The Walking Dead: Say Yes (7x12)

Rick and Michonne! Yay! I'm really happy that we got an episode to focus on their relationship. However, I'm sad to say that I can't give this episode an unequivocal positive rating. It definitely still had some problems.

Cons:

Most of the episode focuses on Rick and Michonne going out looking for guns, which I liked a lot. They end up succeeding in finding those guns, and then bring them back to Jadis. It's at this point that I start rolling my eyes again, because Jadis is such a strange, cartoonish figure. She talks weird, and she makes demands of Rick that don't seem justified, seeing as Rick has all the guns. It totally took me out of the moment. The upshot of it all is that our heroes now have guns, and might stand a chance against Negan.

Rosita has been an enigma for me all season. She's so angry and bitter and frustrated, and I get all of that... but I feel as if I'm being told that she feels that way, instead of getting to see the ins and outs of her emotional journey. This episode had a supremely awkward conversation between Gabriel and Rosita, where she blamed him for putting doubts into her head about killing Negan. She says that this is why Olivia and Spencer are dead, and why Eugene was taken. But... this doesn't make any sense. Rosita did take the shot at Negan. Sure, she hit Lucille instead, but she did indeed try to kill him. So how did Gabriel screw things up, exactly? We also have to listen to Gabriel give a lame little sermon about taking chances and living life. Ugh. Go away, Gabriel.

Pros:

Despite the above complaint about Rosita, I do feel cautiously optimistic about this Rosita and Sasha team-up. Rosita, now armed with a sniper rifle, comes to Sasha and asks for her help. Sasha says yes, but only if she gets to take the shot. I guess their plan is to kill Negan by sneaking into his compound. Now, I do want to point out that they could just wait for Negan to come to Alexandria, but that's a nitpick. Both of these women have shown their impatience. They are tired of waiting for Rick to make a move. They want vengeance now. It could be kind of cool to see them team up and try to cut off the head of the snake.

Tara spends the episode in quiet indecision. She babysits Judith, and confides to the toddler that she knows where to get guns: Ocean Side, the all-female compound she came across on her mission. She doesn't want to tell Rick about them, because she knows it will end in bloodshed. The women of Ocean Side have decided to hide out, not fight. If Tara tells Rick, Rick will force them to comply. In the end, Tara goes to Rick, and says she has something to tell him. This is a compelling little emotional arc for Tara. I liked the idea of her using Judith as a sounding board. She asks herself why her life, and the lives of her community, should be more important than the lives of the women at Ocean Side. In the end, she seems to decide to prioritize her own well-being, but it's interesting to see how much it costs her.

Rick and Michonne spend the episode out scouting for guns, taking time to enjoy each other away from the rest of the group. They find a carnival where some violent event must have taken place in the early days of the apocalypse - these Walkers are still armed with guns. To boot, they manage to fall through the ceiling of a storage basement, and they find boxes and boxes full of preserved food. Everything is going great until Rick nearly dies by falling off of a Ferris-wheel into a hoard of Walkers. He manages to get away, and the two of them head back. Michonne is suffering a bit of an emotional crisis. For the few seconds she believed Rick to be dead, she realized how terrified she was to do this without him. Rick gives a speech about how she can handle losing him, just like he can handle losing her. They need to keep going. That's the only way to live.

This is the first time this show has given Michonne and Rick a chance to just breathe as a couple, and I think it was a smart decision. I like these two together. I like that when they're with one another, these two ordinarily grim people become a bit more lighthearted. They laugh and smile and they make a really good team. All of the scenes of them working together to kill Walkers and accomplish their goals were really fun. The Walkers aren't a threat on this show the way they once were, and this episode was one of the first times in a while I've felt the thrill of danger coming from Walkers. It didn't come from the characters' fear, but rather from their abundance of confidence. They treated the whole thing like a game, which made it all the more shocking when Rick nearly died.

Rick's fake-out death was actually pretty great, despite the fact that the audience probably wasn't fooled very much. I don't think that moment was meant to fool us, though. It was meant to fool Michonne, so that she could realize just how tenuous her happiness really is. It leads in to Rick's speech about the future. I quite liked it, because it lays out a philosophy that gives Rick some solid motivation as a character. He might die. He might lose Michonne, or other people he loves. But if they just stop trying, if they bow their heads and let Negan take over, then they're as good as dead anyway. Of course, Rick is still working through his grief and guilt over the deaths of his friends. Especially Glenn. Glenn has been there since the beginning, and losing him was a real blow to Rick.

I think that's all I have to say about this one. I really, really enjoyed all of the stuff with Rick and Michonne. I liked Tara's little moments, and I even enjoyed the ending bit with Rosita and Sasha. It's too bad Jadis had to show up and mar the episode with her campy nonsense.

8/10