The episode picks up where we left off last season with Carol after she got shot by the Savior and the guys from The Kingdom offered to help. Carol is being pulled along in a cart/wheel barrel. She can barely comprehend what’s going on around her; she catches bits of muted conversation, as she drifts in and out of consciousness. Morgan walks along next to her as they make progress along the path. She sees Morgan and members of The Kingdom kill a large batch of walkers. As she watches Morgan and his group dispatch the walkers, she sees the walkers as the people they once were. Those people fade back into the walkers that they currently are. She’s still disoriented from her gun shot wounds, but knows she has to get away from the battle. She makes her escape into the woods. She’s moving awfully fast for someone who’s been shot a few times and who’s barely conscious. She sees a cute little house with a fence, and a woman beckoning to her at the window. Then the woman turns back into a walker. Carol is about to be surrounded by walkers, and then she watches, unbelieving, as more Kingdom members on horses ride by and slaughter the walkers with spears and swords. She’s only dimly aware of what’s going on. As she watches the carnage unfold, she sees the walkers, then they flash to the people Carol imagines they once were. It’s a nice effect – both because it’s cool, and because it serves to remind us that the walkers were once human, with lives just like survivors. The Kingdom members and Morgan gather Carol back up, and Morgan puts a notch on a mailbox, and lifts the flag up to show there’s mail. Maybe it’s a note to Rick? Breadcrumbs for some other reason?
Next we see Carol lying on a bed, while Morgan watches over her, his lucky rabbit’s foot hanging from the lamp. Carol slowly wakes up, and asks how long she’s been asleep. Morgan says two days, more or less. Carol wants to know where they are. Morgan then pushes her in a wheelchair through garden paths. They see people working on gardens, a small group of children being taught – essentially being a functioning community. He tells her they can leave in about a week for Alexandria, and that this place is called The Kingdom. Morgan’s been helping them out, since everyone has been helping Carol. Carol is suspicious of them and wonders what Morgan told them. He gave them a bare bones version of their story – he wasn’t born yesterday, after all! He tells Carol they’re going to see King Ezekiel. Morgan wheels Carol into an auditorium, and Ezekiel is sitting on a kind of throne on the stage with his very large tiger — that Morgan forgot to mention. Ha!
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Shiva (the tiger) growls, and Ezekiel calms her. He says that Carol, ‘the fair maiden’, has been through trials. Ezekiel views her as a friend since Morgan is a friend. He welcomes her to The Kingdom. Carol is bemused. She keeps smiling, and she smiles through the whole encounter. The scene in front of her, ‘King’ Ezekiel, a huge tiger, and a body guard who’s as close to a court jester as you’re going to find in this show. It’s over the top, crazy. Ezekiel wants to know why Carol is still quiet even when she’s being spoken to. Carol smiles broadly, and says ‘I think you’re amazing!’ She thinks the tiger is amazing too. She says ‘I don’t know what the hell is going on in the most wonderful way.’ Ezekiel says they can stay as long as they want so long as they contribute. Ezekiel has Jerry, his bodyguard, offer Carol a bowl of fruit. Everything is grown in The Kingdom. She’s not up for fruit. Ezekiel suggests a pomegranate. She thinks pomegranates are too much work. Ezekiel comments that pomegranates are sweet surrounded by bitter. She’s definitely in Stealth Carol mode here, smiling and smiling. She asks Ezekiel if she can call him ‘your majesty’.
Morgan wheels her back outside. Carol tells Morgan that this place is a circus and that she can’t be here. She’s going to escape, she just can’t stay here. He won’t let her leave. She asks him if he’s going to tie her up like he tied up the wolf. Ouch! Morgan won’t let her die out there. Carol says it doesn’t matter what you do. People stroll out of a door, and Morgan and Carol quiet down and make their way back to her room.
It’s hard to say where The Kingdom is physically located. Are they a suburb of DC? They’re definitely not out in the boonies like Rick’s group. They leave through the gates, and herd pigs, which they then lock up. More walkers amble toward them. One of The Kingdom members, a guy in his earlier 20s or late teens is being taught how to kill walkers. He’s bad at it, the walker begins to get the upper hand, and the guy needs to be rescued, pronto! The kid feels bad about his failure. Ezekiel says ‘don’t trouble yourself Benjamin, next time’. No one will know about this, any of this, says one of the guys. Off they go in their truck. They see another truck driving down the road, which makes a right turn, while Ezekiel’s group turns left. They comment that those people are going ‘somewhere else’. I bet these people are Saviors.
Ezekiel’s truck returns through the gates, and we see two school buses on either side of the gate. So The Kingdom is on the site of an abandoned school. This makes a lot of sense now – the paths, the auditorium, Carol’s bedroom, which was probably once an office. Ezekiel is impressed by Morgan’s use of the bo staff. Morgan tells Ezekiel that he was taught by a cheese maker. Ezekiel asks if Morgan will teach Benjamin how to use the staff. Benjamin hasn’t shown any affinity with other weapons. Morgan is hesitant, but Ezekiel asks ‘please’, he needs for Benjamin to live. Morgan gives in and says ‘yeah’. Ezekiel is thrilled.
Carol is sitting unamused on her bed, and looks at the wheelchair, while montage music plays in the background. Oh, it’s people singing a cappella, and being directed by a pregnant woman. Alrighty, then. Rick’s group doesn’t sing.
Outside, the camera pans over the filing cabinets with plants growing in them (good use for old filing cabinets!), while at the gazebo, Benjamin is being taught by Morgan. Carol wheels herself outside and quietly (and quickly) picks up a knife and a couple of other implements.
Morgan and Benjamin continue to train in the gazebo.
Carol, still in stealth mode, tells a Kingdom dweller that she is so impressed with the breakfast cobbler. And the other cobblers that they eat. She spins a story to him that all they had to eat out there was possum, and she’s overwhelmed. She asks for a tissue. Oh, Stealth Carol, you’re so funny. She steals some clothes while the guy goes off to get tissues.
Benjamin asks about the book that Morgan is carrying with him – the book about aikido and peace. Benjamin asks if he can read it, as he’s already read all the books here, twice. He’s even read the air-conditioning manual. Ha. Morgan hesitates, but in the end he hands over his book. Ezekiel comes up to them and asks them both to come with them. They have ‘important matters to attend to’.
They go back outside the gates to where the slaughtered pigs are now hanging – a good distance away from The Kingdom. Cars drive up. It’s got to be Saviors. The newcomers ask about the pigs – they look bigger than the previous ones. Richard, one of Ezekiel’s right hand men, says that the pigs are well fed – he saw to it himself. Yeah, well fed on walker chow! The Saviors are happy with the amount of food that they’ve brought. The woman fighter from The Kingdom starts to whisper to Morgan who the people are, but he shoots back with an ‘I know who they are’.
The skinned pigs are loaded up into the trucks. Nasty Savior Guy tells Richard that he’s an asshole. The fight escalates and Morgan draws a gun and is surprised at how easy it came to him. Richard is told to stand down, which he does. Richard takes a lot of punches from Nasty Savior Guy. Ezekiel asks Gavin to tell his guy to stop, and he does. The Saviors leave, but not before reminding Ezekiel that next week is produce week, so produce. Otherwise ‘he’ll have to go first’. Hmm.
Morgan wonders if Ezekiel wants Morgan to stay because he can take down Saviors, but Ezekiel says no, the exact opposite.
At dinner, Morgan and Benjamin discuss family life. Benjamin is raising his little brother. He never thought he’d have to do this, but he does seem to be doing a good job. Morgan asks about Ben’s dad, who was a good fighter. Not enough back up against walkers and his dad didn’t make it out. But Ezekiel is a lot more careful now. He tells Morgan that Ezekiel is keeping the Savior deal quiet because other people might want to fight the Saviors – a fight they’d probably lose.
Benjamin asks about a hand-written inscription in the book – about not to kill? Morgan tells him you have to find that for yourself. Morgan tells Benjamin he’s just fumbling through. He thought he had it, but sometimes we change our minds, his killing of the Savior who attacked Carol is clearly on his mind. Morgan goes off to talk to Carol.
He takes a plate of food into Carol’s room, which of course is empty. Bed made, wheelchair in the corner, because no way is Carol going to leave a mess. Morgan sits on the bed for a moment, and listens to the wind chimes outside.
Carol is in one of the gardens, in the dark, but Ezekiel has anticipated her. He says ‘by all means fair maiden’, as she goes to take some fruit. She’s caught. He wants to know why she’s leaving. He asks Jerry to excuse them. Jerry leaves, but will be within hollering range.
Ezekiel asks if he hadn’t happened upon her right now – never bullshit a bullshitter. He sees through her innocent act. Very clever, she is. They discuss the Saviors. He tells her that she she won her fight with them. She tells Ezekiel that this place is a joke, and that’s what you do with jokes – you laugh. She tells him he’s selling the people a fairy tale, but he counters that maybe they need it. He asks to sit by her. She lets him. He dispenses with his ‘act’, and uses his regular voice when he speaks to her. He tells her that people want someone to follow, someone to make them feel safe. They see a dude with a tiger, and they make up stories about it – make him larger than life, a hero. Next thing you know, they treat him like royalty. He faked it till he made it. He tells Carol he was a zookeeper. Shiva fell into a moat in the zoo, and she was going to bleed out. She was in a lot of pain. He knew the risk, but he wrapped up her leg and saved her life. Now they’re pals.
He tells Carol that he lost a lot just like everyone else. When it all happened, Shiva was trapped, hungry and alone, like him, and she was the last thing in the world he loved. She protected him and got him to The Kingdom. He used to act in community theater, but his name really is Ezekiel. That’s 100% real. Cards on the table, nothing up his sleeve. He’d appreciate it if she keeps this between them. Carol says she doesn’t care, do what you want, she just wants to go. But she says it not unkindly. I think she appreciates his honesty – and the fact that he isn’t really completely crazy. He has his own mask, just like she does.
He tells her he’s sorry. ‘For what?’, she asks. ‘For whatever bad thing happened to you out there.’ He tells Carol that everything isn’t all bad. Life isn’t all bad – where there’s life there’s hope. Where there’s life there’s life. He hopes that that isn’t what she’s walking away from – life. He wants to help her, if she’ll let him. Why does he care, she asks. Because it makes him feel good. And you know what, we pretty much believe him. He’ll let her go, but he hopes she’ll stay. Maybe she can go, but not go. ‘What do you say?’, he asks her. Very sweet moment.
It’s now morning, and we hear horses clomping by a graveyard. It’s Carol and Morgan riding along, and it seems like she’s going to leave. They dismount by the house from earlier in the episode where Morgan put the flag up on the mailbox. This is Carol’s stop, and they look like they’re going to part as friends. They joke about each other being the nicest people they ever had to beat up. Morgan tells Carol to take care of herself. She will – you know her – always watching, always ready. This must be the ‘go, don’t go’ part – she’s left The Kingdom proper, but she hasn’t gone very far. Morgan gets back up on his horse and Carol hands him his staff. She goes into the gate to the house. He looks at the mail box and puts the flag down, as he leaves. If the flag was breadcrumbs, he has decided he doesn’t need it anymore.
Carol hesitates by the front door as she hears the growling of the walker inside. She goes in, and kills it. Sometime later we see her outside burying the walker and getting wood. Once inside, she builds a fire inside the fireplace. There’s a knock at the door. She’s startled, and then hears Shiva growl. She opens the door to Ezekiel and Shiva. He tells her ‘you really gotta try one of these’, and hands her a pomegranate. She smiles, but it’s not a Stealth Carol smile. It looks to be a real smile.
After last week’s bloodbath, this episode was a nice respite. It has a bittersweet note to it in that while Carol and Morgan are each healing, Glenn and Abraham are being killed. And my guess is that for the next delivery to the Saviors, word will get to Carol and Morgan about Glenn and Abraham.
I hope my theory about Morgan and Carol is right – both are at extremes. Morgan won’t kill anyone, and Carol will kill anything that looks like it might someday become a threat. My theory is that they both move to the center and exist there.