Thoughts:
• I'm not quite sure how I feel about this episode. It was a nice break from the recent action filled and highly stressful episodes, as it had a slow, dreamlike quality that was somehow unsettling. It may have moved a bit too slowly though, bordering on the dull.
I'll give them props for trying to give the Governor some extra depth here, as the comic book version was a terrible, mustache-twirling cardboard villain. But I think they're running the risk of humanizing him a bit too much. We should be terrified of him, not sympathizing with him.
• Considering this episode was a flashback and last week we saw the Governor staring ominously at the prison by himself, it's a good bet we shouldn't get too attached to his new companions.
• At the beginning of the episode Martinez and Fake Dhani Jones ditched the Governor in the middle of the night, proving they're two of the smartest people in the post apocalyptic world.
• So after being ditched the Governor goes back to Woodbury and burns it to the ground. Then he wanders aimlessly long enough to grow a long, bushy hobo beard. Then at the end of the episode he literally runs into Martinez again!
How the hell did that happen? Did he walk in circles for six months? Or is there only one road in this area that everyone's forced to use?
• Funny how the walker population seems to respond to the needs of the script. When Daryl and his team were searching for medicine, they met up with a herd of walkers 10,000 strong that impeded their mission. In this episode the Governor stumbles down the street in a daze and fortunately only encounters one or two easily avoided zombies. And later when he's outside digging a grave there's nary a walker to be seen.
• The Governor meets the Chambler family, who just happen to have a little girl named Meghan who's the same age as his deceased daughter Penny. Did anyone in the audience NOT think he was eventually going to bond with Meghan and see her as a surrogate child?
• Lilly and Tara Chambler must be either very stupid or very desperate to let an obviously unstable hobo like the Governor into their apartment.
• Not sure why the Governor felt the need to use an alias. Maybe he's trying to distance himself from his past. The "Brian Heriot" name he gives them is the same one he saw scrawled on the barn during his wanderings.
By the way, in the novel Rise Of The Governor we find out that his real name was "Brian Blake," and he took the name of his brother Philip after killing him. There's also a Tara and David Chalmers in that book. I guess this episode is kind of an alternate universe version of that story.
Any second I kept expecting one of them to say the wrong thing, causing him to snap and break their necks like twigs.
• "I didn't realize the end of the world would be so boring." Haw!
• The Governor goes upstairs to Bill Jenkins apartment. Inside he sees an empty wheelchair and two prosthetic legs on the floor. He finds the legless, zombified corpse of Jenkins in the tub. A couple of things here:
First of all, how the heck did Jenkins manage to crawl all the way across the room and get into the tub without help? Why not wheel himself over next to the tub, remove his legs and then just slide in?
Second, his undead body was lying in the tub with a gun in his hand. The implication is that he crawled into the tub before committing suicide. But wouldn't most people shoot themselves in the head? He wouldn't have turned into a zombie if he'd done so. I guess he must have shot himself in the chest.
• Meghan's grandpa David has lung cancer and needs pure oxygen to survive. I'm wondering how long an oxygen tank lasts? A day? A week? How long as David needed one? A month? How many tanks did they have stored in their apartment before they asked the Governor to bring them some more?
• Looks like the zombie virus is also a cure for cancer!
• The Governor teaches Meghan to play chess. As he explains the rules he tells her the pawns are the army and the king controls them all. Hmm… I'm not quite sure, but I think there might have been jusssst a subtle hint of symbolism there…
• I get that they may not have had much choice, but a lumbering delivery truck doesn't seem like the best choice of vehicle for the apocalypse. Aside from the fact that it promptly broke down, it seems like it wouldn't be very fast and could get stuck easily.
• As the Governor and Meghan flee the zombie herd, they fall into a freshly dug pit with perfectly smooth sides. Setting aside the skill it took to dig such an impressively geometric hole, why was it there? Was Martinez trapping walkers so he could have gladiator fights just like they used to do back in Woodbury? I guess we'll find out next week.
Many people who attempt suicide by putting a gun in their mouth succeed only in blowing a hole in the back of their neck, or shooting off part of their jaw and cheek.
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