The Walking Dead 1016 – A Certain Doom
The Walking Dead is back from its COVID induced hiatus. With Season 10’s finale shelved due to the planet wide lockdown and the production team’s inability to complete post-production on the episode to meet the scheduled airdate, AMC has finally released the finale for Season 10.
A Certain Doom picks up moments after The Tower left off. An enormous Whisperer hoard, intent on bringing about the end of the world surrounds the collective communities, trying to fortify themselves in the abandoned office building. Like a vice grip, the Beta led hoard advances towards their prey, but with a curious wrinkle in the group not seen before now. Doubt in their leader. While Alpha was the undisputed leader of the Whisperers, the group’s faith in Beta has to be earned and this offensive is his moment of truth.
Cracks in trust aren’t unique to the Whisperer faithful. Carol’s gambit to use Negan as a mole hasn’t won her many admirers, particularly among the former residents of Hilltop. It seems like the only support for Carol is in the person of another outcast, Lidia who holds no hard feelings over her mother’s death.
With the hoard literally on their doorstep, Father Gabriel comes up with a plan to Pied Piper the Whisperers off a cliff. To make the plan work a group led by Daryl and Carol must make their way undetected through the hoard and the past the Whisperers to activate a set of loud speakers. One thing that didn’t make much sense was why Kelly was instructed to wear a mask while the others went barefaced. If as Daryl said, that the mask was for protection, then certainly having Daryl, Carol or Luke with clean faces doesn’t make much sense, even taking Kelly’s hearing loss into consideration. Their detection by a Whisperer, especially when they only decided to smear walker guts over their clothes, was made much easier than it had to have been.
Aside from the end of the Whisperer War, little time is devoted to the B story involving Ezekiel, Eugene and their group as they make their way to rendezvous with Stephanie. There’s a last minute, although not unexpected twist to set up Season 11, perhaps to show some connectivity to the newest entry into The Walking Dead universe, The Walking Dead: World Beyond.
A welcome and familiar face also appears and helps to offset some of the episode’s carnage. There are several questions surrounding Maggie’s return and it will be interesting to see if any of her off screen adventures are highlighted next season.
If there is one word to sum up A Certain Doom it’s reconciliation. Lots of fences are mended across several relationships with a lot of the interpersonal tension that drove this season fading into the background. With the news that The Walking Dead will end its historic run after next season what lays ahead for the survivors of the Whisper War is truly up in the air. Spinoffs and features will carry on the show’s legacy leaving ample opportunity to continue the exploits of some of the characters we’ve invited into our homes for over a decade.
