THE WALKING DEAD RECAP AND REVIEW: ‘STRANGER

Legion of Leia contributor Mike Spring is recapping and reviewing The Walking Dead for us this season. Follow him on Twitter @TheMikeSpring!

After escaping from the cannibal haven of Terminus, Season Five of The Walking Dead’s second episode, “Strangers,” opens with our survivors back on the road. The whole gang is back together, and we see them walking through the woods in search of safe haven.

In a few brief character scenes, we see Rick talking to Tara, explaining that he’s okay with her despite the fact that she attacked the prison. Tyreese tells Carol that the other people in the group need to accept what she did at the prison, and Rick and Carol have a heart to heart. Rick tells Carol that he owes her everything and asks for her acceptance, which she gives.

Darryl and Carol have a conversation of sorts, in which Carol insists that she “doesn’t want to talk about it,” referring to what led to her split from the group. Darryl senses something in the woods, and from the camera perspective, we learn that someone is watching them from afar.

The next morning, as the crew walks through the woods, Sasha and Bob are playing the lovebirds and flirting and kissing when they hear cries for help. Rick hesitates, but Carl implores him to help the person in trouble. They find a man dressed as a minister on top of a large rock, surrounded by walkers. The crew make short work of them, and the man introduces himself as Father Gabriel, telling them he has a church nearby. It’s clear the group is wary of him.

They decide to go to the church to get some rest and shelter. After inspecting it for an ambush, they decide it’s safe enough. Abraham wants to get on the road right away to get to Washington, but the rest of the group tells him in no uncertain terms that they follow Rick. After regrouping, the crew splits up to forage for supplies in a nearby town, and Rick has Tyreese and Carl stay behind to watch Judith. Rick gives Carl a speech telling him that he’s “never safe,” but Carl counters by telling Rick that they are strong enough to overcome whatever gets thrown at them.

In town, Rick, Bob, Sasha, and Father Gabriel venture into a food bank that Father Gabriel hasn’t cleaned out because it’s overrun by walkers. Inside the building, they realize that the food is all down in a basement that’s been flooded and overrun with soggy walkers. Descending into the water, they fight with the walkers and kill them all, and Father Gabriel panics and tries to run away. Bob gets pulled under the water by a walker but comes up seemingly unscathed, and the walker is dispatched.

Meanwhile, Carol and Darryl find an abandoned car while out on a water run. There’s a spare battery in the trunk, and they decide to leave it there in case “things at the church go south.” Meanwhile, Glenn, Maggie and Tara scavenge a gun store where Glenn is attacked by a mop and bucket. He finds three silencers stashed in a mini-fridge.

As they are all making their way back to the church, Rick asks Michonne if she misses her sword. She says that “I miss Andrea. I miss Herschel. I don’t miss what was before. I don’t miss that sword.”

Rick meets up with Carl out back of the church, where Carl has found some interesting things. There are knife marks by the windows, as if somebody was trying to get in, but more eerily, there is a message carved into the side of the church: You’ll burn for this. “I don’t know what happened,” Carl says, “but whatever it is, we can handle it. It doesnt mean Father Gabriel’s a bad guy, but it means something.”

That night, the entire group is having a little celebration with the food they’ve scavenged. Abraham gives a toast, calling the group survivors. “Here’s to the survivors!” He then asks them if that’s all they want to be, or if they want to be more by getting Eugene to Washington and helping to cure the plague. Rick decides that the group will go, and everyone seems pleased by the idea.

Tasha reveals to Maggie that she was at the prison when the attack happened, and Maggie forgives her. Rick tells Father Gabriel that he knows he’s hiding something. “These people, these people are my family,” he says. “And if what you’re hiding hurts them in any way, I’ll kill you.”

Carol and Darryl are back at the car when another car drives by on the adjacent road. Darryl runs after it to see that it has the same cross marking on the back of it as the car that abducted Beth. He jumps in the car with Carol and they drive off after it.

Bob seems melancholy, and after kissing Sasha, he wanders outside where he starts to cry while standing by a tree. Right as he does, a hooded figure knocks him out from behind. There’s an odd marking on the tree, but it’s unclear if it was made by Bob or was there already.

When Bob wakes up, he’s tied up and Gabriel from Terminus is sitting over him. He taunts Bob and tells him that it’s nothing personal. “You and your people took away our home,” he says. “Now we’re out here like everybody else, trying to survive. And in order to do that, we have to hunt.” The camera pulls back and Bob looks down in horror to realize that his leg has been cut off.

Gabriel tells him that, “If it makes you feel any better, you taste much better than we thought you would.” As the camera plays over the group of Terminus residents, we see that they’re all eating meat, and the camera comes to rest on what’s left of Bob’s foot on a spit over the fire.