Disclaimer
There are Certain People (whom I love dearly) who persuaded me to watch "The Walking Dead." The deal was that Certain People, in return, would try "Doctor Who" on for size. I am not fond of zombie-ridden material - in fact, as far as zombies are concerned I have all the fondness of a penguin for an equatorial jungle. (What? I've been watching David Attenborough.) However, the lure of a) pleasing Certain People, b) creating another Whovian, and c) having a new TV show to watch overcame my reluctance. This post is the resulting justification to Certain People for being unable to lurch past episode 6 of season 2. It is not a personal attack (a.k.a. "Whoever watches this abysmal show is clearly Sir Stupid from Stupidville"), but hopefully a (semi)rational consideration of what makes this show So Freaking Horrible.
From what I have heard, TV shows generally have two elements - the A plot, which is basically composed of the events that move the story along, and the B plot, in which all the emotional baggage of the characters gets hauled out, tangled up, and poked with a stick. As far as I can tell, these correspond roughly to plot development and character development. Here is the problem: The Walking Dead doesn't really have either.
Plot Development
or
Where are all the Zombies, Anyway?
I made it through twelve episodes total. In the interest of time and, well, interest, I only plan to go through the first three in any sort of detail.
Episode One
Rick Grimes, hard-working police officer, is shot by Bad Guys and winds up in the hospital. He wakes up alone and discovers that he missed the messy beginning of the Zombie Apocalypse. When he goes home to find his family, he instead finds a man and boy who fill him in on events. They tell him his family probably headed for the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta, which is allegedly working on a cure. Rick duly takes off, discovers that Atlanta is overrun with zombies (a.k.a. "Walkers"), and hides in a military tank while zombie citizens eat his horse.
Meanwhile, his wife Lori, son Carl, and partner Shane have joined a group of survivors outside the city. Lori is sleeping with Shane. Their justification: Rick is dead and the world is ending, so what the hell?
A plot: Will Rick Survive??
B plot: Lori and Shane? What?
Will Rick find his wife and kid?
Will random man and boy be able to leave zombie-mom?
B plot: Lori and Shane? What?
Will Rick find his wife and kid?
Will random man and boy be able to leave zombie-mom?
I realize that this episode is merely intended to set the stage; however, the B plot is already set to take over the A plot, and by the end of episode one the series is already establishing itself as Soap Opera With Zombies Lurching Around Potholes of Emotional Goo.
Episode Two
Rick escapes from the tank with the help of Glenn, a survivor who came to the city for supplies. With him are Merle (White Trash Racist), Andrea (Snarky Feminist), and T-Dog (Black Guy to Provide Tension With White Trash Racist), who become trapped inside a department store while zombies pound on the doors and lick the glass. They head for the roof, where Rick and White Trash Racist have a showdown - Rick cuffs WTR to a pipe, chops up a zombie, smears himself and Glenn with zombieguts, which camouflages them enough to get them to a nearby truck, then drives back for the others. Except WTR. Because T-Dog lost the key to the cuffs and in all the Wild Running From Zombies Who Burst Through At The Last Second, he got left behind.
A Plot: Will Rick escape?
Will Rick's plan work?
B Plot: Will WTR succeed in wresting power from T-Dog, the elected leader of the outing?
Will Rick win the showdown with WTR?
What will happen when WTR's brother (back at survivorcamp) finds out they left WTR behind to be eaten by zombies?
Will Rick's plan work?
B Plot: Will WTR succeed in wresting power from T-Dog, the elected leader of the outing?
Will Rick win the showdown with WTR?
What will happen when WTR's brother (back at survivorcamp) finds out they left WTR behind to be eaten by zombies?
Again, more camera time is given to B plot than to A, sure fire sign of Soapiness. According to my (admittedly limited) knowledge, the ratio of A to B should be roughly 60/40, and here it is reversed.
Episode Three
The Escapees make it back to camp, where Rick is reunited with Carl and Lori, who tells Shane that their affair is over. Shane vents his anger by beating up Ed, one of the camp members, when he hears Ed verbally abusing his wife Carol as she chats with other women washing clothes in the lake. Daryl, brother to Merle (a.k.a. WTR), find out that Merle was abandoned and has a tantrum. Guilty, Rick decides to take a group back to Atlanta for a rescue mission, and has a fight with Lori, who doesn't want him to go. When the rescuers make it back to the department store roof, they see that WTR has cut off his own hand with a nearby hacksaw in order to escape; he is nowhere to be found. Daryl throws another tantrum.
A Plot: Will Rick and the group make it back in and out of Atlanta?
Where is Merle?
B Plot: Will Shane leave Lori alone?
Does Lori really want him to go, or is she just guilty?
Will Lori tell Rick about her and Shane?
Is Ed going to take revenge on Carol later for his beating?
Is Andrea, the resident loud-mouthed feminist, right in objecting to Women Washing Clothes?
Is Daryl going to kill somebody?
Is Shane going to kill somebody?
Where is Merle?
B Plot: Will Shane leave Lori alone?
Does Lori really want him to go, or is she just guilty?
Will Lori tell Rick about her and Shane?
Is Ed going to take revenge on Carol later for his beating?
Is Andrea, the resident loud-mouthed feminist, right in objecting to Women Washing Clothes?
Is Daryl going to kill somebody?
Is Shane going to kill somebody?
AHHHHH!! ATTACK OF THE B PLOT!!! Come on, people! Even the A plot points use recycled tension, dragging us back through the same dangers/situations as the previous episode, but with added bickering, back-biting, and snark. All the rest is Pure Undiluted Soap Opera.
Big Brushstrokes
The rest of the episodes I watched merely digressed from there. Basically, the A points boil down to:
Midnight Zombie Attack
Campers Flee to Center for Disease Control
Disease Control Has No Cure and Blows Up
Campers Hit the Road for Fort Bennett
Herd of Zombies Nearly Finds Them
Little Girl Gets Lost in Woods
Everyone Tries to Find Her
Carl Gets Shot and Is Healed by Country Vet Hiding Out With Family In Woods
They Still Can't Find Little Girl
B points: OVERWHELMING EMOTIONAL CRAP
In the last five or six episodes I watched (basically the first third of season two), basically Nothing Happened. The directors have stayed with the tension of "Crap We Still Can't Find the Little Girl" as a mainstay of the plot, throwing in a hunting accident and a country farm with zombies in the barn to keep you going.
Also, for a zombie show, season two has so far showed very few lurching villains. Aside from strays that pop up here and there to make you jump, they appear to have been raptured. This adds to my argument that THIS IS NOT REALLY A ZOMBIE SHOW. THIS IS A SOAP OPERA WITH ZOMBIES IN IT SOMETIMES.
Also, for a zombie show, season two has so far showed very few lurching villains. Aside from strays that pop up here and there to make you jump, they appear to have been raptured. This adds to my argument that THIS IS NOT REALLY A ZOMBIE SHOW. THIS IS A SOAP OPERA WITH ZOMBIES IN IT SOMETIMES.
I am often okay with crappy plot development. I know it's harder to do in a show than in a movie or a book. I have made it through shows like Pushing Daisies, which have equally little or less plot development, with few mental scars to speak of. But here's why it doesn't work for The Walking Dead: I simply don't like any of the characters. Any of them. At all. Not even a little. I don't necessarily have anything against flawed protagonists, but for me to care whether they turn into Zombie Treats, they have to give me something worthwhile to root for. These people are universally scummy, and I honestly wish they had all died off several episodes ago.
Tune in next time for Character Development, or lack thereof.
So after walking around the house fuming at this review, I am now ready to sit an intelligently counter attack.
ReplyDeleteFirst Point: The Walking Dead is not a show about Zombies. The Walking Dead refer to Rick and the rest of the crew. This is told in both the Graphic Novels and the creator of the series. So yes, it is as much about Zombies as Battlestar Galactica is about sci-fi. It is merely the setting in which the drama is played out. And for myself, I prefer drama with Zombies then one of the other 3 tropes on television: Police Station, Science Lab, Hospital.
All the Plot A elements would make sense being 60/40 if the show was primarily about zombies. For those kinds of plot progressions you have to go to George Romero's "Night of the Living Dead" and so on. Plot B is what makes you grow to empathize with characters or hate them.
For example, if you throw zombies and ever present threats into every single episode you rob the Zombies of 2 very important elements: The real and present danger they embody and you take away the antagonistic device they serve to make the living deal with very real issues (Rick's tension with Shane, the hunt for Sophia., etc). While I will fully agree that the hunt for Sophia took WAY too long, once they wrapped up that plot point the rest of the season took off like a bullet.
Take a show like CSI. 60, almost 70 percent of the show is solving the murder of the week interspersed with montage scenes of boring actors filling test tubes and beakers while also having gun fights with criminals. The character development is reduced to two or three lines in between clues and a tag line here and there.
Point 2: I am not sure you can call what Shane and Lori had as an affair. Yes, they were not married at the First Zombie Church of the Apocalypse, but to have an affair you have to be married. Both Shane and Lori stated many times that the mutual attraction did not occur until after Shane had no choice but to leave Rick in Atlanta and reasonably assumed Rick was dead. That element is wrapped up very nicely by the end of Season 2 (if you had bothered to watch all 13 episodes out of the millions of Dr. Who's).
Point 3: Rick is the natural, diplomatic leader with a messiah complex. Shane is his adversary in almost every way. Shane embodies many of the characteristics that Lori wishes Rick had, mainly his ability to take actions that put the family first. For all of Shane's flaws, his motives are for Lori and Carl. Rick is torn between his family and ensuring the survival of everyone else in the group (some of which should just die, primarily Andrea.
Closing Thoughts: I am not sure how you can say there is no character development. Three characters go through remarkable transformations: Rick (the leader turning dictator), Darryl (the rebel turning protector) and Glen (young boy becoming a man). Herschel's character takes a great turn at the end of the Sophia storyline as well and if you can make it through to Season 3, Merle returns which causes an awesome conflict.
If you are looking for Zombies and blood and gore, then The Walking Dead is not your show if that is the only thing you are looking for. And it would be nearly impossible to have zombies be a menacing threat each week without them becoming marginalized.. I am not defending the writing as superb, very few shows have that but I think your perception about what the show offers as opposed to your expectations were not identical.
Now if you will excuse me, I must go watch the 9th, 10th and 11th Doctor and their empty headed, full figured sidekicks in miniskirts which are the only real reason to watch the show. (snickers)
lol! Angry fan to the rescue. Allow me to clarify.
ReplyDeletePoint 1: As someone who has not read the graphic novels or read interviews etc., I totally admit that the title reference was lost on me. However, as someone whose only exposure to the story is the show itself, which contains zombies and is called the walking dead, you can hardly blame me for assuming that the title referred to the dead people lurching around. ;)
As for the 60/40 ratio: I still think this should be a rule of thumb regardless of what genre the show is. If it's an action show, you still need the 40% to make us care about the characters. You can tell when an action show fails, because they neglect that 40% and stuff it full of extra explosions and chases etc. instead, leaving you with a show you have forgotten ten minutes after it ended.
If it's a drama, you still need to have things happen to the people! Relationships don't exist in an eventless vacuum. Any story needs events and goals to help shape those relationships, allowing the characters to react, to react to each other's reactions, etc. A drama fails when the directors compensate for the lack of plot by throwing in more emotional crap, until all you have is a big tangly pile of stagnant melodrama.
It's like you were talking about: put in too many zombies, they are totally not scary anymore. Totally with you there. Put in too much drama, and it's not dramatic anymore.
Speaking of the zombies, I'm not suggesting that zombies would be effective plot drivers. More than once every three episodes, but not all the time. Instead, couldn't they do something else? Find more survivors? Get to Fort Bennett? Make contact with someone over the radio? Avoid pillaging bands of scavengers? ANYTHING??!!
Point 2: Fornication is no better than adultery, no matter which one you think you're doing. :P Even if you accept that everyone in this show is a pagan and doesn't know any better, you'd think Lori in particular could show a little respect for her husband's memory for a while and focus on her kid instead of herself.
Point 3: I will be musing about Rick at length in my next post.
Thoughts: Admittedly, I did not get far enough into the show to see some of the stuff you mention. However, I'd argue that all three of the characters you mention are already dictator, protector, and man at the start of the show. Rick behaves like a dictator to Lori, if to nobody else, from day one; Daryl, in spite of his recurring temper issues, is looking out for other people from day one (starting with his brother); Glenn, from day one, is already pretty confident in himself and knows his own strengths and weaknesses. I don't think they can "develop" into those things. They were like that already. Maybe people's perceptions of them develop, but that isn't the same thing.
I don't really look for much specifically in any TV show except a good time. I don't care much about genre, as long as it's at least mildly entertaining. I have a VERY HIGH boredom threshold. For instance, I got all the way through Hell on Wheels (talk about melodrama). Walking Dead just fails as a story. Zero entertainment value, unless you enjoy watching TV shows merely to hate on them (which I have been known to do).