Much like “Clear”,
Episode 14 of The Walking Dead
focuses on a specific story arc. The
third season is heavily reliant on the conflict between Rick and the Governor,
and since we know a great deal about Rick already, the writers are developing
the Woodbury foe with terrific care.
Major
spoilers follow
Of course, at the moment, any
spotlight on the Governor involves his right-hand-man, Milton and his lover,
Andrea. The latter has slowly been edging herself away from the eye-patched
menace, seeing his Machiavellian ego for all its worth. So for a lot of “Prey”,
Andrea is the centre-point.
We start off, rather bizarrely,
with a flash-back to Andrea and Michonne during their time together. The
question of who the two jawless, armless, chained-up zombies are is something
we as an audience have wanted to know for a while. Still, in comparison to the
rest of the episode, the flashback and its content barely matches the tone and
theme of the episode. We are finally told that they were people Michonne once
knew, and not people she liked it seems. The other quick scene before the
credits start up is of the Governor preparing a torture chamber (and enjoying
it a little bit too much).
Audience’s concerns about the
Governor’s “sanity” have been there from early on. Now it’s Andrea, and even
Milton, questioning his morals and his actions habitually. Showing Andrea the
torture room from a space above, Milton implores Andrea to tell the prison
group to leave before war and in time, the Governor will move on. Andrea is
more adamant about killing him, however, and we witness another perfect set-up
for just that. As the Governor works beneath them, Andrea aims her gun at him.
We know that the chances of him being killed this unassumingly are slim so the
tension is never quite there in this moment. But, the interaction with Milton
does add something to the scene; he still protects “Philip” but also considers
the ramifications of Andrea’s decision.
Andrea understands Milton’s
apprehension and leaves on her own (before confronting the newbies who want no
trouble and let her pass). Andrea out on her own is an interesting choice of
direction for the episode as we haven’t had much chance to follow her
singularly since her entering Woodbury.
The friction between Andrea and
the Governor lurks under the surface of their face-to-face interaction but as
this episode shows, it’s about to become truly unmistakable. After she leaves
the Governor starts asking questions about where and why. Milton is one such
person questioned – his answer of knowing she was leaving finally erodes their
friendship, with the Governor aggressively pinning Milton up against a rail.
The hunt begins after Andrea
departs – the Governor seeking her out himself and Caesar showing the new lot
the ropes. Tyreese and co are a pretty dull bunch, in all honesty, and their
spats and discussions bring hardly anything to the show. Tyreese is the
strongest character out of them but only due to some discord with Andrew
Lincoln 2 (Daniel Thomas May – a southern accent and deranged mind away from
being Woodbury’s Rick). Fortunately, not so of the episode is devoted to their
story and we cut back to Andrea, the Governor and Milton.
Andrea on the run contains one of
the best moments of The Walking Dead,
but not before a clichéd crack at some scares. Dodging the Governor’s car by
running into the woods, Andrea leans back on a tree with no apparent danger in
sight. Out pops a walker’s arm followed by two other walkers walking over. It’s
not a terrible piece of action, but just too formulaic for the maturity of the
show. However, it may have been an excuse for some weekly blood-lust which it
provides once Andrea stabs the zombies and snaps the arm of the walker behind
her.
Some may find the next scene
slightly familiar (No Country for Old Men,
anyone?) but it still creates quite an atmosphere of dread. The Governor
hooting the horn as Andrea runs for her life is a strange action, calling her
out like a madman. Nothing compares to the following chase – arguably one of
the series’ finest moments.
Looking and sounding like a scene
from Halloween (with Jonathan
Ortega’s chilling composed music), the eight-minute hunt is superbly directed
and acted. The Governor may still be out of harm’s way for the season’s climax
(expectedly) but Andrea’s fate is not certain. That’s why her creeping around the
factory, cautious of not making any noise and escaping biters along the way,
makes your heart pound.
It’s almost too wonderful not to
need analysis but if anything has to be said, Andrea’s escape is fantastic.
Opening the door onto herself (and therefore protecting her from any walker’s
contact) and letting a flood of walkers come in through an adjacent room into
the Governor’s path is such a crowd-pleasing instant. He fires off rounds of
ammo and thwacks the skulls on the oncoming hoard and is left to fend for
himself.
Andrea finds the prison and is
almost caught in the sight of Rick’s scope. That’s before the Governor grabs
her and pulls her down (confusing poor old Rick, leading him to think it’s
another hallucination).
The penultimate scene shows the
walkers who have been trapped by Caesar and his crew being burned in a blazing
fire. It could either be Tyreese (who expressed distaste to the idea of using them
as weapons), but it’s most certainly Milton. This is his way of getting back at
his old friend – and after questioning a naive Tyreese, the Governor knows it’s
his spectacled companion. So for Milton, the end could be near.
Speaking of end, the last shot we
see is Andrea tied up in the Governor’s formidable torture room, giving us another
brilliant cliff-hanger.
By Piers McCarthy. Also posted on Flickering Myth
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