So here we are, Season 5 of Fear the Walking Dead is underway and the premiere episode takes no time jumping right into the action as Morgan and his crew come crashing in.
Look, up in the sky!
Max (Ethan Suess) and Dylan (Cooper Dodson), two young boys making their way through the wasteland, are hunting and Dylan brings down a deer for the first time. He also attracts a zombie, which Max tries to dispatch but can’t because the plot decided it was a good time for their rifle to jam.
Don’t worry though, because just as all looks lost, a plane comes crashing through the trees, knocking one down on the zombie before letting the ground stop its descent.
Max and Dylan check out the wreck and find all kinds of boxes laying about–boxes we saw a lot of in Season 4. They’re also seeing a lot of zombies coming their way. And they still have a jammed rifle, which Max again tries to use.
Just then, Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey) comes running out of the fog with what looks like part of a propeller in her hands and begins whacking zombies in the head.
Crashbound and down
The boys find Morgan (Lennie James) strapped into a chair and let him out. John (Garret Dillahunt) is there as well, getting his pistols ready. Luciana (Danay Garcia) is there, but… well, she’s not going anywhere soon as there’s a big hunk of pipe sticking through her right shoulder. Morgan decides to go help Alicia, while John is off to get Luciana some help.
While Alicia and Morgan set to whacking–partially by setting up a trip-wire and nailing zombies when they fall–we find Althea (Maggie Grace) and June (Jenna Elfman) in the pilot’s and co-pilot’s seats starting to wake up.
A zombie is trying to get June, but John blows it away. Althea wakes up and John helps them out, but not before having a zombie almost chew off his foot, which June has to dispatch. June checks out Luciana and says they need to cut the pipe, so Althea and John start checking boxes looking for a hacksaw.
Althea finds her camera and tapes but is attacked by a strange zombie in an all-black outfit including a full-face helmet. Althea impales it before returning to the wreck with John.
Luciana is extracted with some of the pipe still in her shoulder. Alicia discovers they’re in a heavy radiation area and zombies are still coming because plane crashes make a lot of noise.
They only have knives and about 8 bullets to take care of the zombies. It doesn’t look like they’re getting out until a van pulls up, hitting a few dead heads along the way and the two boys say it’s their sister Annie (Bailey Gavulic) coming to save them.
What’s the story, Morning Glories?
The kids have been on their own for a while after losing their parents. They can’t go east because the roads are washed out and they mention that mountain passes to the west are blocked. And going north and south aren’t cool either because… well, they don’t really say. They mention that the area is really dangerous but they don’t say why.
As for our gang of flyers, it turns out they were coming to rescue a dude by the name of Logan, whose people were surrounded by the dead. The kids are not happy to learn they’re heading towards a bunch of zombies and then… well, there’s something they want to show everyone.
And what they show is this roadblock of zombies held together by entrails and decapitated heads hanging from a tree. I’m half expecting some Virginia ninjas to pop out of the woods. Maybe this has to do with–shhhhh! Not yet! Okay, let’s move on– Anyway, Morgan talks the kids into driving them to Logan and they proceed to remove the roadblock.
Time to say ‘something ain’t right’ about a million times
They arrive at the location Logan gave and right off the bat something ain’t right because there’s not a zombie in sight. They go in and no one’s around. Even more isn’t right because the generator needed priming to get started, so no one’s used it.
As everyone looks around for signs of Logan and his people, the keywords here are “something ain’t right” and, yeah, we get it. It’s funky and totally not cool.
So Morgan gets on the radio and lets Strand (Colman Domingo), Sarah (Mo Collins), Wendell (Daryl Mitchell), and Charlie (Alexa Nisenson) know something ain’t right and they may need someone to fly there and pick them up. Which makes me wonder when did everyone start learning how to fly?
Meanwhile, back at the ranch
With everyone on the road, this means the location our Texas zombie killers are using as an HQ is empty, which also means when this dude walks up and opens the lock on the gate without a problem. He can just stroll right in. And he does, looking pleased as punch. After looking at what’s been set up, he sits down before the radio…
Morgan hears someone on the radio. It’s Logan. Morgan wants to know what’s going on because they arrived and no one’s there. Well, bub, that’s because Logan (Matt Frewer) is calling you from your joint and letting you know he wanted to send you as far away as possible because he’s come back to reclaim what is his.
See, those trucks they’re been driving? C&L Transport? Well, Clayton, aka Polar Bear, was the “C” and Logan, he’s the “L”. And The L has come back with his people to take what is his.
When Strand, Sarah, Wendell, and Charlie pull up, they aren’t getting in, though Logan does believe in not letting them leave empty handed and leaves a ton of stuff outside the gates for them to use before they move on.
Of course, Alicia loses her cool on this guy, reaffirming why he didn’t want anyone here when he showed up. He doesn’t want a fight, he just wants what’s his. Spoken like a true Canadian. So 10-4, old buddy. Over and out.
That all-around sinking feeling
The kids take off, thinking that staying with the adults is going to get them killed. The pipe is removed from Luciana’s shoulder and while she may have nerve damage, she’ll live.
I have to say this is the first time I’ve seen someone with a major shoulder injury on TV or the movies where they were bandaged up like they’d just had a major shoulder injury. Luciana won’t using that arm any time soon.
John and June are having a quite moment of reflection. Morgan and Alicia are out in the yard talking and it’s pretty obvious that Alicia is sick of Morgan’s “We gotta help people” BS. It’s in her words and it’s all over her face. They’re not helping anyone, they’re tired, and they just got scammed. It all blows.
And Althea? She goes back to the crash site and examines the zombie that attacked her, the one in the black Judge Dredd outfit.
She removes the helmet and discovers the person under it isn’t decomposed at all. If anything, it’s only been a day or two since they died. They’re carrying something that looks like a folded up map and plastic inserts with a logo on them that could be some kind of lame bio-hazard warning.
Althea looks into her camera and tells Morgan that there is a story here, but she isn’t telling it soon because at that moment another Judge Dredd person walks up and gives her a stun gun to the neck.
As for the other four…
While Sarah and Wendell kick back with beer and Charlie is wondering what she can do, Strand is going through Althea’s tapes because apparently there’s one guy who was interviewed that she said they could probably work with.
Strand’s going to talk to him. So he watches the tape and he’s cool right up to the point where Althea turns the camera on him and asks this person their name.
“My name is Daniel Salazar.”
And suddenly Strand isn’t in a hurry to talk to this guy.
Fear the Walking Dead airs Sundays at 9/8c on AMC.