The Walking Dead: Dead Weight (4×07)
Synopsis: The second Governor-centric episode, complete with an old favorite – Martinez! As his new makeshift family tries to settle into the camp, the Governor is torn between the person he’s become and the person he once was to protect his new family.
Rating: ★★★★☆
Picking up where last week left us, Martinez helps the Governor and Megan out of the ditch while Lily and Tara meet up with them. He seems momentarily confused by them all calling him Brian, but Martinez rolls with it and allows them to join up with their group. At first, Martinez is a bit unsure if he should claim knowledge of the Governor, but eventually he lets everyone know he does know the Governor. Later, he asks the Governor if he’s been on the road all this time, surprised that he’s survived so long. The only catch to joining the group is that Martinez is in charge and there’s no dead weight.
At a campsite, the Governor and Megan have mended their rift and are playing chess. She’s spending a lot of time contemplating her next move and lamenting the fact that he never lets her win. He gives her a tough love lesson, one his father taught him with a bit more (it’s implied) force – it wouldn’t be winning if he lets her win. She asks him if his dad was mean and he claims that he was, but that he himself was also bad sometimes. Megan goes on to ask him if she’s mean too because of the way her father treated her. Seriously, he tells her she’s good, but when asked if all of them are good, he doesn’t answer her, claiming to be thinking.
The Governor becomes an essential part of the camp. Along with Martinez, he goes out on supply runs with the numbers two and three in charge, Mitch and Pete Dolgen. Lily is starting to settle into the camp as well, planning to contribute by setting up a nurse station for the camp. He insists he wanted something better for them than the leaking camper they have right now, but she is optimistic that the camp is good and they’ll only make it better. On the supply run he learns that the pond is dead and the hunting is slim pickings, but they’re doing what they can. They’re headed to a survivalists’ cabin when they come across a body tied up in the woods with its head hopped off and a sign that says, “Liar” on his chest.
By banging on the door frame, they can tell there’s at least one walker inside the cabin nd cautiously go inside to find it. Pete is nervous and gets attacked first, but the Governor saves him before they find a lot of severed walker heads. Martinez reveals to the Governor that he wouldn’t have even let him into the group if not for the people he was with and tries to get some assurance that the Governor has changed.
Meanwhile, Mitch finds canned food and beer to celebrate. Pete is trying to rationalize the dead body and the walker heads, but the Governor tells him not to think about it too much. Before the world went to shit, Mitch shares that he’d been an ice cream truck driver, then a tank driver. When everything went to hell, he took his tank and left while Pete stayed longer in Fort Benning. All the Governor offers up is that he “survived.”
When they return to the camp, Martinez reveals that his father was a Catholic priest over drinks and food with the group. Earlier in the day, Lily fixed up Alicia, an Army Reservist who flirted and almost instantly connected with Tara. It’s very domestic and homey before everyone begins to clear out from the Governor’s campsite. Megan lets him know the roof is still leaking and when he goes to fix it, Martinez returns with a surprise for the Governor. He’s drunk and has decided it’s an awesome idea to go play some camper roof golf with the Governor.
Martinez reveals that Shumpert died nearby some time ago because he was unable to move beyond the events of Woodbury and Martinez swears he didn’t even defend himself against a biter. He also admires how having a family has brought the Governor back and admits he doesn’t think he could go through losing a family again. This seems to sit poorly with the Governor, who refuses to lose them, and when Martinez offers to share the crown of responsibility with the Governor, he’s rewarded with a nine iron to the head before the Governor kicks him off the camper roof.
He’s disoriented and dragged to the walker pit by the Governor, who is screaming, “I don’t want it” before dumping him in. Later, Lily finds him crying while he’s sitting on their bed and when she asks him about it, he claims it was just a bad dream. Pete is left to tell the rest of the camp about how a drunk Martinez fell into the pit and wants to assume responsibility of the group. Everyone begins arguing about how to proceed and they’re forced to leave the decision until later.
Meanwhile, Pete, Mitch, and the Governor go on a hunt for food. They find a well-off camp with approximately ten people and lots of supplies. Mitch thinks they should go in and take what they need from the people by force, while Pete thinks they should offer the group a chance to join them. They don’t come to a consensus and end up leaving the group alone. When the Governor goes back to the same camp a little while later, they find it raided and all the inhabitants killed. Mitch kills an old man who may have made it in Pete’s opinion, causing another argument.
They get back to the camp and the Governor tells Megan and Lily to pack up their things. Along with Tara and Alicia, they leave in a car because he tells them it isn’t safe anymore in the camp and he “can’t lose them again.” Unfortunately, they get to a point where they can’t progress any further by car because of a mud pit filled with walkers. They return to the camp and in the morning the Governor tells Lily that he’s surviving.
His first act of survival is to kill Pete. He then goes to Mitch’s RV with a gun in hand and Mitch has no choice but to let him in. The Governor readily admits he killed Pete, but is in no hurry to kill Mitch. He doesn’t care about Mitch killing the old man and agrees that they should have raided that camp first. The Governor tells him that they’re going to do the only thing, removing any problems with right and wrong – and the old Governor is back! They decide to tell the camp that Pete died on a supply run. What actually happens is the Governor kicks his body into the pond.
The Governor takes responsibility for the camp, starting a perimeter and an armory. He rules that arrows are only to be used on supply runs and despite all of this, Lily thinks this could be home. Tara and Megan are playing tag around the camp while the Governor and Lily have a moment in his RV. Megan finds a walker behind a laundry line and it goes after her. She’s screaming and Tara can’t pull it back, but manages to pull the skin off of its leg. The Governor hears and shoots it in the head. Without saying anything, he walks away to look at re-animated Pete in the lake at the end of the pier.
He drives out into the woods and comes across Hershel and Michonne, cocking his gun and taking aim. Next week, the midseason finale and we’ll take bets on who is going to make it through. Poor Pete has taken the place of the Governor’s wall o’ walker heads and I miss him already. What did you think? How devastated are you that we’re already at the mid-season finale?
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