First off Grue-Believers, let me apologize for the long delay. Soon, very soon, you will all be able to call me Master. I am in the midst of my last class for my Master’s degree and between that and my every day job my life has been consumed. Don’t think I’ve forgotten about you, like Willie Nelson sang, “you are always on my mind.” So, with tha,t I offer you up my review of Shiva, the mid-season finale of Fear the Walking Dead.
The season this far has been average to pretty “ok.” Definitely leaps and bounds over season one but so are the videos I take of my dogs. Seriously though, I have not hated this season so far. Things have been getting pretty weird with Daniel (Reuben Blades) lately as he is hearing voices and seeing things. This episode picks up with him in a flashback as a boy getting handed a gun, lil Daniels is about to cap someone.
Photo Credit: Richard Foreman, Jr/AMC
The episode then picks up where last week left off, sort of, with the shot ringing out when Strand (Domingo Colman) dispatched his bitten lover Thomas Abigail (Dougray Scott). This act enrages Celia (Marlene Forte) as she brands Strand a liar and a coward telling him, in not so nice terms, that he’s got to go.
Also picking up from where we left off is my new least favorite character I’d like to power bomb, Chris (Lorenzo Henrie) acting like a psychotic baby and taking off after brandishing a knife above Alicia (Alycia Debnam Carey) and Madison (Kim Dickens) as they slept. Let’s follow this track first: Travis (Cliff Curtis), another character I just want to slap in the jaw (like father like son) tracks Chris down in his bloodied bare feet in a little hacienda and finds him holding a little boy at knife point, have I told you how much this punk enrages me? Anyway, Travis gets him away from the boy and he takes off. Travis does catch him and tackles him to the ground and gets stabbed at with a knife. Travis disarms his son and realizes he needs some alone time with just him and Chris much to Madison’s protest.
Let’s get to my boy Nick (Frank Dillane). He bloodies himself up again to head to the walkers, something he enjoys doing because he buys into Celia’s theory of them not really being dead. He goes and retrieves her zombified son Luis (Artero Del Puerto). This delights her so much she places him in the gated house with the rest of the preserved walkers. Nick uses this as leverage to get Celia to allow his family to stay. She agrees but says Strand must go.
Strand digs a hole anyway to bury Thomas much to everyone including Daniel’s warnings. He buries him and Celia provides the eulogy then tells Strand to hit the skids. Meanwhile, Daniel is continuing his mental downward spiral and gets a beat down after slashing a man who tried to restrain him after a vision of his dead wife Griselda (Patricia Reyes Spindola) beckoned him to the gate. He gets tied up in the wine room and continues to have conversations with Griselda who is convincing him that he is the way he is due to being forced to kill as a child. Anyhow, Daniel breaks loose after a strange conversation with Celia and formulates a plan which I will get to.
Madison is pleading for Strand to be able to stay but Celia is having none of it. She is too busy trying to brainwash her like she did Nick and want to take her to visit the walkers in their fenced in area. Madison goes with her and pulls the banana in the tailpipe trick and locks Celia in with the walkers she loves so much. Meanwhile, Daniel, who is still tripping, gets some gasoline and douses the walker area and lights it all up. In all the calamity Alicia pulls a hysterical Ofelia (Mercedes Mason) from the fiery area as she is screaming for Daniel and they, along with Madison, meet Strand, get in a truck and begin to get the Hell out of Dodge. Nick still bathed in blood and guts is upset with the whole ordeal and refuses to get in the truck and sulks away.
I wasn’t too amused with this episode. They tried to cram what seemed like 200 story-lines into an hour long show. They may want to take a cue from The Walking Dead and just concentrate on certain characters for some episodes. It will help development for both the show and the characters.
Fear the Walking Dead Season 2 Episode 7: 
(1.5 / 5) on the Thug Meter
