The Walking Dead’ Season 2, Ep. 1: Sophia’s Choice

Thank NO ONE for little girls

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  • AMC
  • Bald mom stars in “Not Without My Daughter”

Look. I know Sophia’s 12. Twelve year olds don’t take direction well because of their underdeveloped brains and their raging hormones and things. Plus, you know, she’s living in a post-zombie-apocalyptic world in which her first period is less cause for celebration (which is weird anyway) and more cause to sew her stuff shut before Walkers catch her scent. But, seriously, that little girl led everyone budding-breasts-first into what would appear to be a lot of unnecessary trouble in the much-anticipated (a thing people say) premier of “The Walking Dead.”

At the end of last season, there was a battle of the wills between Rick and Shane: Go to the CDC (good-guy Rick’s idea) or go to Fort Benning (sex-with-Rick’s-wife-having Shane’s idea). Our rag-tag gang of still-alive-people, naturally, chose the former, which ended up being a bust (LITERALLY). So, after some wine and some hot showers, a date-rape attempt, and a couple lives lost, they’re off to Fort Benning.

The episode begins with one of Rick’s external monologues delivered via walkie talkie to Morgan and his son, who are probably dead and then undead at this point. And he ALMOST tells us what Jenner whispered in his ear right before the CDC got blowed up (“Rick, you are NOT the father”), but decides it doesn’t matter, most likely because the new writers have yet to decide what Jenner said.

Then they’re on the road. In the truck, Rick and Lori share a quaint story about a failed trip to the Grand Canyon. In the RV, Shane’s cleaning guns and offers to clean Andrea’s, because it’s abundantly clear NO ONE wants Andrea to have a functioning gun. She lost her deadly weapon privileges when she lost her will to live.

The highway’s a mess, (why they didn’t take backroads is beyond me), and as they try to negotiate their way around a wrecked semi, Dale’s RV breaks down, which, of course it did, because it’s needed a new radiator hose since forever ago, and even though are a hundreds of unmanned (albeit, corpse-filled) vehicles on the road for the taking, they’ve consistently refused to swap it for a vehicle that hasn’t been in service since Nixon was in office.

Even if the cars are no good, the stuff inside apparently is, so they start looking for the necessities — water, food, cute red dresses. See, shorn-haired mom wasn’t allowed to have nice things when her dickhead, abusive husband was alive (before he got zombie bites and she got to bash his brain in a bunch). Now she IS allowed to have nice things and it doesn’t even fucking matter. Isn’t that the way?

From the next scene we learn three important things:
— Walkers travel in “herds.” Social commentary.
— Hiding from Walkers under cars doesn’t always work.
— T-Dog has way more blood in his body than other people.