Daryl’s situation, Dwight’s backstory, ‘Easy Street” and “Crying”.


Last week, we got a peek into The Kingdom and its benevolent leader, King Ezekiel. This week, we get a look at a totally different kind of leader (sadistic if you will) – Negan, his Saviors and the Sanctuary.

Negan (and Dwight “D”) are doing their very best to break Darryl. He is naked in a dark cell and being fed literal dog food. The song “Easy Street” by The Collapsable Hearts Clubs is played on a loop in the next room and is the kind of music that can make a man go crazy. D comes for Daryl, gives him sweatpants and takes him on a walk (like you will a dog). He takes Daryl to the hospital and there we meet Sherry (D’s wife who Daryl met in the forest alongside Dwight and Tina while trying to escape from the Saviors). Sheryy tries to make conversation with Daryl but D asks her not to. She was there to check her pregnancy status and from the look on D’s face, the baby is not his.

D takes Darryl to see other people dressed in similar sweatpants lining the gates of the Sanctuary with walkers. A hint that Daryl may end up just like that if he doesn’t become a good little doggie. Daryl returns to his cell and D is trying to convince him to give in to Negan but Daryl says "I ain't never gonna kneel". D reveals a little of himself by saying he also thought he wouldn’t kneel.

D and Negan are having a talk about their progress in breaking Daryl. D thinks they’re almost there but not quite there yet. Negan attempts to reward his right hand man by telling him to have a pick at any woman in the Sanctuary – as long as they’re willing. D says he will rather not and Negan makes a mockery of his manhood. They get a code orange message from the walkie – someone had taken off with Sanctuary supplies – “a grab and take”. D says he will handle it but Negan suggests a different person saying its “grunt work”. D insists and goes after the runner.

Gene Page/AMC


He leaves the Sanctuary wearing Daryl’s jacket (which he has been wearing ever since), Daryl’s crossbow and Daryl’s bike. Outside he finds the road littered with disabled walkers. While he is distracted by the sight on the road, a walker jumps from the roof of a building and lands on D – arguably the coolest part of the episode. D struggles to fight off the jumper and succeeds -  but not without getting injured.

He finds the runner who turns out to be his friend. The nameless man launches into an existential conversation with Darryl – saying he’s had enough and is never kneeling to Negan again. He wonders why they all do what Negan says when there’s more of them than there is of him. D’s response is “Everything is his or will be”. The man says he’s never going back and D might as well kill him. After D threatens to kill everyone he knows, dig up the man’s late wife and feed him to crows, the man succumbs and agrees to walk back to the Sanctuary. In an act of mercy – and proof that Dwight still has a heart, he shoots the man and goes back to the Sanctuary alone.

While D was out looking for the runner, Daryl noticed that the Savior who gave him food had neglected to lock the door. Daryl takes what may be his only chance at escape and walks out the door. While making his way out, he meets Sherry who warns him to go back saying “no matter what he’s done to you, there’s more, there’s always more… you won’t get away and when you get back, it will be worse”. Daryl ignores this ominous piece of advice and makes his way out of the building. He takes his bike and is about to make a sweet escape when Saviors circle round him with Negan.

To further prove self-acclaimed omnipresence, Negan randomly asks his men “who are you” and they all say “Negan”. He tells Daryl that he doesn’t have many choices – either he dies and works for him as a dead man or walks for him alive and reap the benefits. He moves to hit Daryl with Lucille but Daryl squares up to him. Negan laughs and says “You don’t scare easy. I like that…but Lucille finds it disrespectful”. He tells Daryl he’s lucky Lucille’s not thirsty but he is so he goes to have a drink and leaves Daryl at the mercy of the Saviors who proceed to beat the shit out of him.

When D gets back from his run, he visits Daryl with his food and is a little upset that Daryl wasn’t killed for trying to escape. He reminds Daryl that he got Glenn killed and he (D) got Tina killed so the score is even. He leaves a polaroid of one of Lucille’s victims with Daryl, changes the song to Rob Orbison’s “Crying” and waits by the side to hear Daryl sobbing in the dark.
Gene Page/AMC


D later comes for Daryl (who has thrown up inches from his face) and takes him to Negan. Negan who seems pretty intent on turning Daryl tells him that he and Dwight didn’t use to be on the same page. Dwight's "super hot” wife Sheryl and Sheryl’s sister used to work at the Sanctuary for points. Their points got a little low and Tina needed medicine so he offered to marry her and care for her “in sickness and in health” and she said she’d think about it. But D, Sheryl and his fiancée pulled a code orange and ran away with medicines. He sent his guys after them but “Dwighty boy” still got away. Eventually, D “saw the light” when Tina got killed and came back to ask Negan’s forgiveness. He said he intended to kill Dwight  but his “super hot” wife offered to marry him if he spared Dwight’s life “which if you think about it is a screwed up deal as I was gonna marry her sister till she wound up dead but Sheryl is super hot” . That still wasn’t enough for Negan so he burned Dwight’s face, married “his super hot wife” and D is now his cool right hand man.

This whole story did not work in softening Daryl’s heart or making him see reason as when Negan asks him the deciding question “who are you”, Daryl takes a long pause and finally answers “Daryl”. D tries to make Daryl see reason but Negan says “its cool D. He made his choice. Ain’t my problem if he made a dumbass choice”. At this, Dwight returns Daryl to his cell and is mad at him for not taking Negan’s deal. Daryl says “I get why you did it – why you took it. You were thinking about someone else. Its why I can’t”.

Dwight leaves Daryl and goes outside to find the man he shot now lining the Sanctary’s fence as a walker.

Why didn’t he just rid the world of one less walker and shoot the man in the head?