The Walking Dead Episode 5

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The Walking Dead Episode 5
By Tao Mori
December 16, 2010 - 19:41

Studios: AMC
Writer(s): Charlie Adlard, Frank Darabont, Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore
Starring: Andrew Lincoln, Jon Bernthal, Sarah Wayne Callis, Laurie Holden, Jeffrey DeMunn, Steven Yuen, Norman Reedus, Michael Rooker, Lennie James
Directed by: Frank Darabont
Produced by: David Alpert, Charles H. Eglee
Running Time: 60 min
Release Date: October 31st 2010
Distributors: AMC
Genre: Horror

The Walking Dead is based on the comic book series the Walking Dead by Robert Kirkman. The story follow Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) who wakes up in a world overrun by zombies a world commonly referred to as a zombie apocalypse. He travels to Atlanta to look for his wife Lori (Sarah Wayne Callis) and his son. Eventually he is reunited with his wife and son and a group of survivors who try to decide where to go and what to do. The story focuses on the humanity of the characters and tries to provide a realistic approach to how people would live in a zombified world. The characters in this story are not perfect, they are very human with human flaws.

Episode 5: Wildfire

The episode starts with a scene of Rick talking to Morgan on the radio, or he thinks that he’s talking to Morgan on the radio, because Morgan doesn’t answer, Rick just hopes he can hear him. I feel like they’ve set this up to be a therapeutic process for Rick so that he has someone to talk to, or not talk to. He can vent his personal fears, frustrations, etc. Also as the audience we can directly understand what he’s thinking, this is a typical writing device for the screen, but it works. I do hope Morgan returns, and yes it is mostly because I like Lennie James as an actor.

    The next scene is the cleanup of the camp site, as there’s all these zombies who have been shot. I discussed with a colleague of mine the impracticalities of the cleanup process. Yes they wearing gloves, but they have limited facial protection. When they start smashing these zombies in the skulls with pickaxes or other assorted melee weapons, blood goes flying everywhere. Is there no concern of getting this blood into your body? We know that bites will turn you into a zombie, what about if your body absorbs blood through skin contact? Or if some gets in your eyes or mouth? Can the human body protect against minor amounts of the zombie virus, or whatever you want to call it. This was a serious concern in the movie 28 Days Later. This issue was particularly poignant in the episode, when Andrea is hovering over the dead body of her sister. She’s got Amy’s blood all over and when she finally shoots her sister, Amy’s blood gets onto Andrea’s face. And Andrea doesn’t get infected by that?
    That technical issue aside, there was an emotional outburst from Glen, when Daryl starts moving the bodies to the burn pile. Glen protests that they will bury their own people and not burn them like the zombies that have been burned. Why is Glen so upset by this? Glen is the loner of the group, we haven’t seen much strong social interaction between him and anyone else within the camp. There were the no-name people that died that may have been close to Glen, but I don’t think Glen was close to Ed (Carol’s husband) or Amy, though he probably thought she was cute. He’s a young guy, I’m just saying. His pairing up options are starting to shrink, I suspect that would upset most young men. Carol also gets her revenge on Ed when she volunteers to puncture his skull so that he won’t return as a zombie. Daryl lets her and looks slightly shocked when she hits him four or five times.
    When everyone discovers that Jim has been infected, there’s a discussion as to what they should do. Rick says they should go to the Centre for Disease Control (CDC) that’s somewhere in Atlanta, whereas Shane says that they should head to a military base that’s 100 miles away. They have this discussion because they don’t think that the camp is safe any longer. We haven’t seen any zombies since the attack that night so I don’t know what they’re worried about. They are running short of food too, and there isn’t much to exploit from this area, other than the fish that are left in the lake. One can make an argument either way as to whether or not the camp site is safe, but the characters decide that it is in fact not safe.
    Shane and Rick take a walk together and when they’re walking in the woods, they hear something so they split up. We see Shane pointing his gun at Rick’s back and you can see that he wants to pull that trigger very badly. If Shane thinks that Lori would sleep with him if he killed her husband, he’s irrational, I don’t know if he comes to that conclusion to lowers his gun or because he still sees Rick as his friend and not his sexual competitor. Then Dale shows up after this, and looks surprised at Shane, I suspect he knows exactly why Shane was pointing his gun at Rick. Shane jokes about how they should wear reflective vests so they don’t accidentally shoot each other, Dale doesn’t look convinced. Dale’s no slouch for human behaviour, he gets it.
    After being caught red handed, sort of, Shane decides to agree with Rick, that the group should go to the CDC. I believe this action to be rational, 100 miles is a long way to go and you have to stock up on food resources in case things don’t go according to plan. They pack it up in a convoy and head back into the city, the Hispanic guy and his family decide to go visit their family and they split up. Never split up from the group! I can’t stress that enough. The camper has some radiator trouble, which stalls them and Jim says he wants to be left behind, he knows he’s dying. He looks happy under his tree though as the group packs it up and moves into town. This next part detracts from the book quite a bit, as we see scenes from this doctor at the CDC and we soon learn that he’s the only one there. He’s working at finding a cure, but loses his fresh sample in an accident, and sounds like he’s given up on his life as his work will be impossible to complete. This may be the character, Eugene from the comic, the two are similar in that they both worked at the CDC. Though Eugene comes into the story much later in the book than he has in the show, but then again big changes have already been made.

When the group arrives at the CDC building, there’s lots of bodies that have been rotting, the smell factor is quite obvious as the characters cover their noses. There’s also tanks, more .50 calibre machine guns, and a few assault rifles. How many do they pick up? None. Granted they’re more concerned with getting to the entrance, but still. How hard is it to bend down and pick up a discarded assault rifle? When they get to the doors they’re all shut and the rest are frustrated and want to leave. The emotional tension is very high, the characters display it so well, you get caught up in their frustration and want to leave as well. Okay well I wanted to jump behind a .50 calibre machine gun and start firing wildly, but that’s just me. Rick sees the camera move and realizes that someone’s inside, so he starts begging to be let inside. The episode ends as the door opens and a flood of light pours out.

Rating: 9.5/10