This week, the chaos of the main story of “The Walking Dead” took a hiatus to show viewers a much needed backstory about Morgan, a long-time fan favorite character.
Morgan is an interesting character in “The Walking Dead” TV series. Despite appearing in only seven episodes in the entire series prior to last Sunday, he is a very likeable character with many dimensions that enhance his character’s depth. Lenny James, the actor who plays Morgan, also plays his role exceptionally well, which adds to a lot of his popularity.
Nearly every Walking Dead fan was left shocked and curious after last week’s episode because of Glenn’s uncertain death, so many were annoyed that the nagging question was left untouched this week. Instead, the writers chose to hold off and give the viewers an episode that was beneficial and productive for the story, but did not fit in with the timing and pace of recent entries of the series.
In this episode, we see Morgan as we saw him back in season three, crazy and unstable. In the wake of his wife and only child’s deaths, he wanders around Georgia killing everything he sees in a psychotic craze. He stumbles upon a lone cabin in the woods and confronts a man by the name of Eastman, who he tries to kill. Eastman knocks him out with his staff and locks him in a cell in his home. He feeds Morgan and offers him solitude, along with a more positive outlook on life. Morgan, though stubborn at first, eventually implements Eastman’s ways and becomes a staff wielding, ninja-like, beast. He learns from Eastman and adopts his motto, “all life is precious”, and vows to never kill anyone again.
Though a noble feat, it will be hard for Morgan to survive in this post-apocalyptic without killing people, as we have seen countless times on the show. Especially with the crazy axe murderers known as The Wolves still at large.
In any case, this episode was very well done and was necessary for the show in order to move forward; however, the timing of this episode’s implementation was a bit frustrating for fans who were itching to see Glenn’s fate. I guess fans will have to wait another week to find out. The next episode of “The Walking Dead” will premier next Sunday at 9:00 p.m.