The Walking Dead Season 10 premiere was a peculiar piece of television. It’s peculiar because the main dramatic arc of the episode makes complete sense in the world of the characters, but absolutely no sense to the audience.
Let’s examine.
The plot of “Lines We Cross” begins in Oceanside where young Judith finds, what she thinks, is a dead skin mask used by The Whisperers. In reality, this is not the case, it’s actually a face that was severed from a walker’s body by Michonne during the episode’s opening action sequence.
The remainder of the episode is a paranoia-fueled drama where the heroes of Hilltop, Alexandria, and Oceanside sweat it out over whether The Whisperers are back.
For the episode, this plot makes all the sense in the world. No one has seen this group since the tentative peace between the two groups was forged. The Whisperers savagely murdered a lot of people they loved. They’re very dangerous, and could bring down the actual happy and thriving community they’ve built. So, it makes all the sense in the world that these characters are walking a razor’s edge of keeping it together.
Yet, the plot, and the suspense it creates, makes absolutely no sense for the audience. We know The Whisperers will be in this season. They’re literally all over the trailers, commercials, and promotional material. It’s not like they hid them in the marketing, they were front and center. Also, think about the narrative we’ve seen in The Walking Dead for 10 seasons — unless a bad guy is officially dead — they’re still a threat and will be in every season until they’re actually dead.
Given this history, why should the audience invest one iota of care into a story where we already know the ending?
And that’s just the issue with this series right now — for everything good they do — there’s always something undercutting the positive strides they make.
It’s a shame because “Lines We Cross” is probably one of the better Walking Dead episodes in recent memory. It emphasized character development, built a credible threat (within the world of the story) which the characters had terrific reactions to, and it gave us some pretty neat walker deaths. It honestly felt like a different show than we’ve seen over the past three to four years. The new lead characters — Daryl, Michonne, Aaron, etc. — have settled naturally into bigger roles. The loss of Rick, Carl, and even Maggie (who is set for an eventual return) were not missed. The pacing of the episode had an immediacy to it. The implementation of the walkers felt realistic — they weren’t just target practice, they came in at times that made the drama and suspense feel natural. There wasn’t a lot whacky violent spectacles that make you roll your eyes (like the high tension wire scene from a few years ago).
This is all great, but the emotional hook for the story just isn’t there. We know The Whisperers are coming. We know there’s going to be another war. We know characters are going to die. That formula has not evolved since we first met The Governor, and it desperately needs to evolve. This series used to be so awesome at grabbing the audience on an emotional level, sadly it no longer does, and has not for some time.
The series is no longer destination television like it was during the infancy of this site. However, The Walking Dead Season 10 premiere was actually a good episode — but with a better plot — it could’ve been great.
