Title: Fear the Walking Dead “Wrath”
Network: AMC
Air Date: October 2nd, 2016
Genre: Serial Drama, Horror
Fear the Walking Dead just aired two back to back episodes to close out its second season and… whoa. Now I will be combining both episodes (Wrath, North) into this one review. The written review will be in order as the episodes aired, starting with “Wrath.”
First up in the two back to back episodes of the Fear the Walking Dead finale is “Wrath.” This episode had it all and was certainly the more jam packed of the two. Travis snapped and went all American History X on Brandon. Nick was no doubt a fan of 29 Days Later with how he dispatched one of the infected. We saw a familiar face from Sons of Anarchy. And at last… we had the false prophet. It was all in there. For me, “Wrath” certainly felt like the stronger episode of the two. I was surprised though that we had no “definitive” death for any of our main characters. That’s something the show has really tip-toed around. When it comes to the Walking Dead, they had/have a bit of a bigger cast to play with I suppose. I mean we can continue to assume Daniel is dead, we can now assume that Chris is dead but… we aren’t absolutely certain. When it comes to death here, let’s talk about Chris.
For me, “Wrath” certainly felt like the stronger episode of the two. I was surprised though that we had no “definitive” death for any of our main characters. That’s something the show has really tip-toed around. When it comes to the Walking Dead, they had/have a bit of a bigger cast to play with I suppose. I mean we can continue to assume Daniel is dead, we can now assume that Chris is dead but… we aren’t absolutely certain. When it comes to death here, let’s talk about Chris.
I have been saying for awhile now that Chris’ time on the show would be coming to an end. I mentioned it back in Pablo & Jessica. The biggest indicator was when he was cast in season four of Agents of shield. When it comes to this episode, for all intents and purposes… Chris is dead. Although, this is where we get back into “definitive” deaths. When we see Chris killed, it is in the mind of Travis. That death is based off of what Brandon and Derek are telling him. We never see a body at any point. Would Brandon and Derek lie to Travis? It’s possible but I don’t know what if anything would motivate them to do so. Needless to say, this was the breaking point for Travis who hulks out and kills both Brandon and Derek (sort of).
The scene where Travis finally snaps is, without a doubt the most intense, emotional moment of season two for me. It was in that scene that we saw a man stripped of everything except for rage. With everything Travis tried to do to save Chris, he still failed. Not only did he fail but his son was killed by two men he desperately tried to steer Chris away from. He knew Chris was headed down the wrong path – he saw it clear as day – and he couldn’t do anything. I understand Travis finally losing it and I can’t say I wouldn’t have done the same thing. Unfortunately, in his rage, he also severely wounds Oscar.
And… look who turned out to be a false prophet after all! Alejandro came onto the scene as the one in charge in Colonia and the one who could not be turned. I’ll admit, I wasn’t a fan of the whole “bitten but didn’t turn.” Thankfully, this turned out to not be the direction in which the showrunners were going. The scene in which Alejandro was bitten also came with one of the most brutal scenes, if not the most brutal throughout the season with Nick jamming his thumbs deep into one of the infected’s eyes. This same infected also just bit the nose off of a patient a few seconds earlier. While I don’t now how much you could damage one’s brain from jamming your thumbs deep into the eyes, it was crazy to watch.
Even though Alejandro was a false prophet, I somewhat respect his decision for creating the lie he did. Honestly, how many people did he save with that lie? Well, maybe he didn’t save them, as opposed to just give them more time but isn’t that something we would all want? As much as I have found Nick irritating in Fear the Walking Dead up until this point, I did appreciate him as a character in this episode. He knew Alejandro was lying and he addressed him head on in front of Luciana. He also was seemingly the only voice of reason. Very bad people are coming… we need to leave.
While Ofelia wasn’t left out in this episode of Fear the Walking Dead, I felt her scenes were largely filler up until the very last one. We see a new… yet familiar face. No, it wasn’t Daniel which I was hoping for. It was Dayton Callie, who played Wayne Unser on Sons of Anarchy. His face was slightly shielded by the sun but that was him. It appears he is part of some military group that’s still patrolling the border. Perhaps these individuals will play a role next season… or maybe even at the end of the next episode??
Title: Fear the Walking Dead “North”
Network: AMC
Air Date: October 2nd, 2016
Genre: Serial Drama, Horror
Getting into the final episode, the main focus was on both the consequences of Travis’ actions and Nick escaping Colonia. This will definitely be my shorter review of the two. While this final episode from Fear the Walking Dead did have some important moments, it felt very drawn out. Also, I watched the first episode of Luke Cage this weekend and highly recommend checking it out once you’re done with this show.
When it came to Oscar dying, it wasn’t a very emotional moment for me. The Saw movie style operation on his head was pretty intense. When the drill was being used on his skull, it was a clench your first moment. The scenes that followed this were, however, very emotional and I loved it. Alicia killing an innocent person to save Travis was… wow. Let’s be real for a minute here. While yes, Travis did lose his son and his rage is understandable, he also killed an innocent man and member of the hotel community and poor Oscar died a slow death from swelling in his brain. His own brother is the one who eventually had to stick the razor blade in his brain. Who wouldn’t revenge? Furthermore, who wouldn’t be justified in getting revenge for that?
I can’t say I’m onboard with Strand deciding to stay at the hotel. He has no real connection to anyone there so why stay? His reason is that he doesn’t want to die. While I understand that on some level, these are also the people you have already encountered countless problems with and survived. The hotel may be secure in a sense but you really don’t know anyone there. Ultimately Strand helps his friends escape while he elects to stay behind. Since Strand didn’t harm the community in any way, it’s unlikely he would be killed but we are left with yet another loose end.
Back in Colonia, after all the back and forth between Alejandro and Nick about leaving or staying, Alejandro eventually agrees with Nick. It only required him to be near death. What bothers me about that is, the situation didn’t change. It’s been the exact same from the first warning Nick raised. If Colonia had a large standing army… well then I get trying to hold out. I’m not religious but I’m pretty convinced of the fact that you can’t stop evil men with guns with faith. Nick did mention the helicopter he saw not long after leaving but I find it hard to believe that would be a deciding factor in Alejandro changing his mind. The whole business felt like very forced conflict for the episode.
I have no idea what the deal was with Alicia asking what Madison was doing when looking for an address of where Nick might be. The dramatic music played and the scene went black. Did I miss something? I’m guessing that Alicia is supposed to feel some sort of way because Madison is still looking for Nick. Yes, Nick did make the decision to leave, but you can’t blame someone for wanting to find or know the fate of their son. It was sad to see Francisco and his family were killed. Again, not an emotional moment for Francisco being killed. The real emotion from that scene was seeing that his wife and daughter were killed as well.
With Alejandro being outed as a false prophet, I fully expected him to make some type of heroic act, in order to redeem himself. I was a little confused as to how the gang made in it with zero trouble but got taken down with the amount of firepower they had. Don’t any of them know the guise trick anyway? I feel like that would have been a much better route to go. Needless to say, the whole gang gets wiped out while Nick and Luciana are safely on their way to the border.
In the end, a shootout ensues at the border which wounds Luciana. The individuals that shoot Luciana coupled with the man that caught Ofelia, lead us to believe that some military style group is stationed at the border. Perhaps they are… Trump supporters? With Madison and Travis now knowing where Nick was headed, the conflict has been set up for the opening of season three. I think we can expect either some type of rescue attempt or time to be spent with this military group. After all, Nick and Ofelia are both American citizens. Fear the Walking Dead closed with a drawn out episode in “North” but “Wrath” really showed some worth and gave me hope for season three.
Did you see tonight’s finale of Fear the Walking Dead? If so, what did you think? Were you disappointed in not seeing Daniel again? Do you think he’ll go through a Morgan like change before we see him again? How did you feel about the final episodes? Be sure to let us know in the comments below and check back in just a few weeks for our review of the premiere episode of The Walking Dead.
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