Title: Fear the Walking Dead “Shiva”
Network: AMC
Air Date: May 22nd, 2016
Genre: Serial Drama, Horror
I can’t believe it’s here already – the mid-season finale for Fear the Walking Dead titled “Shiva.” Things have certainly picked up and our group finds themselves in a precarious situation with Strand “killing” Abigail… after he died, by shooting him in the head to prevent him from turning. As I mentioned last week, this was obviously not going to sit well with Celia who believes the infected should still be cared for and treated as people. She’s essentially the evil version of Hershel from season two of the Walking Dead. So much happened in this episode from Travis seeing just how far gone his son is, to Daniel suffering from a mental breakdown to Nick just walking off, along with a number of potential (but uncertain) character deaths. Fear the Walking Dead left us with a ton of questions and we’ll have to wait until the second half of the season to have them answered. Thankfully it is nothing like that Negan mess of an ending from the Walking Dead.
As expected, psycho Hershel, aka Celia, did not take kindly to Strand shooting Abigail in the head to prevent him from turning. Celia is further enraged that Strand failed to follow up with killing himself so he could follow Abigail into the afterlife, so guess what happens. If you said she orders everyone to leave the compound, then you are correct. As much as I love Fear the Walking Dead, the basis of this whole episode could be seen coming from a mile away because we’ve seen it before. It was the exact same thing in season two of the Walking Dead; however, some interesting things still did happen with some of the characters.
Daniel is my favorite character of Fear the Walking Dead so far but Madison for me has really gone from annoying me to… I kind of dig her. The whole business of her locking Celia in with the infected was just cold and so well done. Celia is trying to explain to her how she sees the infected and as soon as Madison takes a step back you can slowly see what is about to unfold. I just loved this moment in the episode not only for how it played out but for Madison as a character as well. The big question is, though, is Celia dead? One would certainly think that Celia’s fate was sealed but when Daniel opens the door later… we don’t see Celia anywhere. Speaking of Daniel…
The whole breakdown thing Daniel is going through is a little frustrating because he seemed to be the most grounded, given the horrors he’s already been through. Something at the compound triggered this state of mind for him, but it’s never really presented to the viewer which makes the whole situation with him feel out of the blue. I will say that I always have enjoyed characters in general that have that tormented soul. I mean really in some way we all have done something we aren’t proud of or experienced something horrible that we’ll always remember, so that type of character feels more real to me I suppose. This episode does provide some more insight into just what Daniel has been through during his life and how accepting his wife was of what he had done. Daniel is tormented by the lives he’s taken and perhaps he is ready to die. In a scene reminiscent of what Shane did back in season two, Daniel burns all the trapped infected and we get a very eery shot of Daniel standing in the flames. Did he kill himself or did he escape? Daniel is such a big part of Fear the Walking Dead so I don’t think he would have a merely suggested off screen death but I could be wrong.
Travis made an interesting and questionable decision in this episode and I found myself scratching my head some. Travis really begins to see how just how troubled his son Chris is in this episode after all the warnings from Madison and Alicia. When Chris runs off, Travis finds him but elects to stay with him instead of returning to the compound. Even after Nick finds Travis and explains how much Madison needs him back at the compound, he still decides to stay and tells Nick to say that he didn’t find them. Under any other circumstance, I suppose I could rationalize with this but given everything that has happened, I can’t understand why Travis continued to stay away. The episode ends with Travis and Chris still gone as the compound burns to the ground so we’ll have to wait quite awhile before we see what becomes of that decision.
I am not a fan of the turn of events with Nick and his openness to Celia. However, his decision to go out and get Luis, who has now turned, was certainly a good move. Nick is a very smart character and doing that secured him and his family being able to stay at the compound. Therefore, it’s hard to see him then go and eat up everything that Celia tells him and not realize she’s a little off her rocker. This ego he seems to have about being able to walk among the infected and can’t die also bothers me. The only reason he can walk among them is because he’s masked himself with the blood of the infected. It’s not as if he can walk among them without doing that so that whole line of thinking is just beyond me.
Fear the Walking Dead had a so-so season finale with some big changes to our characters and the group. Given that AMC has a full order for season two, it is very likely we won’t see Fear the Walking Dead back until August. The aim here would be to wrap the season just before season seven of the Walking Dead starts back up in October. With the group now abandoning the compound as it burns to the ground, where will the second half of season two take place? Strand mentions going back to the boat during the episode if it is still there so it is very possible we’ll see our survivors back at sea. We’ll have to wait until Fear the Walking Dead returns in August to find out.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkvf7c9suSk[/embedyt]
- Characters: Mystery surrounds Celia and Daniel while the remainder of the group is split
- Story: The safe haven at the compound has come to an end
- Cinematography: Very eery shot of Daniel in the flames
- Acting: Nick and Chris are still frustrating with their emotions
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