Although fans of the series peg the finale as the best episode of the series, I much prefer “Pretty Much Dead Already.” It’s when the survivors really go for each other’s throats, and the cast’s performances are top notch. Particularly Jon Bernthal who is just a bull dog ready to do whatever it takes to keep himself safe. Hershel’s big secret was a gruesome one in the comics, and here it works to the same effect.

Hershel is convinced the dead are just sick people, and he’s convinced his family of the same idea. And this has pretty much halted their survival, for better and for worse. They’re lucky they’ve been generally untouched by the apocalypse, but living in such denial eventually leads to catastrophe.

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This is the episode where it all begins to unfold. For readers of the comics, we already know what was in the barn and why Hershel was so protective of it, but here we finally see what the secrets cost everyone. Glenn is very lucky he didn’t just jump in to the barn preparing for Maggie. Investigating goes a long way in the zombie apocalypse, folks. This opening is much screwier than most episodes of the show as Carl is being his usual petulant self to Lori, while Hershel’s helper Patricia hobbles a bunch of chickens to feed to the walkers in the barn. The show has a penchant for animal cruelty, but it also serves to emphasize the eat or be eaten mentality that the world has become.

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This is a banner episode for Daryl Dixon, who owes a lot to season two. Say what you will about season two, but it’s where we get a better definition of the character and the rigid guidelines he operates by. For a long time he’s been about himself and Merle, and now he realizes he has something else to fight for. He has a goal to strive for, and he’s dead set on finding Sophia. The Daryl from season one would tell everyone to fuck off, but here he’s saving T Dogg from being chomped by a horde of walkers, he’s out bonding with Andrea, he’s giving pep talks to Carol. And now he’s going all Rambo to find a trace of Carol’s daughter.

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This is the episode where Rick begins his transformation from law man to post apocalyptic warrior. Shane has been intimating for a while now that things are just different and there’s no method to the madness anymore. People will die, people will be killed and people have to be sacrificed. Maybe Otis needed to be sacrificed, or maybe not. Shane definitely felt it was worth sacrificing Otis to get to Carl. Would Shane and he have made it out of the school if Shane didn’t kill Otis and leave him behind? Who knows? I’m not saying what he did was justified; it’s just the law of the new land.

When Rick completely stores his sheriff’s uniform and badge in to a drawer, it’s the hint that this is no longer a man following a code. He’s no longer living by normal rational guidelines that we all once lived by.

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I call this episode the “Breaking Dead” episode. It starts out much like “Breaking Bad” where massive events have happened, and we have to catch up. That’s not a bad thing, I just like that the episode practices the aforementioned show’s methods, and it does it well. We see Shane, we see him with a shaved head, and we know some heinous shit has gone down.

I say this again, though, Chandler Riggs really is at his top in this episode. Riggs, Bernthal, and Melissa McBride own this season without a doubt. Their performances vary wildly, but they take command of every episode they’re allowed to have a spotlight in. I really wanted to see more of Carl’s plight, and I was terrified for him from the moment he was shot.

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It’s funny to watch T-Dog’s fever soaked rant about being the only black man in a group of Southerners and how little he’s contributing because the writers seem to be going somewhere with this. Mid-way when the changing of the guard drastically transforms the second half of season two, there seems to be a hint at something going on with T-Dog.

We just don’t know what, yet. We know that T Dog is kind of an outcast, and definitely the only African American in the group. So what was going on here?

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When I first saw the previews to this episode, I was kind of at a loss. I didn’t know if I was angry or excited, but one thing was for sure: the producers ensured audiences that this series would only take what it needed from the comics and carve its own path. If at any point the show lost a portion of their audience, this episode would be the one that pulled them out.

It’s still a controversial episode, even with the producers jumping back in to the comics in recent episodes. “TS-19” is not a bad episode it’s just not a very necessary one. It’s both a season and series finale that leaves the characters on the road to an uncertain path; just in case AMC didn’t pull in enough ratings to justify a second season, or simply couldn’t afford another season.

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