Season 10C of AMC’s The Walking Dead has finally arrived! Already, many viewers knew the episode would center on Maggie (Lauren Cohan) and the aftermath of the Whisperer attack on the communities.
What they also got was a very rapid introduction of a new villainous group that has tracked Maggie all the way from wherever she’s been all these years. I mean, the dust hasn’t even settled on the Whisperer War yet…
Negan and Maggie meet
It was totally expected that Maggie would finally lay eyes on Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan). There’s a complete eyeball battle going on for a moment before Negan finally admits that he didn’t escape. This p*ssed Maggie off, and she stormed off.
FYI Maggie does quite a bit of storming off in this episode of The Walking Dead.
Maggie also had grand plans. Now that she was finally back with the OG, she wanted some of her people to shelter at Hilltop.
Yeah, about Hilltop, Maggie…
Carol (Melissa McBride) quickly explained to Maggie that the community was destroyed by the Whisperers. She then ‘fessed up to letting Negan go and how he was the reason why they didn’t lose everything.
It all seemed to get lost in translation for Maggie, though, since she couldn’t see past the fact that Negan killed her husband, Glenn (Steven Yeun), all those years ago.
Maggie’s lost years explained
Maggie spent most of the episode mad for super secretive reasons that she won’t say but, in conversations with Daryl (Norman Reedus), it seemed likely that the past few years have been pretty terrible for her and the members of Georgie’s (Jayne Atkinson) group.
It’s the usual story. A new group is discovered. Then, a group of a*sholes moved in and destroyed them. Rinse and repeat.
After all this time, we just thought it was Rick (Andrew Lincoln) and his sh*tty ideas that kept getting people killed. Nope, it turns out everywhere in the U.S. is a horrible place to be during the zombie apocalypse.
She also explained some of the places she had been to, including a holiday destination that she and Glenn were always going to visit but never got the chance.
Her son, Hershel (Kien Michael Spiller), loved it there, and everything looked perfect, but, as regular viewers know, bad things happen and that, my folks, is the story of how Maggie ended up back with the regular crew looking for a place to stay.
The new characters are introduced
Along with her son, Maggie brought a new group of people with her; however, only two are introduced at the start. The rest are hiding out in a safe house that turned out to be not a safe house at all.
When Maggie finally arrived at the “safe house,” she discovered it had been burned to the ground. Two members of her group were dead, and the others are missing.
As to be expected, Maggie is frantic by this point because Hershel is among the missing.
Daryl does what he does best: tracking, and small footprints indicate that Hershel is among the group they are following. But then the missing group splits up. Because in the history of television, splitting up is always the best thing to do. *rolls eyes*
Needless to say, Maggie’s group is also forced to split up. Maggie and Daryl head out together and Kelly (Angel Theory) is lumped in with Maggie’s guys, Cole (James Devoti) and Elijah (Okea Eme-Akwari).
Elijah is the cool metal mask-wearing guy with awesome deadly weapons that showed up in the mid-season finale of The Walking Dead. He quickly bonds with Kelly after she discovered that he couldn’t speak. Plus, he’s lost a sister, too.
Finally, after a near-scare, Maggie and Daryl meet up with the missing members of her group. Here, the discussion turns to the Reapers, and Daryl realizes that there is no rest when it comes to fighting bad guys in The Walking Dead.
Of course, after all these years, he is a little blasé. After all, how bad can these Reapers really be?
Well, military-grade bad, it turned out.
The Reapers attack
It was at this point that it is discovered that Hershel was still missing.
Another search mission ensued, and the group gets split up again after the Reapers — or, in this case, a single Reaper — starts thinning the herd.
Several new characters go the way of most new characters on The Walking Dead. Maggie got snared in a rope trap with the Reaper approaching. Luckily, Daryl was there to attack and that lasts all of three seconds before he is down for the count too.
Eventually, though, the group finally manages to get the guy, and Maggie immediately starts asking him a bunch of questions. The Reaper responds by blowing himself up with a grenade — but not before he tells Maggie that “Pope marked her.”
Right-o then. Daryl tries to tell Maggie later that the guy was just spooking her, but this late into the apocalypse, no one believes that. Which means there is plenty more to this story to come.
As yet, though, viewers have no clue as to why Pope has his sights set on Maggie but, judging by the fact that she has secrets that she can’t even say out loud to Daryl, perhaps there is a legitimate reason why the Reapers seem so intent on bringing her down.
Maggie returns to Alexandria
Hershel is finally discovered safe and well which means it’s time for Maggie to find a place to stay.
While she had planned to head to Hilltop with her group’s remaining members, that’s not an option now. And, even though Maggie wants nothing to do with Negan, she heads to Alexandria anyway because what other option does she have?
Although, as Vulture points out, perhaps she should have considered Oceanside for at least a brief moment — especially after that story about how much Hershel loved the beach. Alas, that doesn’t help the plot heading toward a Maggie/Negan showdown, so Alexandria it is.
Season 10 of The Walking Dead is currently airing every Sunday night on AMC.