Before you check out our episode recap of the third episode of the 6th season The Walking Dead, you need to watch the episode! This is an intense one, with some major things going on! But come back and check out our thoughts on this week’s episode titled Thank You!
Don’t need the The Walking Dead episode recap for Thank You? Click here to jump directly to Violet’s thoughts on the episode!
To see Josh’s thoughts on this week’s The Walking Dead episode, Thank You, click here to get directly there!
Episode Recap of The Walking Dead, Season 6 Episode 3: Thank You
So this episode opens with Glenn on the run in the forest. Rick is with him, and Michonne. Then the rest of the Alexandrians are running with them too. Daryl, Abraham, and Sasha radio to find out what is going on. Daryl wants to head back to the Alexandria to help, but Rick tells him to stay put. Daryl does…for now. As Rick’s group runs through the forest, a girl falls, hurting her ankle. Nick seems to have a panic attack, and another is giving some lip about the way Rick is handling this mission. Rick comes up with a new plan, to use the RV to round the walkers that are heading to Alexandria. Rick has a pow-wow with Michonne and Glenn, in which he basically says that Glenn and Michonne have to make it back. They can try to help the Alexandrians, but if they fall behind, they are SOL. Heath overhears this and seems a little disgruntled, but keeps quiet. As Rick predicted, a walker manages to take down an Alexandria while they are meeting, and Michonne puts him out of his misery. Finally, the horn that was going off from the semi truck ends, which Rick is thankful for. Rick salvages the dead guy for supplies, and Rick heads for the RV.
Michonne and Glenn take the lead getting the people back home. As they move, they run into a group of walkers. Glenn and Michonne move in quickly and quietly, then the Alexandrians join in the fight. They aren’t quite as adept, and one Alexandrian, Sturgess, shoots another Alexandrian in the leg, Scott. Sturgess takes off in a panic, but the group seemed to have finished the group of walkers off–or not. One of the Alexandrians is bitten on the back. He seems pretty calm for being bit, and resolved to his eventual fate.
Moving to Daryl, Abraham and Sasha, Daryl decides it is time to break rank, and head back to Alexandria. Sasha and Abraham aren’t happy with the decision, and Daryl tells Abraham and Sasha, “I have faith in ya” in regards to their staying alive.
Michonne, Glenn and the rag-tag Alexandrians continue their journey home, and Michonne and the bitten Alexandrian talk about his wife and how he found someone new after the loss of his previous family. The group comes to a town, which Nick has been to before on a run. They look for a car to use, but nothing will start. Glenn and Michonne talk in private, and Glenn tells Michonne they have to get home, but have to help these people too. Heath talks to Nick about this town–and apparently there were some deaths on their last run. For some reason, the group appoints Nick to take point, despite his previous botched plans. Nick finds Sturgess’ hat on the group, and then after a little more wandering in town, they find the rest of him–being gnawed on by some walkers. Nick has another moment of panic, and gets frozen with his decision making when all paths seem to be covered with walkers. Eventually they find an abandoned pet store, and hold up there to recuperate and bandage the wounded.
Inside, Heath gives Michonne some lip about Glenn and Michonne eventually ditching the Alexandrians when things get tough. Meanwhile, Glenn comes up with a plan to distract the walkers away from Alexandria–lighting a building on fire with a flare. Nick suggests a feed store that would be easily burned, and offers to go with. Glenn gives him a look, but then agrees to let him come. Glenn takes a moment, possibly praying, looking at Hershel’s pocket watch. He also radios Rick telling him the plan.
While listening to Glenn, Rick is still running to the RV. He comes across a few walkers he has to take out. His knife winds up breaking, and he injures his hand in the scuffle. He grabs a few items left on the corpses and continues on to the RV.
Back at the pet store, Scott’s leg is bandaged, and Annie gets a crutch. Scott and Annie both ask to be left behind, but Heath refuses. Michonne continues to get lip from Heath, and Michonne gives him an ear full about how Heath has no idea what it is really like. Her intensity seems to quiet Heath right up.
Moving over to Glenn and Nick, they find one of the runners that was with Nick on his run to this town. Nick recognizes him, and wants to take him out. He hesitates at first, but finally does it. Glenn tries to reassure Nick that he is, “not that guy anymore.” They continue on their journey to the feed store, but as bad luck would have it, the feed store is already burnt down. Nick gets stuck in his own head again, not knowing what move to make. He finally makes a decision, and they move out. Unfortunately, Nick chose poorly. They are at a dead end as well, with a chain link fence. They look to climb the fence, but walkers are on the other side. Glenn and Nick open fire until their gun is empty. Hope seems to be lost…Glenn and Nick climb onto a dumpster, which is their last move before they are surrounded. The walkers grab at their feet and we see Nick go full panic-attack mode. The world moves in slow motion, and we see him gaze into the crowd of walkers–crying. Glenn calls his name, and Nick stares blankly at Glenn. He tells Glenn, “Thank you” and holds a gun to his own head. Glenn tries to stop him, and Nick pulls the trigger. Both Nick and Glenn tumble off the dumpster, and into the crowd of walkers. We see Glenn’s face, a state of horror, as a body–possibly his, or Nicholas’–being torn and eaten….Glenn seems to be at his end–or is he?
Hearing shots from back home, the group in the pet store plans to move out, but they are halted by the herd passing right by the windows. The bitten Alexandrian asks Michonne for a favor–to give a goodbye note to his wife back home if he doesn’t make it. She makes a promise to get him home and doesn’t take the note. Things get hairy for the group though–inside the pet store, they hear banging. Some walkers have woken up, and Michonne has to take then down. Michonne was too loud though, and the herd outside moves to the pet store. Michonne makes the decision that they have to move now.
They open the doors, take out the close walkers, and move from the herd as fast as they can. Annie falls due to her wounded leg, and Michonne looks to go back for her, but Annie tells them to keep going. Annie has a last stand with her pistol, and is gobbled up by a dozen walkers. They come to a dead end, with a big gate in the way. They start to climb over, and Michonne and the bitten Alexandrian are the last to climb. Both are grabbed by their feet, and are struggling to get over. Michonne finally makes it, but the bitten man is not so lucky, and is pulled down and eaten. The note he had written to his wife fell out of his pocket, a reminder to Michonne about her promise she won’t be able to keep. As they watch the man torn apart, Heath is the one to say they have to keep going. They make their way to the forest, and try to hobble along with Scott in pretty bad shape from his leg wound. Finally, after some more walking, they get back home.
Rick is still on his run to the RV, and finally gets there. He starts it, and begins his drive. he pulls over after driving for some time, thinking he is where he should be. He radios for Glenn. No answer. He radios for Tobin. No answer. Rick calls Daryl next. He responds, as he is still on the way back to Alexandria. Sasha mocks Daryl, since he is not where he should be. Daryl tells the team on the radio that they have to stick to the plan, no matter how bad they think things are back home.
Rick bandages his hand as best he can, but he is not alone. Someone bursts into the back of the RV, opening fire on him. Daryl hears this on his radio, and turns back on his motorcycle, but heads to Sasha and Abraham. Back with Rick, he gets in a scuffle after the person runs out of ammo. Another attacks him from behind, but Rick gets his trusty revolver and blows them both away. He searches the two men, and finds some baby food. This seems to affect Rick, probably because he is thinking Judith could be in trouble. But before he can mourn too much, he catches a glimpse of more attackers sneaking alongside the RV. Grabbing his AK, Rick opens fire through the wall of the RV into their direction, mowing them all down. Rick then tries to start the RV, but something has gone wrong, and it won’t start. He begins to freak out. Then we hear it. Walkers emerge from the woods, gurgling and moaning as they do, surrounding the RV with Rick still inside.
Josh’s Thoughts: The Walking Dead, Season 6 Episode 3: Thank You
Walking Dead is firing on all cylinders right now. I was very disappointed the last couple seasons, but right now, I am calling it my favorite show this fall. There is a lot of intense stuff going on this episode. Let’s get the big discussion out of the way–Glenn. Is he dead? So far I am not believing he is. There are a couple reasons for this. Keep in mind, this could be spoiler-ish, as my evidence will not include only what is contained within the show. Starting first within the show–How did Nicholas have a bullet left to shoot himself in the head? That is the first part that is hard to believe. It could be that Nicholas hallucinated that last scene when they both fall, and perhaps next time we see them, they are both still standing on the dumpster, and Nick has his empty gun to his head. The next thing I would look at is the second scenario, if they both actually did fall. When the walkers are tearing into…a body, they seem to be grabbing handfuls of intestines. From the camera angle we see, this looks to be way too high on Glenn’s body for them to be his. It could be that they are Nicholas’, or it could be just an odd angle, and intestines are a favorite organ to use when walkers are tearing apart a human being. Another issue with this death playing out this way, is that no one else knows what happened to Glenn. This played out with Beth in a similar way, and she was eventually found alive. I can’t imagine the show would just leave Maggie hanging, not knowing what happened to Glenn. This could be solved by eventually having “Walker Glenn” show up at Alexandria, but given the amount of walkers in this herd, the probability of Glenn being seen is very small. I also feel this would be a terrible way for Maggie and the rest of Rick’s group to say goodbye to Glenn.
Let’s look at a couple more reasons why Glenn may not be dead yet–one is that it looks like the actor, Steven Yeun, is a part of the credits for the rest of the season. There are also reports that he has signed a contract for the next season. Also, if you watch Talking Dead Glenn was mysteriously absent from the “In Memoriam” that Chris Hardwick does. Hardwick also read a message from producer Scott Gimple that said we would see Glenn in some fashion or another in subsequent episodes, but the message was very cryptic in its meaning. Finally, to cap off the reason I don’t think he is dead is that, within the comics, there is an important storyline that involves Glenn. I am not sure the producers and writers would want to change that, as it is a defining storyline in the comic book. They could have another character go through that arc, but I think this would enrage the hardcore fans.
But that’s enough about Glenn, other things happened this episode. Rick’s storyline was done very well this episode as well. The intensity to which he moves to complete his mission feels visceral. His running to the RV was menacing, and despite his injury, his taking down of those walkers on the road was brutal, yet efficient. The same can be said about the way he handled the Wolves which attacked him in the RV. He is not taking chances or giving these guys second chances.
What I wonder with Rick though is this: When he finds the baby food in the pocket of one of the Wolves, and he goes to start the RV–is it to continue the plan, or make for home? I am very unclear on this. Before the walkers emerged, they couldn’t be heard, so I think it could have gone either way had the RV actually started. It seemed like before he found the baby food, and he was giving his pep talk on the radio, he was almost trying to convince himself that the right decision is to stay on their mission, rather than go back.
This brings me to Daryl, who seems to not be totaling agreeing with Rick’s decisions. What I think is kind of worse, is that Daryl is not voicing these decisions, and leading Rick to believe Daryl is doing his job, when he is actually abandoning his post. If he is going to break rank, he needs to tell Rick he is. That way the plan can take into account that Daryl is not there as it is executed. That kind of got me angry, seeing Daryl just take off.
Finally, with Michonne and the rest of the Alexandrians, it looks like the two who survived the ordeal learned a lot in their “Walker Boot Camp.” Hopefully these two now realize the harshness of the reality outside their safe walls. Decisions have to be made in this terrible world, and sometimes there just is no right one.
But again, to wrap up, this episode was another masterpiece of season 6. So far the episodes are top notch, and I hope it doesn’t let up. I am sure the hi-octane will subside for a few episodes, but hopefully the quality of the episodes remains. I am looking forward to the next episode, which is a long one, 1.5 hours!
Violet’s Thoughts on Season 6 Episode 3 of The Walking Dead: Thank You
The Walking Dead continues to deliver this season! You want action? You got action. You want walkers? You got ’em! Lots of them! Maybe too many… Just kidding. You can never have too many zombies on a zombie show, right?!
Anyway, so now we see why last episode, although there were walkers headed toward Alexandria, we never actually saw them show up while the community was battling the Wolves — because they were still too far away and hadn’t made it yet. Rick came up with a plan to head them off with the RV. How far that plan progresses is yet to be seen, as it looks like Rick is in a lot of trouble right now with all the walkers converging on the RV. Is the RV going to suddenly decide to start after all, or is something more exciting going to happen? Also, I feel like that RV door is still open from when the Wolves came in, and Rick needs to close it before the walkers get in too! It looks like their original plan may be at least somewhat still on track, and I’d like to see it actually play out.
Then of course there’s the elephant in the room, Glenn. Is he dead? Is he not? I’ll admit that when I saw it happen, it did pass through my mind that the intestines being pulled out looked a bit high, but I didn’t think much of it, and assumed he was dead. After all, he’s surrounded by walkers, no one else is even remotely nearby to save him, how’s he going to get out of this? But then upon watching Talking Dead, his name wasn’t in the In Memoriam. Remember the last time the show made it ambiguous whether a character had died? That was Judith. Her name was not in the In Memoriam either, and she turned out to be alive. Also, Steve Yeun, who plays Glenn, was not a guest on Talking Dead. Pretty sure it’s become a tradition for every actor to appear on Talking Dead following the episode where they die. Then there was that cryptic message from Scott Gimple. I started to get hope that he was alive. Then all the conspiracy theory articles have been coming out all week with the evidence supporting that he’s still alive. I hope he is, and if so, I hope there’s a believable explanation.
Oh, Walking Dead, you have me hooked yet again.
Scenes from The Walking Dead, Season 6 Episode 4: Here’s Not Here
Here are scenes from next week’s The Walking Dead episode titled Here’s Not Here:
