexandria had returned to a peaceful routine. On The Walking Dead, however, routine never lasts for long. There will always be others who want what they have. In this case, those others are still The Saviors, with Daryl’s old friend Dwight among them. Dwight killing Denise (borrowing a scene straight out of Abraham’s comic arc) was the final straw for Carol. As the episode came to its conclusion, Carol had left Alexandria and Morgan stared off into the distance, looking guilty for his role in Carol’s departure.

With two episodes to go this season, we have several questions about last night’s episode.

1. What will Morgan’s jail cell be used for?

“Why?” Rick asked of Morgan, when he saw that he’d completed building his jail cell. “It’ll give us some choices next time,” Morgan told him. That next time will almost certainly involve Negan, and if Negan is not ultimately killed in his showdown with Rick, maybe Morgan can use that jail cell to transform Negan into a peaceful, productive member of Alexandria. Stranger things have happened, right? It also gives Morgan some utility in the show moving ahead, and puts a button on Morgan’s flashback origins story with the cheesemaker.

Either that, or like the cheesemaker Eastman, Morgan plans to use the jail cell to starve a man to death over 47 days.

2. Where have we seen this figure before?

Thanks, AMC Story Sync.

3. What’s cooking between Rosita and Spencer?

You mean, besides beef-jerky stroganoff? Clearly, Spencer is a rebound for Rosita as she continues to get over Abraham. She obviously needs a good rebound relationship before moving on to her one true love, Eugene. Unfortunately for Rosita — as Denise pointed out before she died — being with Spencer doesn’t make Rosita any less alone.

4. Why was Daryl so adamant about not taking the train tracks?

Here’s an easy answer: Terminus flashbacks, not to mention Daryl’s run-in with Joe, leader of the Claimers, on the train tracks. The train tracks never lead to anything good. He should’ve stuck with his instincts coming back. Denise got killed. Eugene got shot. Train tracks are never a good idea!

5. Is Eugene the carrot, the egg, or the coffee?

In last week’s episode, Polly told Carol a parable about the carrot, egg, and coffee. A carrot goes into boiling water stiff and comes out limp; a egg goes in soft and comes out hard; and a coffee changes the water. That’s essentially what Eugene was saying about himself in his speech to Abraham. He is the coffee.

“As with any RPG, tabletop or otherwise, the key to survival is allowing one to be shaped by the assigned environment. In doing so, a broad range of capabilities are acquired allowing one to flip the script and use said capabilities to shape said environment for maximum longevity.”

He proved himself the coffee when he took Dwight by the dick (literally) and saved Daryl, Abraham, and Rosita from Dwight and the Saviors, of which there must be 100 or more.

6. What was the most tragic death of the episode?

If you said Denise, try again. Denise’s death is sad. Alexandria loses a doctor; Tara loses a girlfriend (who never told her that she loved her!), and The Walking Dead loses a great actress in Merritt Wever. More importantly, Denise’s death may indirectly spell doom for Daryl. However, the most heartbreaking death in tonight’s episode was that of Eugene’s mullet.

R.I.P. Eugene’s hair game. Welcome to the Monytail.

7. Has Eugene solved the show’s ammo problem?

The ammo issue has come up fairly often on discussion boards and comment threads about The Walking Dead. People often wonder why they never seem to run out of bullets. In fact, just this week, Business Insider talked to John Sanders, the property master and weapons expert for The Walking Dead, who said:

“As the story continues, we’re going to see a lot more transfer to more melee weapons,” Sanders said. “Bullets are a finite instrument … and we need to make sure that each character can only use so many and that they’re thinking about it.”

“Bullets [will] start to become really valuable,” he said. “And you certainly wouldn’t just spray bullets at something if you’re not hitting something. So, I expect we’ll probably move more and more away from the machine guns.”

I don’t expect that the ammo plant Eugene has designs on creating will solve the ammo problem entirely, but it should go a long way toward making the seemingly endless supply of ammo on the series more believable.

8. What happened to Dwight’s face?

I am not sure if the series is going to explain it, or if we’re supposed to draw our own conclusions. I will say, however, that in the comics (spoiler), it was Negan who ironed his face. In this case, because Dwight left the Savior compound with his wife, Honey, to search for someone else, which was when he came upon Daryl and stole his motorcycle and crossbow (both of which Daryl has gotten back now, so he’s whole again).

9. What was the song that played while they were mourning the death of Denise?

That was “Chapel,” by Nicole Dollanganger.

10. Why did Carol leave?

If you’ve missed the last two or three episodes, Carol’s departure may come as a huge surprise, especially because for a few episodes, she was not the kind of person who would ever leave Alexandria. She was also not the kind of person who would run away from a fight, or be hesitant about killing. Morgan, however, got in her head in a way that Morgan probably didn’t intend. Now Carol suddenly can’t kill anymore. When Daryl told her that he should’ve killed Dwight, she suspected he was right. When Carol found out that Daryl’s refusal to kill Dwight cost Denise her life, Carol knew he was right, and knew that killing was necessary to survive in this world.

Carol doesn’t want to kill anymore. Ever again. The only person who may be able to change her mind is Morgan, and that’s why Morgan has to go get her. If the midseason promos are any indication, he’ll do so on a horse, like the prince that he is.