Episode 3: Tell It To The Frogs

Before jumping into my review of Tell It To The Frogs, let’s pause for a moment—we’re halfway through The Walking Dead’s first season. AMC has already renewed the show for a second season at 13 episodes. This on top of the news that Disney and Marvel are planning at least three live action television adaptations (including The Hulk). We’re about to see comic books invade TV the way they took over the box office. I hope those shows get the same respect, dignity, and reverence that The Walking Dead received.

Onto the review! Tell It To The Frogs brings the Atlanta-group back to their camp outside the city. As such, the action was scaled back drastically, with only two zombie kills, let alone interactions. I appreciated the chastising of Glenn at the beginning for bringing back the Charger with its alarm still going. That was dumb, dumb, dumb on Glenn's part (especially since last episode the noise was what attracted the geeks). Rick pulled up in the construction truck soon after, and we all knew what was coming: Rick has finally found his family. Breathe easy, zomies (zombies + homies = zomies)! It looks like the zombie apocalypse has reinvigorated Lori's love; she may also be embarrassed and mad at herself and is overcompensating with affection, but we'll find out. At the very least, they had a passionate reunion...in the same tent as their sleeping son. I wonder if she and Shane had done the same, what with her stating, "He won't wake up."

When Lori told Shane to stay away from her and her family, I was shocked. Everything we'd seen to that point showed Shane as a stand-in dad to Carl. Breaking off the affair makes sense, but cutting Shane out completely? Was she that ashamed of herself? She couldn’t be blaming the affair entirely on him, right? Then we got the reveal: Shane told Lori that Rick was dead. Wow. Maybe not the best moment in his life. But let’s think this through: why would he say that? Could be he wanted Lori to himself. Think back to the first episode, when he and Rick are talking about their ladies. Shane’s demeanor is definitely…different when Rick brings up Lori. Or maybe he thought Rick really was a goner. Maybe he knew the only way to get Lori and Carl to safety and leave their over-run town was to lie and tell them Rick was dead. Right now, Shane looks like a giant d-bag but I’ll reserve judgment until we find out why he said it.

The Walking Dead isn’t doing much to dispel any rumors of Georgia being backwater; in Guts we had racist druggie Merle. Now we get sexist wife-beater Ed. We got hints of Ed’s nature while Rick was storytelling at the campfire with some fine acting, but they left it up in the air until the laundry scene. The laundry scene was one of those nice breaks from the intensity of their situation, and reenforced the idea that despite the circumstances, people can still be terrible. The writers succeeded in making Ed infuriating and detestable. When things escalated, Shane came in, freshly infuriated by Lori (and presumably his conscious). The result? Ed will be eating through a straw the remainder of the season. And in the real world, Shane’s entire hand would be shattered. Effective scene from the start of the laundry conversation to the end of Ed’s beating.

The show opened with Merle losing his mind. He might’ve been going through withdrawal, too, which added to his seeming insanity. Zombies were at the chained roof door and Merle was getting desperate. Back at the camp we met his brother, Dylan, who’s as abrasive as big brother. Was anyone else disquieted that Dylan used the same arrows he hunts with to kill zombies? I hope their sanitization is thorough. Anyways, Rick, Dylan, T-Dog, and Glenn head back into Atlanta to rescue Merle, even though the entire camp thought it was a bad idea. I think everyone said something like, “Merle? That piece of trash? Why?” Rick and T-Dog felt responsible for Merle’s death sentence and wanted to make it right. There was also the giant bag of weaponry and ammo Rick dropped in the streets. As the group climbed the stairs and cut the chains, I was worried about the silence coming from the roof. Last time we saw Merle, he was making noise. The silence and reveal were equal parts disturbing. The mindset of a man willing to cut through his wrist has to be questioned. It was an effective hook and immediately had me and my cousin talking.

The preview for Sunday's new episode added kerosine to my curiosity and now I'm counting down the days. Another group of survivor's is in Atlanta, not to mention a zombie attack on the group's camp? Then add in the search for Merle, and it looks like we've got a packed episode coming up.

Final Verdict: 8.536 out of 10 Head Shots. Tell It To The Frogs was a lot slower than Guts, but that is not a bad thing. We got to see how everyone's been living the last few...weeks? Months? Who knows! Key storylines advanced and I'm once again anticipating the next adventure.


P.S.: Sorry this took so long. It's a sucky excuse, but I'm still adjusting to working 40 hours a week. I'll do my best to have my review up by Tuesday from here on. Thanks for reading!