‘Walking Dead': Why Carl’s Death May Be the Most Important Death in the Show’s History (Commentary)
The mid-season premiere was not a great episode, but it solidified what Rick and friends will need to do to build a new society worth living in
Phil Owen | February 25, 2018 @ 7:27 PM
Last Updated: February 25, 2018 @ 8:40 PM
AMC
(Spoilers ahead for the season 8 mid-season premiere of “The Walking Dead”)
Well, it happened. We knew when Carl revealed his bite last year that he was a goner, and the cast and crew haven’t even tried to pretend otherwise. And in the mid-season premiere, Carl really did bite the dust in one of the show’s biggest departures from the comics on which it’s based.
It wasn’t a particularly good episode, honestly — at least not the parts with Carl, which were more emotional porn and not all that dramatically effective. I’d hoped that Carl (Chandler Riggs) would try to go out in a blaze of glory, since he knew his death was imminent anyway. One of the best moments on “The Walking Dead” ever was in the season 7 finale when Sasha (Sonequa Martin-Green) killed herself to turn the tide of the war with the Saviors — I figured Carl would try some similar gambit, since they’re still embroiled in that war and it’s not quite going as well as they’d hoped.
But no, he didn’t really do anything. This whole episode Carl just kinda hung out waiting to die while everybody told him how great he was until Rick (Andrew Lincoln) handed him a pistol and he shot himself. It was not what I would call a super engaging collection of scenes. Sure, other stuff happened too, but the majority of the episode really was spent watching Carl dying on a cot — they basically had his funeral while he was lying there, with everyone paying tribute to his face — and it’s understandably going to be the main topic of conversation until the show moves ahead from all this next week.
Premiere episodes are usually pretty eventful, whereas this felt more like a change-of-pace episode that comes in the middle of a run of episodes. So in that way, it was just strange in general. But, also, there’s not a ton of dramatic heft in watching people tearfully discuss how they’re going to honor Carl’s memory while Carl is sitting right there.
While Carl’s death was kind of a dud in terms of narrative momentum, all that stuff did serve a very important thematic purpose — as a pretty clear statement of intent for what kind of place Alexandria is going to be from here on out.
The first half of Season 8 has been preoccupied with a big philosophical debate about how the Alexandrians, Kingdommers and Hilltoppers should deal with the Saviors, and how that approach would dictate what kind of society they would build. On one side you have the hardliners like Maggie and Daryl and Morgan, and on the other side you had the folks who wanted to simply bring the conflict to a close so that everybody could live together in peace.
Rick was ostensibly a representative of the latter philosophy, given the statements he made to open the season, when they went on the offensive. Only one person had to die, he said, and that person was Negan. But he’s waffled from that occasionally, as he’d been spending a lot of time listening to Daryl talk about how hyped he was to murder every Savior.
Carl, meanwhile, unknowingly set the example for those who hoped to eventually live alongside the Saviors. And all the eulogizing Rick and Michonne (Danai Gurira) and Siddiq (Avi Nash) and everyone else were doing in this episode demonstrated a pretty significant shift for Alexandria: They’re going to honor Carl by doing whatever they have to to win the war against the Saviors… without becoming the Saviors themselves.
Carl’s death is forcing them to crystallize their idea of the world they want to make. In one of the more poignant moments, we see that the visions of the future we thought came from Rick all year actually were the world Carl wanted to usher in. He told Rick and Michonne what he wanted to happen, and now it’s up to them to bring it into existence.
So in that vein, this episode feels like an extremely important moment for these characters moving forward. It feels like “The Walking Dead” is positioning Carl’s death as being the thing that hardens their resolve to handle the rest of this war the right way, in order to bring about an as-close-to-utopian future as is possible in this world. Carl is, in death, lighting the way forward. It’s important that it wasn’t just Rick and Michonne hanging out with Carl this week — Daryl (Norman Reedus) and Tara (Alanna Masterson) and Rosita (Christian Serratos), who have been taking an extreme hardline stance all season, also got to witness a part of the emotional display, and they looked more than a little bit shaken and reflective about the whole thing.
So while this episode doesn’t really work as a self-contained chapter in this story, it manages to be possibly the most thematically significant episode in the entire series, and Carl’s death the most significant of its many main-character deaths. But that’s only if this goes the way it looks like it will. If Rick and Michonne live up to Carl’s last plea, that they stay civilized and work not just to defeat the Saviors, but also toward a world worth living in afterward. If they can “make it real” like Rick promised.
If they can do that, then Carl’s death will have more meaning than any that happened before on “The Walking Dead.”
'The Walking Dead' Surprises: 26 Times the TV Show Has Strayed From the Comics
"The Walking Dead" generally follows the path of the graphic novel series on which it's based, but the AMC hit has often changed things up. Here are 26 times the show took a meaningful diversion from the story that "Walking Dead" creator Robert Kirkman laid out on paper, through the next-to-last episode of season 8.
The Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta didn't even figure in the comics, but the season 1 finale of the show featured a pit stop there. The last remaining staffer, Dr. Edwin Jenner, explained to our "heroes" that everyone living is infected with the virus to some degree, so that no matter how they die they'll resurrect as a walker.
Daryl (Norman Reedus) and his brother Merle (Michael Rooker) aren't even in the comics. Merle died in seasom 3, but Daryl has remained a main character and fan favorite since the start of the show.
On the show, Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies) died giving birth to her daughter, Judith, during season 3, but in the comics Lori survived Judith's birth -- though she and Judith end up being killed when the Governor raids the prison.
RV owner Dale Horvath (Jeffrey DeMunn) dies during season 2 on the show but survived much longer in the comics, eventually being bitten by walker and then partially eaten by cannibals (infecting them with his "tainted meat").
On the show, Bob Stookey (Lawrence Gilliard Jr.) lasts longer than he does in the comics -- he ends up being the "tainted meat" the cannibals ate instead of the long-deceased Dale.
The comic version of Shane Walsh (Jon Bernthal) was killed by sheriff's son Carl (Chandler Riggs) very early on, before the group even makes it out of Atlanta. But on the show, Shane made it to the end of season 2, and Carl's dad Rick (Andrew Lincoln) is the one who takes him out.
The Governor (David Morrissey) chopped off one of Rick's hands in the comic, but our hero remains stubbornly two-handed on the show.
Lizzie and Mika were actually gender-swapped versions of their comic book characters, Ben (in place of Lizzie) and Billy (Mika). In the comics after Ben kills Billy, Carl is the one who kills Ben. On the show it's Carol who puts down the psychopathic Lizzie.
In the comic, Tyreese (Chad Coleman) had a daughter who entered into a suicide pact with her boyfriend, Chris. The pact didn't go as planned, though -- the two were planning to shoot each other at the same time but Chris fired early and came away unharmed. Until Tyreese dismembered him, anyway. On the show his only family is Sasha, who was created for the show.
The TV version of Carol Peletier (Melissa McBride) is middle-aged and timid, the victim of prolonged domestic abuse -- before coming out of her shell and developing into a powerful character. But in the graphic novels, Carol is much younger and her husband never abused her. And she tries to have a threesome with Rick and Lori.
On the show, Shane injures ranch hand Otis (Pruitt Taylor Vince) and leaves him to be eaten by walkers. In the comic, though, Otis isn't killed until walkers invade the prison later on in the story.
Tomas (Nick Gomez) only appears on the TV series, but he serves the same function as Dexter from the comics, letting walkers into the prison enclave before being killed by Rick for doing so.
Andrea (Laurie Holden) is killed in the season 3 finale of the show after the Governor arranges for her to be bitten by a walker, though Andrea shoots herself before she can turn. In the comic, Andrea only just recently died, at a point in the story that is well past where the show has gotten.
Hershel had many children in the comics, but Beth was not one of them. None of the Greene kids in the comics directly correlates to Beth -- though the closest would be Billy Greene, a teenager who is killed when Woodbury folks attack the prison.
Beth's entire time at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta, likewise, is completely original to the show.
In the comics, Jessie Anderson only had one son, Ron, but in the show she had two: Ron and Sam.
The circumstances under which Jessie and her family died were different in the show as well. In both versions they, along with Rick and Carl, were navigating a walker horde while smeared in walker blood. In the comics this gambit simply failed, but on the show their deaths occurred because Sam had a nervous breakdown when he spotted a child walker.
The circumstances under which Sherry left Dwight to become one of Negan's wives was changed on the show. In the comics she married Negan in hopes of making life easier for the two of them. On the show, she agreed to marry Negan when he was about to kill Dwight for going AWOL.
The reason Negan burned Dwight's face was also different in the comics than the show. In the book, Negan burned Dwight for sleeping with Sherry after the left him for Negan. On the show, Sherry agreed to marry Negan so he'd spare Dwight, but Negan burned him with the hot iron anyway.
Negan killed Glenn in the season 7 premiere, as he also did in the comics. But the show faked us out first by having Negan also kill Abraham. In the comics, Abraham was killed by another of the Saviors, Dwight, before the confrontation with Negan happened.
In season 7 of the show, Richard was killed by Morgan as revenge -- Richard had carried out a plan to start a war between the Kingdom and the Saviors, but all it accomplished was getting the teenager Benjamin killed. In the comics, however, Benjamin was shot and killed by one of the Saviors during a big battle in the war that the show hadn't gotten to yet.
In season 7, Eugene has become a turncoat against Rick and Alexandria, becoming a willing collaborator with the Saviors after being captured. In the books, however, Eugene was captured by the Saviors only after Alexandria went to war with them -- and he refused to help them at all while in captivity.
After the attack on the Sanctuary, a different person is left behind on the show and the comics. In the Season 8 premiere of the show, after the battle ends and the walkers invade, Father Gabriel is the only one of Rick's party who gets trapped there -- in the comics, it was Holly who ends up trapped in Sanctuary after the battle.
In the Season 8 mid-season finale, we discovered that Carl has been bitten by a walker, and then he died in the next episode. In the comics to date, which the show is not close to catching up to, Carl remains alive, making this one of the biggest departures from the comics the show has ever done.
Out of nowhere, in the second half of season 8 a woman named Georgie showed to to give the Hilltop a book explaining how to build mills and aqueducts and stuff. This character has never been in the comics at all, but she does look oddly like the leader of a comics faction called the Commonwealth that the show isn't even close to getting to yet. Or is it?
Simon, Negan's second in command until the next-to-last episode of season 8, is original to the show and took the story of the Saviors completely off its comic book rails. The war with the Saviors in the comics ends with the battle at the Hilltop -- which Simon led instead of Negan on the show and which ended in a stalemate instead of being the decisive fight. Simon's attempted coup is also original to the show.
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The show doesn’t always stick with the story as told in the comics it’s adapting (SPOILERS)
"The Walking Dead" generally follows the path of the graphic novel series on which it's based, but the AMC hit has often changed things up. Here are 26 times the show took a meaningful diversion from the story that "Walking Dead" creator Robert Kirkman laid out on paper, through the next-to-last episode of season 8.
