The Walking Dead came back this week from a two-month winter hiatus with a reminder that if you’re in it for the happy ending, you’re watching the wrong show. After a punch in the gut with the death of Beth in the mid-season finale, the show barely took a pause to hit us again, this time with the death of another character who refused to compromise his character, even if the price was death.
In all fairness, the episode was set up from the very beginning to set expectations that this one was about death and loss. The opening scene, a close up of the digging of a grave, was continued at the end of the episode, after we’d learned that the grave was not for Beth, but for Tyreese. The opening grave scene is followed by a beautiful series of images and sounds, including Maggie and Noah sobbing, Father Gabriel delivering a eulogy, the sharp glare of the mid-day sun coming through dirty car windows, a skeleton lying in the woods, and an abandoned child’s drawing of a happy sun. Through this brief montage, we’re brought up to speed on the plot (Rick and a group are heading out to find Noah’s walled home) and our expectations are set that this is an episode about loss.
Meanwhile, while the group with Rick, Michonne, and Glenn debated what to do next, Tyreese took an emotional moment to look at pictures of the dead twins, and didn’t notice one of them sneaking up behind him until it was too late, and he was been bitten on the arm.
The Spiritual Side of Death
An aspect that has felt lacking since the death of Hershel has been the spiritual side of the show. Hershel was religious and often connected what was happening in their world to the scriptures. While the addition of Father Gabriel would have seemed a natural fit to fill that void, up until this episode, and hearing his eulogy, we’ve been focused more on the human side of Gabriel and his weaknesses, rather than his religious side. In Gabriel’s defense, he was speaking to a very cynical audience who wasn’t receptive to hearing sermons. For example, Gabriel’s comment that they were in the House of God was met by a retort from Hershel’s daughter that it was only four walls and a roof.
On the one hand, I believe the show does well to not make religion too central to its story. On the other, the show can become very bleak with the absence of occasional references to a spiritual journey with the possibility of a somewhat positive end.
In a hallucinogenic state after being bitten by a walker and suffering blood loss, Tyreese’s mind manifests dead friends and adversaries to play different roles of a debate within his mind. Tyreese appears to be troubled by the belief that surviving means killing and compromising your ethics. He’s told by Terminus’s Martin, "You don’t want to be a part of it, but being part of it is being now." Tyreese is confronted by the Governor, who plays a devil figure, and reminds Tyreese that he made a deal with him. In exchange for refuge, Tyreese promised to do whatever it took, and "the bill has to be paid."On the other side are Beth (playing the Jimmy Cliff song, “Struggling Man,”), Mika, Lizzie, and Bob, all telling him that it’s okay to move on, and that it’s "better now" (in death).
Another theme woven in throughout the episode sprung from a lesson Tyreese had learned from his father – that listening to the news and keeping your eyes open to the horrors of world – is a person’s duty and “the high cost of living.” Through learning that Tyreese had this sense of duty, and this duty gave him the strength to continue on after his losses, we get a rare glimpse into his character. Although Tyreese was on the show for about two years, he has mostly played supporting roles up until week. This episode was a nice end to an underused character, whom we got to know better through death than through life.
Actor Chad Coleman (Tyreese) did a fantastic job in conveying the character’s struggles as he tried to come to terms with his choice whether to live or die.In some ways, this episode reminded me of the season 3 episode, "Clear," which was also written by showrunner Scott Gimple. In that episode, Rick, Michonne and Carl went on a run for guns and happened upon Morgan, who was spouting nonsensical jibberish that had spiritual tones mixed in with the insanity. Both of these episodes seem to hint at a longer-term spiritual storyline that transcends the daily struggle to just get by.
Finally, I want to draw attention to Executive Producer Greg Nicotero’s directing. The episode combined montages of haunting images, harsh lighting effects, mournful sounds such as a baby wailing, and a manipulation of time by seamlessly inserting flashbacks and slowing down events as the group fends off an attack by walkers to give this episode the sense of being not quite in this world. The addition of the radio newscast, sounding eerily familiar yet mirroring the events of their world – with descriptions of raids on villages, atrocities to women and children, and the burning of prisons – was the perfect touch to an already moving episode.
RIP Tyreese.
