
Remember in the first half of season six when Carol all but sighed and rolled her eyes like a petulant teenager every time Morgan talked about never killing anyone? Well, somewhere during the time jump between episodes nine and 10, she started to lose her appetite for doling out destruction. 2) Alas, Carol's character journey doesn't make a lot of sense Carol ends the episode feeling pretty bad about what she's done. She's deeply concerned about the health and well-being of Maggie's baby, for instance, and that makes her end-of-episode breakdown slightly more believable than it probably should be.

(She's really using the rosary to effect her escape.)Ĭarol and Paula are a study in contrasts, but as the episode title suggests, they're in the same boat - both of their lives have been unexpectedly improved by living through the zombie apocalypse, even if they had to go through a ton of horrible things to get there.īut McBride also reminds us of why Carol remains human, even in the face of her evolution into a death-dealing machine. Witt chews the scenery as Paula, calling Carol a little bird and clearly judging her for the Catholicism that Carol feigns as a way to stay sane. It's also fun to watch her more restrained performance bounce off Witt's showier one.

McBride is a terrifying performer when she wants to be, and that's very much true in this episode.
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Melissa McBride's performance in "The Same Boat" is sterling, as Carol begins hyperventilating, seemingly as a ruse to lure the Saviors into trusting her just enough to leave her all alone in a room - at which point she promptly breaks free of her restraints and destroys everyone who's been holding her captive. It's only been fitfully successful at achieving either of those goals, but the inadvertent benefit is that all the Carol we've seen in the past two episodes has been that much more welcome. AMCĬarol has taken a bit of a back seat this season, as the show has focused on developing other characters and building up the wonders of Alexandria. Carol pretends to be harmless in order to inflict maximum harm. Here are five thoughts about the ultra-grim "The Same Boat." 1) Carol now. Plus, it's proof of something very important: The Walking Dead is always better when it gives Carol plenty of screentime.

The hour takes some narrative shortcuts I don't really like, but I do appreciate where it ends up. Indeed, for much of "The Same Boat," only one man has a major speaking role. It's centered on Carol and Maggie's ordeal after being captured by the Saviors, but it also checks in on a group of women affiliated with the Saviors - a group led by Paula, played by Alicia Witt as a raw nerve who's only gotten rawer with all the zombies around. For most of its running time, the episode is entirely about The Walking Dead's women.

"The Same Boat" nicely illustrates this point. And yet characters like Carol, Michonne, and Maggie have complicated lives and hardened relationships with their own morality. Now, several seasons later, women account for most of the show's best characters.
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It reminded me of something that was very much true of the show back toward the beginning: The Walking Dead used to be a series about male alpha dogs facing off, snarling and yipping at each other, while women cowered in the background. Apropos of nothing, I was reading the Wikipedia character page for Sophia Peletier, Carol's daughter who died all the way back in The Walking Dead season two.
