Original Airdate: March 16, 2014
The kettle is on the stove and girls play outside while music plays on a record player. It’s an old time song. As the kettle comes to a boil, we see that the girl is playing with a Walker as if it’s a playmate.
It’s nighttime and Lizzie can’t sleep. Carol tells her that she can sleep, but Lizzie tells Carol that she can help with Judith. She wonders if there are kids at Terminus. She tells Carol that she saved Tyreese by killing the people who were shooting at him. Then she asks Carol if she had kids, and Carol tells her about Sophia, who didn’t have “a mean bone in her body.” Lizzie wonders if she misses Sophia, and then she asks if Carol would miss her. She goes off to sleep with her sister. Tyreese is having a nightmare.
The next day Carol tends to Tyreese’s wound. They discuss how far they are from Terminus, and then Carol reveals that Lizzie isn’t as tough as Tyreese thinks because she doesn’t understand that the Walkers are not people anymore. Lizzie just sees them as being “different.” She says Mika is worse because “she doesn’t have a mean bone in her body.” That is fast becoming the kiss of death in this brave new world.
As they walk along the tracks the next day the girls ask Carol about the ending to Tom Sawyer, since they never got to finish it. She tells them how the Widow Douglas adopts Tom, and Mika says that she’s Huck Finn. Lizzie says that Mika is more of a Tom Sawyer.
Tyreese and Carol smell a fire nearby. They stop to get water, and Carol leaves Lizzie with Tyreese and Judith. As they sit and play “I Spy,” Tyreese spots someone on the tracks. Whoever it is, he is staggering along. He falls to the ground and turns almost instantly. Tyreese starts to kill the Walker but Lizzie tells him that they don’t always have to kill Walkers.
Mika tells Carol that she knows that she’s not as big as Lizzie. Carol wants her to “toughen up,” but Mika says that she can run. Running got Sophia killed, though, so Carol says she can’t run. She can run, but she will not kill people. Even if people were trying to kill her, she still wouldn’t kill them. Carol pleads with her to change how she thinks. She refuses. Those people probably weren’t like that before the change. As they arrive in a clearing, they see a house in the distance. Mika beams at Carol. He mom always said that “Everything works out the way it’s supposed to.” We’ll see.
Carol suggests that they “catch their breath” at the house. They found some pecans, and then they saw deer eating them so perhaps they can kill one. Mika doesn’t like that idea and would prefer to eat the nuts. In the distance they see the smoke that they smelled. We know that this is from Daryl and Beth’s house party. Carol leaves the girls outside while they scout the house, and while they’re inside, Lizzie spots a grave with baby booties hanging on the cross. She wonders if Tyreese and Carol will find a baby inside, which makes Mika angry. They are interrupted by a Walker as he jumps out of the house. Lizzie trips with Judith in her arms, so Mika raises the gun and shoots the Walker. She hits its head on the third shot. Carol and Tyreese rush out and grab Judith and help Lizzie to her feet. Lizzie is in tears over the dead Walker, and Mika gives Carol a long look before going to comfort her sister.
Later on, Lizzie cracks nuts and stares at the candle. She tells Carol that she doesn’t understand, but she’s trying to. Mika runs in with a new doll, and Tyreese announces that they have plenty of water. He’s not used to being in a nice house after so much time. “So relax,” Mika laughs. “We should live here,” Mika tells them.
Now we arrive full circle. Carol puts the kettle on to boil and looks outside in the yard to see Lizzie playing with a Walker. It’s a woman, and when Carol runs out and stabs the Walker, Lizzie goes into a full meltdown. Carol killed her friend. The woman wanted a friend, and Carol killed her. Carol points out that the Walker wanted to kill Lizzie, but Lizzie points out that Carol killed the Walker so it’s the same thing. She proceeds to have a full scale meltdown. Tyreese hears the kettle and takes it off of the stove, and then he looks out the window to see Lizzie bent over in a hateful rage. Carol looks on, realizing finally that they’re in trouble. Lizzie is not right in the head.
Carol goes out into the woods with Mika, who toughs it out while carrying a rifle. She tells Carol that the fire hasn’t gone out because the smoke is still black. She misses science class. Except the part about dissecting worms. They come across a deer and Carol encourages the girl to shoot it. She aims, but then backs away. “We have peaches,” she points out.
Tyreese takes a break from pumping water to say that Mika is right, that they could stay at this house. He trusts them all (which is going to suck when he finds out that Carol killed Karen). They should stay.
Mika goes to find Lizzie, and she follows her to the tracks, where Lizzie is feeding a rat to the Walker they left there. He gulps down the rat while Lizzie smiles. Well, now we know who was feeding the Walkers at the fence. Mika tries to convince her sister that they only played games and named the Walkers at the prison as a way to forget how awful things were. Lizzie doesn’t want to hear it, and she tells her sister that no one understands. She sticks her hand out close enough for the Walker to bite her, but Mika pulls her back. Suddenly a herd of burned up Walkers emerges from the bushes. The girls take off running. Carol and Tyreese hear their screams. When they reach the fence, Lizzie gets stuck and Mika tries to pull her free. Carol and Tyreese arrive in time to shoot the Walkers. Mika regroups and starts shooting, too, as does Lizzie, who bursts into tears when the Walkers are all dead. Carol reassures her that it’s all right. She did it.
Later that night, Lizzie sits with Carol and says that she had to help stop the Walkers. She knows what she has to do now. Carol agrees that it’s ugly, but they have to do it to survive. Mika pipes up and says that she doesn’t want to be mean or hurt anyone. Lizzie says she has to be mean sometimes. Carol changes the subject and asks if they’re tired of pecans. “No!” Mika laughs.
As Carol and Tyreese scout the perimeter the next day, Carol says they can find a car and stay there. Tyreese says they could always go to Terminus later. He’s just not ready to be around people just yet. He goes on to say that he dreams about Karen, that they talk together back before everything went wrong. On the bad nights, he sees someone killing her. “Some stranger,” he says. Carol stares at him, but clearly she’s cracking. Tyreese says that they honor the dead by living. “The whole world is haunted now,” he says. “Tyreese,” Carol says slowly. It looks like she’s about to confess, but instead she says that maybe the dead aren’t haunting them but instead reminding them of what has to happen. Tyreese tells her not to be ashamed, that she saved those girls. He hugs her, and she hugs him back.
They continue along the path as they search for deer. She tells him that her husband used to tell the same stupid joke every year about Beer Nuts and deer nuts. When they get back to the house, they find Lizzie standing next to Judith with blood on her hands. She killed Mika, but didn’t damage Mika’s brain so that she can come back. When Carol takes a step forward, Lizzie pulls out her gun and aims it. They have to wait, she says. Then they’ll all understand. She was just about to turn Judith, too, but Carol reminds her that Judith can’t even walk. This makes sense to Lizzie, who agrees with Carol. Carol urges Lizzie to go inside with Tyreese and Judith and have lunch, and Carol will tie Mika up. She promises. As they walk away, Carol breaks down at what she has to do next.
Carol sits at the table while Tyreese holds Judith. He gave Lizzie some food and cleared out her room so she doesn’t have any weapons. He found a box full of mice and realized that she was the one feeding the Walkers. Tyreese wonders if she killed Karen and David. Carol says she can take Lizzie away, because they can’t sleep with Lizzie and Judith in the same house. “She can’t be around other people,” Carol realizes. And Tyreese certainly can’t care for Judith on his own. What are they going to do?
Carol takes Lizzie out to pick wildflowers for Mika. She sees the smoke and says that the fire is still burning, but Carol says the smoke is white now. Lizzie sees that something is wrong with Carol and realizes that she’s angry with her about Mika. She tells Lizzie to look at the flowers to calm herself, and she raises her gun and shoots her. As she walks away, a deer appears in the clearing. Carol and Tyreese bury the girls beside each other in the house’s little graveyard.
That night, Carol and Tyreese sit at the table. Carol slides the gun across the table and admits that she killed Karen and David to prevent the illness from spreading. It wasn’t Lizzie or a stranger. She did what she thought she had to do. “Do what you have to do,” she says. He asks if she knew what was happening. “It was quick?” he asks. “Yes,” she replied. He grips the gun as she looks away, and then he lets go of it. “I forgive you,” he says. “I’ll never forget.” He knows she can feel it, so he offers his forgiveness. “Thank you,” she says. He says they can’t stay there now.
As they leave the next day, we hear Carol talking to the girls. “We all change,” she says. They come to the tracks where the Walker is still moving around. They turn from him and walk away from him.
I’m speechless. This was a crazy episode. I knew Lizzie was messed up, but I had no idea. And I’m glad to see that Carol finally realized that she put too much faith in Lizzie and didn’t give Mika enough credit.
What did you think of tonight’s episode? With two episodes left, anything could happen…
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