Walking Dead

[Yegolev]

Too much time where no Cylons are attacking but otherwise I'm on board.

[Evildrider]

I never read the comic either. I just think that this is the worst season of this show.

The comic isn't really about the zombies either, it's about all the survivors. 

Other than that, season 2 was definitely worse than this season.  People complain this season is moving too slow but the last one was worse.

[Nevermore]

I don't think this is the worst season, but in many ways it's the most uneven season.  This last episode was actually pretty well written.

[Tannhauser]

Last episode pulled the show out of the tailspin.  Finally, finally we get some much needed dialogue.  Motivations are reinforced, lines are drawn, choices are made.  Good.  This episodes theme to me was 'unity'.  Ricks final speech was overdue as he finally sees his reflection in the Governor. 

 

[Ruvaldt]

This season started incredibly strong, faded, and is picking up again at the end.  Pretty standard for a lot of good shows.  It is significantly better than season 2.  Also, while the characters don't always make completely rational decisions, they're still making better ones than they did last season.  Plus, you know, zombie apocolypse...I don't think I'd be all that rational either.

[Threash]

I am pretty optimistic because two of the best recent episodes (last nights and the one were they meet Morgan again) have been from the new show runner.

[MrHat]

I am pretty optimistic because two of the best recent episodes (last nights and the one were they meet Morgan again) have been from the new show runner.

I feel like Rick's apology speech was the new show runner apologizing to us.

[Tale]

Too much time where no Cylons are attacking but otherwise I'm on board.

Best post.

[Yegolev]

Thank Ron Moore for that one.

[luckton]

This season started incredibly strong, faded, and is picking up again at the end. 

You just described every JJ Abrams series.  Ever.

[HaemishM]

We can't root for him at all. Everything they've done to humanize him as someone who "just wants to create a safe place for his people" is totally undermined by all those things piled on. It's taken what could be an interesting, conflicted character into cardboard cutout.

We were never meant to root for him. I didn't see anything done to humanise him. He has never wanted to create a safe place for his people. He has never been a conflicted character, just a sick fuck. The thing with his daughter was just more of his sickness.

That's part of my problem. He's just been this one-note psycho. I don't know how he was in the comics either but he's a cardboard cutout. He's boring and silly and he's been one step from mustache twirling all season long. His stupidity is only eclipsed by Andrea. It's been a decent season but it's been in spite of him, not because of it. I think we could have had a real good season full of conflicting emotions and some subtlety so that there might actually seem like a real choice between Woodbury and the prison. But as it is, there's just no reason to root for Woodbuy or think the citizens are anything more than blind idiots.

[Ironwood]

Just because everyone keeps banging on :

THE GOVERNOR IN THE COMICS WAS AN UTTER SHITFUCK FRUITCAKE.

Thanks.

[HaemishM]

How close has this season's story with Woodbury followed the comics? Was the town just a flimsy mechanic to introduce said shitfuck fruitcake?

[Ironwood]

 
Fuck it, spoiling it all.


Edited to Add ; The wiki isn't that bad.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Governor_(The_Walking_Dead)

[Ruvaldt]

I like Woodbury and the Governor more in the series than in the comics.  Anyone who is mad about the Governor being one-dimensional needs to stop; what we got in the series is an improvement, believe it or not.  Also, yes, people in Woodbury are blind to what the Governor is doing, but they're reacting very similarly to how people react in the real world when someone comes along and brings them normalcy during a difficult time, even if he is a psychopath.  In fact, it's pretty common.  You don't  have to have someone to root on the other side to make a good story, or make it believable, either.

In fact, I think damned near everything this season is better than what is in the comics, which have some of the worst dialogue I've read in a comic and are very overrated.

[HaemishM]

Wow, ok. Yeah the series IS an improvement over the comics then... because that bit in the comics sounds pretty shitty and not worth spending much time on. I can see the problem though. The TV writers don't want to make him quite as obviously crazy but they haven't done a good job of disguising his crazy at all. The Woodbury idea in the TV show is a good one that has a lot of interesting story potential, but only if you make the Governor deeper than he is, which they can't do because they are following the over-the-top bad beats from the comic.

I like Robert Kirkman as a comics writer (his Invincible was pretty good for the first 50 or so issues I read) but the comics Governor sounds horribly written.

[Ruvaldt]

He was abyssmal.

[MahrinSkel]

The fact that the Woodbury citizens are so desperate for the pretense of both normalcy *and* that the walkers are just like scary animals they pit-fight for amusement is probably meant as some kind of commentary on our own ability to be distracted from shit-tastic government actions by "you won't believe what Kim Kardashian did to Honey Boo-Boo".  But it's either so veiled it sails right on by, or I'm just reaching for it to *mean* something besides giving the writers an excuse to turn Merle.


--Dave

[Velorath]

I like Robert Kirkman as a comics writer (his Invincible was pretty good for the first 50 or so issues I read) but the comics Governor sounds horribly written.

Out of the entire run of the comic so far, the Governor has been the thing I disliked most. It's the level of cartoonish villainy you'd expect to see in superhero books. Based on the most recent issue of the comic though, I have a feeling Kirkman has just added something that is about to become the new most retarded thing he's put in the comics (and I say this as someone who is a fan of the comic for the most part despite its multiple flaws).

[Ironwood]

I'm just going to go ahead and put this out there.

The Walking Dead is not a very good comic at all.

And I love Zombie Stories.  It's just not very good.

[Velorath]

I'm just going to go ahead and put this out there.

The Walking Dead is not a very good comic at all.

And I love Zombie Stories.  It's just not very good.

I enjoy it, and yet I can't argue with you on any of that.

[Surlyboi]

This season started incredibly strong, faded, and is picking up again at the end. 

You just described every JJ Abrams series.  Ever.

Except for Fringe. Which started out weak, got really good, got weak again and then ended well.

As for Walking Dead? Yeah, shit story if you stop and think about it, but I still enjoy the hell out of the show.

[Ironwood]

I'm just going to go ahead and put this out there.

The Walking Dead is not a very good comic at all.

And I love Zombie Stories.  It's just not very good.

I enjoy it, and yet I can't argue with you on any of that.

I enjoyed it too, but it just got silly shelling out for it when very little actually happened.

[KallDrexx]

That shit's expensive too.  I tried to get into the comics but after the first few batches I couldn't justify $8 for about 15 minutes of entertainment.

[Numtini]

I bought one of the huge compendium. $32 for 48 issues worth. Still haven't gotten past the first series though.

[Ruvaldt]

I got them from my local library.

[Velorath]

For anyone who wants a minor spoiler on just how retarded things got in the most recent issue (#108) I sincerely hope this doesn't spoil anything for future season of the TV series because they need to sidestep this entirely:


Part of this makes me think that the reason they're on their third showrunner on the TV series is because at some point these guys ask Kirkman what he's got planned for the comic and he tells them about stuff like this prompting them to ask him if he's fucking crazy.

[Yegolev]

About the Governor(TV), some of you touched on it, but there is one huge positive for that guy: hot showers.  You go long enough without a hot shower and you'll be pretty much drinking any koolaid that you are handed.  Andrea wants a fucking hot shower.  So, yes he's a nutcase, but he built a secure town with a relatively-amazing quality of life.

[Cyrrex]

About the Governor(TV), some of you touched on it, but there is one huge positive for that guy: hot showers.  You go long enough without a hot shower and you'll be pretty much drinking any koolaid that you are handed.  Andrea wants a fucking hot shower.  So, yes he's a nutcase, but he built a secure town with a relatively-amazing quality of life.

Hot shower, hot food, shelter, safety, fighting pits lined with zombies.  No doubt he is a psychopathic asshole, but given a choice between the two camps, I think I'd choose the Governor's.  I think most people would.

[Ironwood]

No.

[Threash]

Those people have zero clue he is a crazy psychopath in the first place.  The only ones who know are his henchmen, and they are people like Merle who don't much care.

[HaemishM]

See, I could buy that right up until the pit fighting started. Then I'd be the slightest bit suspicious. By the time he's drafting kids with asthma to fight for him, I'd be all like "HELL NO."

[Numtini]

He's drafting kids to fight for him because an armed gang of evil psychopaths attacked the town. The average resident doesn't have a clue what's really going on. They just know that suddenly these guys were invading what had been a peaceful safe place.

[Mrbloodworth]

I'm not going to try to judge the minds of people living though what they have lived through.  Its not like the citizens of the governors have an options, and he offers them a life like they used to have. Kinda powerful.

[Tebonas]

I'm wish Haemish on this one. Maybe i could have bought all those excuses before the zombie fighting pit. Not anymore afterwards. There is no excuse for watching people fighting Zombies and each other to the death. Everybody who didn't walk out of that in disgust deserves to be stuck in a town overrun with Zombies.

And, yes that includes dumbass Andrea.