The Walking Dead - S3E12 - "Clear" Recap

This week could be called a filler episode, but it's really a one off with a limited cast where we explore what appears to be a fairly important theme for the season.  Of course, I'm a bit behind in posting my recaps, but this one off is giving me a chance to play catch up.  The recaps for the other three I've missed will be up later this week.

The Recap

So we start off with Michonne driving Rick and Carl out on a run.  We don't know exactly where they are going, but it's more fun to just drive random places during a zombie uprising so let's just run with it.

As they are driving along we see signs of how bleak the world is.  A sign is up telling someone named Erin that "We tried for Stone Mountain", they pass a live hitchhiker who screams at them to stop, but they don't even blink as they pass him buy and he desperately runs after them.   Shortly after that they run into a area on the road where it appears there has been a bit of a car accident.  There is even a walker that is halfway trapped under a truck screaming at them.  Michonne tries to pull around the wreckage and she manages to get the car stuck in some mud.  It's becoming a recurring theme every time a woman drives in this show they get the car stuck or wreck it. You think the guys would learn, but apparently not.

As Michonne spins the wheels going nowhere, walkers attack the car from nowhere!  If you were paying close attention you would have noticed that Erin from the earlier sign didn't seem to make it to Stone Mountain.

A subplot being quickly resolved

Rick tells everyone to cover their ears as he rolls his window down enough to blast the walker closest to him in the head.  We don't get to see them finish off the rest of the undead, but instead fast forward to them scavenging the area.  Rick is teaching Carl how to get a car out of the mud and takes this opportunity to have a heart to heart about why Michonne is with them.  Rick tells him that they have a common interest and once that's over, they won't keep her around.  It doesn't take them long to get the car unstuck, and right as they do the hitchhiker from earlier is catching up to them.  They take off before he can get to them, and the hitchhiker is clearly saddened by his inability to connect to living people.

The group arrives at their destination, which turns out to be the town Rick and his family lived in before.  As they walk into town, there are strange markings and warnings all over the place.  They run across a pile of burnt corpses and more strange warnings painted all over the sides of buildings.  They make it to the police station where Rick finds the armory cleared out.  Rick then comes up with a plan to search the local businesses that he knew had guns based off his signing off on the permits.  Michonne doesn't like the idea that much, but agrees to go along with it.

As they get closer to the center of town, they discover quite the elaborate setup of walker traps.  Someone has used small rodents in cages as bait to lure walkers onto spikes where they get held in place for them to be dealt with later.  In addition to that, there appears to be trip wires and other homemade traps everywhere.

A walker approaches them from behind, but before they can deal with it a bullet to the head ends the threat, however it presents a new one as they turn to find a masked man on a rooftop telling them to drop their weapons and leave.  He gives them a countdown, during which time Michonne says she can get to him and Rick tells Carl to run back to the car.  At the same time they all break for cover with Rick returning fire at the masked man.  Rick pops out of cover to take a shot and finds that the man is gone from the rooftop.  Michonne shows up on roof next to it and looks at Rick, both of them confused about where he went.  The man pops up again seconds later on street level firing at Rick.  As he approaches the area Rick is hiding in Carl pops out and shoots him in the chest.

Rick and Michonne quickly arrive next to the man, and Rick admonishes Carl for not doing what he was told, but Carl is just like... doing what I gotta do pops!  Rick notices there is no blood, and pulls back the shirt to reveal body armor on the man.  Then he peels off the mask to reveal...

Ahh shit son, it's Morgan!!!

Some people may have picked up on a little nod to the pilot episode here...

This seems familiar...

Rick explains this is the guy who saved his life, and they can't just kill him because he owes Morgan his life.  They track down the building he was staying in and carry him back.  On the way they have to avoid more booby traps including a welcome mat that had a pit of knifes under it, and a trip wire that swings and ax at the head of intruders.  Clearly it must have worked a few times based on the dried up blood on the blade.  Inside they find a room with crazy markings on the wall and a huge arsenal of weapons, more than Rick had at the police station.   It appears Morgan had been busy collecting quite the stash.

Morgan's stash as detailed on the AMC story sync

Rick ties Morgan to a bed in the room and they begin packing weapons.  Michonne even finds some food to snack on and Rick objects to it, but Michonne gets a chance to speak saying "The mat said welcome".  Who knew Michonne would get to do some comic relief?  At this point we have to be sort of worried about Michonne getting to stay alive.  When a normally quiet character starts talking, it's a sign they are about to get killed off (Source: T-Dog).

Carl finds a color coded map of the city Morgan had created showing areas he had cleared, and decides to go on a run to get supplies from a baby store for Judith.  Michonne wants to go along, Rick agrees, but Carl is pissed.  As they go outside Carl asks Michonne to deal with a walker that comes near them.

Stick them with the pointy end!

Carl uses this little distraction to attempt to run away, but Michonne isn't so easily out ninja'd and she catches up to him to ask why he is passing the baby store.  He leads her to a cafe where he wants to get something inside, but it appears there is quite the collection of undead inside.  They come up with the brilliant idea of taking some of the rat cages Moran used for his traps to distract the walkers inside.  They roll a few in on skateboards and the walkers come out of their nap time to attack the cages.  Carl and Michonne then slip around the side to the bar, where Carl goes up and grabs a picture off the wall of his parents with him celebrating a birthday.  It becomes clear Carl wanted to get a picture of Lori to show his little sister.  However they managed to forget the dead bartender who reaches up to grab Carl's leg, but Michonne stabs him the way she did the one earlier.

On the way out, a rat circles the corner and is being chased by walkers to now see a larger meal and the chase is on.  Carl pops a few shots and Michonne pulls off a pretty nifty blind face stabbing as they circle around the cafe in an attempt to escape.  They get out of the front door and close it, but Carl wants to go back in because he dropped the picture.  Michonne tells him to wait at the door and runs off, she comes back shortly with the picture and a rainbow colored cat statue.  They bond over this as they walk away.

Meantime, Morgan wakes up and attacks rick with a knife as Rick pleads with him that they know each other.  He manages to stab Rick before Rick gets the upper hand and they stop fighting.  At this point Morgan pleads with Rick to kill him...

Can we get Lennie an Emmy?

Rick tells him that he isn't happening, and in the following few scenes we learn that Duane died because Morgan couldn't kill his mom like we saw him planning to do in the pilot episode, and eventually she got a hold of Duane who couldn't shoot her in time leaving Morgan to kill them both leaving Morgan in a clearly mentally disturbed state.  I want to point out how great of a job that Lennie James does in this role, the guy is a really talented actor.

Poor Duane, sweet kids aren't going to make it in this world

Rick seeing this wants to help him, but Morgan goes on a rant about how Rick wasn't there when he checked his walkie, and tells him that his role now is clearing.  You can see Rick realizing that if he keeps dwelling on Lori and alienating people this is what is in store for him, and it's no way to survive.  Carl and Michonne arrive back carrying a crib just as Rick is leaving.  Michonne seems disturbed that Morgan is killing and carting off walkers from his traps, and Carl pauses to apologize to Morgan.  Morgan tells him that he should never apologize.  As they load up to head back to the prison, Carl tells Rick that Michonne is "one of them" and we get a glimpse of Morgan dumping bodies to be burned as they drive off.

On the way they see the body of the backpack guy from earlier in the episode on the side of the road.  They back up and snag his backpack and keep driving.

Conclusion

It was nice to finally get to see what happened to Morgan, it's just unfortunate that he has basically lost it mentally because he could have been a great addition to the cast.  However we know that Tyreese is still around, so with the "there can be only one rule" for black males it's no surprise he isn't going to become a regular on the show.  It should be noted that...

Funny because it's true!

Overall this was a fairly heavy handed episode in forcing it's themes on us, which basically comes down to you can't survive on your own.  We get several examples, first being the Erin girl, the second being the backpacker and most importantly Morgan himself.  Morgan serves as a notice to Rick of what happens when you keep alienating people and try to do everything yourself.  Hopefully this pulls Rick out of his stupid Lori is dead funk and get us moving on the plot line with Woodbury.

It's also worth noting this episode was written by the guy who is taking Glen Mazzara's place as the show runner.  There were a few plot holes this week (Carl being able to hold a double door against multiple walkers with little effort, the backpack guy dying on the open road despite apparently surviving this long in the world, how easily the car got stuck in mud even though it looks completely dry all around them), but the good outweighed the bad, especially compared to the silly things that have happened the last three weeks.  I guess we will see where things go from here.

This Weeks Kill Count

Michonne -
Carl -
Morgan -
Rick -

Left my counts at home and I'm updating this at a different location, so will update this later!