The Walking Dead returned for season seven with “The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be.” The episode brought to a brutal conclusion the cliffhanger we were left with at the end of season six. The episode was written by Scott M Gimple and directed by Greg Nicotero. The title is a throwback to a conversation Rick has with the CDC guy that there may be a day when they won’t be happy to have been spared. Has that day come?
I’m not going to lie – this was a very difficult episode to watch. I have a very high threshold for brutality and gore – maybe too high – yet this episode was right on the cusp of being too much for me. I felt physically ill as it unfolded and for some time after the episode finished. It took me the better part of the week to be able to write about it, and unlike most episodes, I can’t bring myself to re-watch it. Not yet anyway.
There has been a lot written about whether this episode went too far with the violence. Yet, I would argue that the violence and gore really weren’t any worse than much of what we’ve already seen. But those gorey deaths were almost always walkers – not characters we cared deeply about. So, in a way, it’s a testament to the storytelling about the living characters on this show that even in the face of being de-sensitized by all those other deaths, we can still be so deeply moved by the death of one of the core characters. And indeed, it’s not like we haven’t already been through Glenn’s (Steven Yuen) death last season – once when it looked like Nicholas had gotten him killed and then again when he managed to get back to Alexandria only to look like he was going to die right in front of Maggie (Lauren Cohen). And ironically, it’s Abraham (Michael Cudlitz) who saves him. For me, then, the verdict is still out on whether this episode went too far. It certainly opens up a number of dramatic storylines going forward as the other characters deal with these deaths.
The episode is brilliantly structured to keep us all on the edge of our seats and disoriented, mimicking the shock of the group. They make us wait for who is the first to meet Lucille. As someone who was/is invested in all of these characters, I didn’t play the bargaining game all summer – ie please just let it by “X.” However, I had to say that when it looked like it was going to be Abraham, part of me breathed a sigh of relief. Not because I was ready to say goodbye to the character. There was so much more that I wanted to see between him and Sasha (Sonequa Martin-Green) and between him and Eugene (Josh McDermitt). But of all the characters, Abraham would be the one to most embrace dying for the group. I loved him telling Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) to suck his balls even after the first blow. He did die a hero.
Of course, we don’t get right there. First we see only Rick’s (Andrew Lincoln) reaction to someone to his right being the chosen one, and him telling Negan that he’s going to kill him. The entire cast is stunning in this episode, but Lincoln and Morgan truly deserve awards for their performances. Morgan is more chilling than even the Governor ever was. The Governor was a psychopath and a cold-blooded killer, but Negan is a psychopath who truly enjoys his work, and he systematically works at Rick, learning exactly what makes him tick, until he breaks him. He knows who the leader is and he takes extra care to chop off the head of the group – figuratively speaking.
For those not familiar with the comics, you may not be aware that Rick has had his right hand chopped off, so they totally had me going with that entire first scene. Was that your right hand? Hard to do anything without a right hand. And that shiny hatchet! Where did they get a brand new hatchet from in the apocalypse anyway? That small detail aside, I was convinced that Rick was going to have his right hand chopped off. But it’s a testament to Negan’s psychological warfare that he really doesn’t physically hurt Rick. And there’s something to that. Anyone that has survived this long in this new world has to be at least somewhat immune to pain. But they still aren’t immune to loss.
Negan displays and utilizes classic abuse techniques. He immediately isolates Rick – which he also does to Daryl (Norman Reedus) when he realizes that he could also be a potential problem. Of course, he also sees the potential to use Daryl as a way to keep the others in line and the potential for Daryl to be a good – read brutal – soldier. I suspect that we may see Daryl take on some of Carl’s comic storyline in which Negan takes Carl under his wing.
In the meantime, Negan makes off with Rick in the RV and finds out just what Rick is made of. Rick may be reeling from shock and anger, but his survival instincts are still there. It’s horrific as he battles the walkers – with Negan actually being very careful not to let Rick get bitten. Rick jumping on to the hanging walker was simply inspired and an amazingly tense scene with fantastic effects. And of course, that underscores what I said earlier about not being generally affected by gore. In that scene, I was worried for Rick, but the mutilation of the hanging walker merely elicited a “cool.”
However, Glenn’s death was even more brutal because once Abraham was killed, it seemed that he was safe. Negan promised to only kill one of them, and only killed one in the comics. However, when Negan’s psychological warfare extended to taunting Rosita (Christian Serratos), that’s when Daryl loses it and punches him. And of course, Negan doesn’t kill Daryl – and not just because it would break the Internet (and possibly the show), but because it’s far more damaging on them all to know their actions will result in someone else being punished.
There are a lot of things we can take out of this scene even before Glenn’s horrible death. Rosita appears to be even more affected by Abraham’s death than Sasha is. Of course, we already know that Rosita wasn’t over Abraham and now will have a much harder time coming to peace with it, but I was expecting a much bigger reaction from Sasha. Sasha has to be thinking that any time she tries to get with someone it gets that person killed. Maybe she just expected this? It was especially touching, however, to see how sensitive and almost tender she was at the end with Rosita over Abraham. It’s going to be really interesting to see how they both deal with this going forward.
There is no doubt that Daryl will carry a very, very heavy burden from this – Reedus said as much on the Talking Dead special that aired after the episode. It will be interesting to see how this plays out in his interactions with Maggie. Maggie, of course, has now lost everyone, and Daryl still feels responsible – at least in part – for Beth.
Glenn reaching out to Maggie and reiterating one more time that he would find her was heartbreaking. Did he actually retain enough consciousness at that point to mean he would find her even in the afterlife because he knew he was dying? Or was he simply on auto-pilot at this point? Regardless, I will be haunted forever by the vision of his mutilated face and head; not because of the shocking horror of it – though that is a part – but because of what Glenn represented for the group and what he could have represented in the future. He had managed to retain that sense of humanity and optimism – even though he had dark moments – his love for Maggie and his respect for Hershel always carried him through. It was really fitting, then, I think that Maggie was really the one to pull them all together at the end. She won’t let her emotions rule her. She has a job to do, and that job is getting Negan.
Negan’s final torture of Rick is the threat to Carl (Chandler Riggs). This show lucked out in such a big way when they cast Riggs. There was no way they could have predicted seven years ago that he would mature into such an accomplished actor. He utterly kills this scene. Once again, it looked like Rick might be going to end up losing that hand – and then it looked like they might just mutilate poor Carl further, but I have to say that I had it in the back of my mind that Negan is already wondering about Carl and that this was really just a final test for Rick. Was he broken enough now to mutilate his own son. I loved that Michonne (Danai Gurira) tried to intervene. She knew enough not to push, but she risked an awful lot to try to help the ones she loves.
Negan puts a tourniquet on and draws a line – he looks pretty serious, right? Rick is already well past the point of being able to cope with more. Carl had to be wondering if this was going to push Rick over the edge again, and as he’s done so often in the past, Carl comes to his father’s rescue. He takes the decision away from Rick. And it speaks volumes that Carl doesn’t say, “It’s ok” or “I forgive you” – he just coldly and practically tells him to “just do it.” And he’s completely dispassionate as he says it because in Carl’s world, the best you can hope for is that you keep breathing. Losing an eye – or a hand – is simply the price you pay. What will Negan’s influence be on Carl? And if I had one criticism of the episode it would have to be Carl’s magic hat – because how else is his hair that sparkly clean?
In the end, Negan does stop Rick from taking his son’s hand. He takes Daryl, however, and promises to send him back in pieces if they don’t comply and start earning for him. And it’s clear that at least in the short term, they are going to have to comply. I felt like the audience was left exactly like the rest of the group with Negan’s departure.
I know many people had mixed feelings about the flash forward to what the future might have held – that idyllic family dinner. I have to say that I did take some comfort in it. I didn’t take it as a final taunt from Gimple. The episode has certainly reset the table for everyone, however.
What did you think of the episode? Did you think it would be Glenn? Were you surprised to lose Abraham too? Was it too violent for you? Was the violence justified? My final feeling on it really do boil down to the conclusion that the fact that we were so affected by the violence to Glenn and Abraham proves that the other violence the show has portrayed really hasn’t desensitized us. The last time I was moved to feel ill while watching a film was Saving Private Ryan, and I would suggest that the same kind of feelings were stirred. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!
