There Is Always A Cost, And Other Takeaways From This Week’s ‘The Walking Dead’

“What is it?” former Kingdommer Dianne asks Maggie at the end of this week’s episode of The Walking Dead, “Do Not Send Us Astray.” Maggie, contemplative, looks out over the graves of a dozen or so of her people, who have just died in yet another battle with The Saviors, and says a single word, “Cost.”

The utterance harkens back to a speech Negan gave midway through the seventh season. “We survived. We provide security. We bring civilization back to this world. Rules are what make it all work. There is always a cost,” Negan bellowed to The Saviors.

What Maggie must be thinking about as she looks over the newly dead is the cost of this war with The Saviors, and whether all the lost lives have been worth it. Two sets of graves are dug at The Hilltop during this episode, one after the initial battle with the Saviors and a second after wounds and infections killed even more members of The Hilltop. After the first set of graves, Maggie conceded that, for her, it’s all about seeking revenge for the death of Glenn. “I sent Negan that box to make him mad, to lure him here. Because I wanted my husband’s grave to be the last thing he saw. Even if it came at a cost.”

The cost for Maggie is two sets of graves, but for the Alexandrians and their allies, the cost has been much larger: Glenn, Abraham, Carl, most of The Kingdommers, a large number of Hilltoppers, and Jadis’ entire community. “There is always a cost.”

It’s this cost that Maggie must be grappling with as she contemplates her next steps, although the All Out War seems to be stuck at a standstill. The bulk of the episode sees The Hilltop community hold off the Saviors’ assault. Defying Negan, Simon had planned to kill everyone in the community, but the end result is something much closer to what Negan had in mind in the first place: Wounding several Hilltoppers with infected weapons and leaving them to literally eat their own. Maggie had been ready for the assault, although director Jeffrey F. January designed a battle that looked a lot like the other battles in the All Out War: Incoherent chaos, bullets, and the occasional dead person. There must have been one dead person for every 100 bullets.

In the end, Simon retreats, leaving several wounded and unaware that they are infected. The battle must have taken a lot out of the Hilltoppers, because they all manage to sleep through Tobin’s death, his subsequent re-animation, the screams of a couple of his victims, the grunts of awakened zombies, plus another newly zombified Hilltopper who loudly falls down a flight of stairs and into a room full of sleeping people who somehow manage to remain asleep until the zombies begin attacking them. Rick, Maggie, et. al, finally come to the rescue, but not before several more Hilltoppers are killed in the chaos.

Once the dust settles, Rick and the others realize what has happened: The Saviors’ weapons were dipped in zombie blood. This creates an immediate scare in Tara, who had been shot with an arrow by Dwight, although it’s unlikely that his arrow was infected for reasons explained here (also, because Dwight is clearly an ally to The Hilltop in spite of Daryl’s skepticism).

Meanwhile, not-so-bright 10-year-old Henry — the worst character on the series since Sam — is still hellbent on avenging his brother’s death. He somehow steals the key to the Savior pen (does no one keep an eye on that?), takes a large assault weapon and breaks into the makeshift prison where the Savior hostages are being held. Naturally, the plan goes awry (kids: Stay away from assault weapons), all the Savior hostages get out, and Henry goes missing. Morgan, again, blames himself. His PTSD is further triggered, and he begins seeing visions of Gavin blaming Morgan for the death of his own son, Duane. It’s obviously only a matter of time before Morgan takes his leave of The Hilltop; the question is whether he does it before or during the season finale.

There are three episodes remaining this season, and what’s interesting is that the series has already used up many of the tricks deployed in the comic source material. The War is at an impasse, the Saviors are in retreat, the Hilltop is down a lot of people (all redshirts, save for Tobin) and out of ammunition. Meanwhile, Negan is still being held hostage by Jadis. The conclusion of the All Out War may mirror the comic books, but how the series gets there remains an open question. After 37 Savior-related episodes, the end of the All Out War cannot come soon enough, if only so the remaining characters can lick their wounds, reset, and finally embark on a new storyline.

Additional Notes

— Before he died, at least Tobin was finally able to get some closure with Carol, who explained to him why she left before returning to a variation of speech that has been given dozens of times on this show: “Winning just means we get tomorrow.”

— Not only is Morgan’s story repeating itself, so is Carol’s. For her, Henry’s disappearance is basically the Sophia storyline all over again. The Walking Dead often doesn’t understand the line between a callback to an earlier storyline or recycling it.

— Speaking of the same old, same old, this series had a lot more voices in the writers’ room in earlier seasons. Lately, however, the series has solidified around the same five or six writers and a similar number of directors, most of whom have been with the show for years: Angela Kang, Matthew Negrete, Channing Powell, David Leslie Johnson, Greg Nicotero, and Corey Reed. When Angela Kang takes over as showrunner next season, she’d be wise to bring in some new voices if only so that they can provide a fresh perspective on the same repeating themes.

— Similarly, even if AMC were willing to meet Lauren Cohan’s salary demands, she might be wise to move on, anyway. The post-Glenn “widow” version of her character is decidedly one note, and as others have pointed out, the future of her character in the comics as written doesn’t offer Cohan a lot of screentime and even less in terms of challenges.

— While The Hilltop lost a dozen or more people, at least they have gained a few Saviors who switched teams out of respect for Maggie’s leadership, which is as close as a The Walking Dead character is going to get to Daenerys Targaryen. Too bad Maggie doesn’t have any dragons at her disposal, although the show is holding a helicopter in reserve.

— It’s good to see that I wasn’t the only one incredibly annoyed that no one woke up when a zombie fell thunking down the stairs.