The Walking Dead: “18 Miles Out”

Is it wrong that I want to set the zombie scenes from this one to “Yakety Sax” and post the vid on Youtube?

NOTE: Video update.

Title: “18 Miles Out”

Cast and Crew

Directed by Bill Gierhart
Written by David Leslie Johnson
Andrew Lincoln as Rick Grimes
Jon Bernthal as Shane Walsh
Scott Wilson as Herschel Greene
Laurie Holden as Andrea
Sarah Wayne Callies as Lori Grimes
Jeffrey DeMunn as Dale Horvath
Lauren Cohan as Maggie Greene
IronE Singleton as T-Dog
Emily Kinney as Beth Greene
James Allen McCune as Jimmy
Jane McNeill as Patricia
Michael Zegen as Randall

Additional cast and crew information may be found here.

Premise

Rick and Shane find themselves in conflict with zombies and each other when they try to deal with Randall, the young man they acquired in the previous episode. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the increasingly badass Andrea and the increasingly annoying Lori argue about the role of women while a life hangs in the balance.

High Point

The scenes on the road were as intense as anything in the series, with some real question regarding who would and would not live. Of course, they could have avoided this situation if they had either (a) left Randall behind last week or (b) taken some time to know him before they decided to drive him to Zombie Central.

Low Points

The debates about each character’s role in the post-apocalyptic society would be more palatable if they were better-handled.

The Scores:

Originality: 2/6

Effects: 6/6

Story: 4/6 The plot still receives some of its direction from dubious decisions made by the characters.

Acting: 5/6 It serves the series to have episodes where we can focus on only a few of the characters.

Emotional Response: 5/6 This might have been an interesting episode to present from Randall’s point-of-view, but the conflict between Shane and Rick was overdue.

Production: 6/6.

Overall: 4/6.

In total, “18 Miles Out” receives 32/42

Lingering Questions

Why were these zombies so inept at breaking through glass, something the Atlanta walkers managed in season one?

Update

I thought I was being original with my opening comment. Apparently not. Enjoy:

3 replies on “The Walking Dead: “18 Miles Out””

  1. One thing that still bugs me: the characters have surmised that an open wound could present the risk of infection from whatever has infected everybody else, and yet Rick and Shane pummel each other, have open wounds and Rick shoots three Zombies who then proceed to fall on him. Seems very opportunistic for blood spatter and dripping detritus to invade his cuts inflicyted by Shane’s fists. Then Shane purposely cuts his palm to smear blood on the door sill of the bus. I would be avoiding any kind of open wound like, well, the plague. Now, when will Lori start having nightmares of having a zombie baby?

  2. Well, so much about a lot of my predictions last week on the sick sister storyline. Oh well.

    This was not a bad episode at all but somehow still not as engrossing as the first season eps. Somehow season 2 Part 2 of TWD (while significantly better than the drag-ass Part 1) is like a good car running at a good speed but somehow you know from the sound of the engine that it could still use a tuneup.

    In particular, the flow and rhythm of this episode seems significantly out of sync with the previous three eps, all three of which narratively occurred in a single 24 hour period with an hour-by-hour time flow and used every single character. Now we’ve got some kind of quick flash-forward to where our “prisoner” is ready to be released (a week? two weeks? more? later) with NONE of the intervening character development angles that would have occured during such a span, and only a limited number of actors in this story. Just seemed weird, a little jolting…

    Rick makes a strong comeback as Alpha Dog with a welcomed show of some fire in his belly, hooray, yet still struggling with just where he wants to dig in his heels on his ride down the muddy slippery slope. Shane continues to be Shane without becoming a caricature, also hooray. Still characters worth watching in their continuing struggle for their respective places in this world.

    Lori really IS annoying, isn’t she?

    Technically, the zombies were very well done from a makeup, acting and plot utilization standpoint. Brilliantly using one as a, well, silencer, shows that TWD still hasn’t forgotten how to do true horror with a dash of shock value instead of just grind-it-out screen gore. Kudos, that.

    But overall the scene shows a core weakness that TWD still struggles to get under control in Season 2. Country zombies are hard to make scary – the space is too open, the scenery too beautiful. We’ve got to get inside a wrecked car or chainlink fence for tension – gritty post apocalyptic look, confined spaces, places to say boo from and get trapped in and move slowly in that are all part of the REAL zombie apocalypse experience we truly want from TWD. And sadly, the only way for our heros to GET in a situation like that is to act stupid.

    Hope the show solves that quandry to keep delivering not only episodes that are worth watching, like this one, but stories that are “must watch” – like Season 1’s gripping Battle of Atlanta scenes. Here’s hoping.

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