By: Kelly Kearney
After surviving a trippy, bat-infested trek through the Chunnel, Daryl and Carol finally arrive in England where a chance meeting in London hints at a possible way home. In true Walking Dead fashion, nothing is ever as easy as it seems. A dangerous boat ride followed by an unplanned detour pulls them into another crisis.
London Bound
The episode opens on the White Cliffs of Dover, with Daryl (Norman Reedus) and Carol (Melissa McBride) stepping onto English soil and edging closer to their long-awaited return home. Carol clutches a can of hot dogs she scavenged, debating whether it might last forever, while Daryl observes how eerily empty England feels. The Scots who betrayed them in the Chunnel claimed England was “under control,” but Carol wonders if the country discovered what others couldn’t: how to contain the outbreak. Maybe the living are in safe zones? That doesn’t explain the lack of dead wandering the streets.
As they move on, the two check in about their recent injuries. Daryl’s knife wound is healing, but the emotional weight of France lingers—especially his quick goodbye with Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi) and the loss of Isabelle (Clémence Poésy). They ponder what went wrong with Codron (Romain Levi) and why, after he and Daryl formed a truce in honor of protecting Laurent, he turned on them. “It must’ve been the bat guano messing with his head” Daryl assumes. “Guess that’s why they call it bats**t crazy” Carol laughs. After all the drama and heartache these two have endured, their sense of humor and playfulness has never wavered. No matter the hell unleashed around them, when Daryl and Carol are together, the world feels just a little more right. Still, both of them are growing weary of moving from one fight to the next. Maybe it’s time to stop running. Maybe it’s time to live.
Daryl goes on to explain how his whole life has been one long escape—first from his father with Merle, then from one broken community to another after the world fell. The exhaustion is clear in his voice. Carol, who has finally put her own ghosts to rest, can’t help but agree. If home is where the other is, maybe it’s time to plant their feet and think less about surviving and more about living. This opening exchange sets the tone for the season and the duo’s determination to get home, no matter where that location might be..
“Mind the Squid”
As they approach London, Big Ben looms in the distance, enclosed by makeshift gates plastered with a warning about a curfew in effect. Anyone outside after nightfall will be shot. The meaning becomes clear in the bodies strewn along the path to the city. Those “safe zones” Carol wondered about look more like mass graves. Still, silence hangs over the ruins of the capital, the quiet almost more haunting than the dead putting both travelers on edge. Weapons drawn, the pair step through the gates, bracing for whatever fight awaits them.
Not long after they descend on London’s streets, they spot graffiti across the city walls twisting the famous Tube warning from “Mind the Gap” into “Mind the Squid.” What’s “the squid”? Soon, the answer becomes clear—it’s just another local word for walkers–who they finally spot trapped inside the relics of the old world. One growls from behind the glass of an old red phone booth, and another pinned beneath ivy and vines grown to reclaim the city. Nature, it seems, has done to the dead what humanity could not: held them in place, but not for long. The smell of fresh meat stirs them, and the walkers begin tearing free of the greenery. Within seconds, the two travelers are overwhelmed.
With their weapons drawn, Daryl and Carol fall into their familiar rhythm—moving as one fighting unit, equal in their combat skills and always watching each other’s backs. It’s yet another reminder why they’re the ultimate survival team who have outlasted almost everyone we’ve met in this universe. Together, they carve their way through the mini-horde and manage to find safety in a posh apartment building protected by steel gates. Outside, the dead press en masse against the gates driving Daryl and Carol to climb floor after floor. They eventually reach the Penthouse where they scavenge what they can and catch their breaths. The break only lasts a few minutes as the former occupants reanimate and attack.Carol opens the season with the most creative Walker kill-death by fire extinguisher. She shoves the blasty end of the hose into a walker’s mouth and the pressure explodes the decayed brains all over the apartment’s walls. After a few touch-and-go moments, the fighting duo takes out the threats and are finally safe to survey the city below. Now they’re trapped high above it with no way out—clinging to hope that the crowd outside the building thins before hunger drives them to crack open that dented can of hot dogs.
The Last Man Standing
Two days later, the horde surrounding the apartment building has only grown, and Daryl and Carol are starting to suffer from the effects of starvation and dehydration. Those “special occasion” hot dogs and the single bottle of stout Daryl scavenged might truly be their last meal. They’ve placed pots outside on the apartment terrace in hopes of collecting rainwater, but so far, only a few drops have fallen, and both are growing weaker by the minute. Daryl thinks their only chance is to break through the walker horde at dawn. “At least we go down fighting,” Carol says in a sarcastically chipper tone.
Their plan for a final stand is interrupted when they spot a flash of light shining through a window. Maybe it’s just the sun reflecting off the glass, but Daryl grabs a shard of broken mirror and reflects the beam back toward the building across the city. Maybe someone is signaling them that London isn’t completely empty.
Later that night, they meet the sole occupant of the English capital when he rappels down onto their terrace. His name is Julian Chamberlin (Stephen Merchant), a nervous and chatty man who breaks the ice by handing them two rabbits and asking if they’re hungry.
After a meal of roasted meat and shots of single malt, the three talk about what happened to London. The story is the same as they’ve heard elsewhere: “Things were manageable for a while, until they weren’t.” The Chunnel was sealed off to protect the island from the outbreak in Europe, and for a time it worked—until humans divided into tribes and lost control. Carol expresses how impressed she is by Julian’s ability to survive alone for so long. Those are the kinds of skills she and Daryl need if they want to escape Europe and find their way home. Lucky for them, Julian has a boat—and he knows how to sail it. It doesn’t take long for Carol to convince him to captain the vessel across the Atlantic and join them on their voyage. After all, there isn’t much left of England, and their family back home would welcome anyone who helped bring them safely across.
The next morning, at ten o’clock sharp, the signal Julian told them to wait for rings out across the city. The bells of Big Ben echo through the streets, scattering the horde from the front of the building. With their path finally clear, Carol and Daryl leave to meet Julian, who has spent the morning gathering supplies for their trip. The moment Julian realizes Carol and Daryl are not sailors, he compares this to his last attempt to leave England by boat. It was a disastrous voyage that ended with the deaths of his friends and loved ones. Now he fears this one may meet the same fate. Daryl insists they’re fast learners, but Julian knows the Atlantic is brutal, and his concern deepens. He also admits he isn’t much of a sailor himself; wanting to be one and actually being one are two very different things. Daryl gives “the last man standing” a pep talk, convincing him they’ll manage, because they have to.
A Stormy Detour
The three set sail on the Thames, passing beneath the decimated Tower Bridge as Julian takes one last look at his home. Soon, the boat reaches open waters, and for a while, everything goes smoothly. They’re finally on course for home.
That night, under the moonlight, Carol confesses that saying goodbye to Sophia in the Chunnel has left her with a strange sense of peace—almost excitement—for the future. She notices the sadness lingering in Daryl’s eyes. He isn’t ready to move past his heartbreak just yet, though he’s glad to see Carol finding hope again.
Later, as if mirroring Daryl’s stormy mood, the skies crack open. Torrential rain pours down, winds rock the deck, and waves threaten to overturn the boat. The three of them scramble in a desperate attempt to stay afloat, but when a runaway mast swings loose and smacks Julian in the head, Carol and Daryl are suddenly on their own. In a panic, Carol tries to express her feelings for Daryl but he shuts her down before she gets past telling him she is glad she found him. He isn’t giving up, and he won’t allow her to either. She clutches those hot dogs and the two of them, soaking wet with an injured Julian down below, try to stay the course.
The next morning we find Daryl face down on the shore, sand in his face, with a groggy Carol moaning out a, “good morning sunshine.” She was hit in the head, bleeding, blurry-eyed but alive. Unfortunately Julian is missing, and Carol finds him by the water’s edge. He’s turned and almost kills Carol when he attacks her in her weakened state, Daryl saves her just before that deadly bite. He was a good man, and those deserve a proper burial. They push his body out to sea, towards his homeland.
Later that night, Daryl realizes Carol is more injured than she let on. At first, he fears it might be a bite, but when he removes her jacket, he sees a jagged piece of metal lodged in her shoulder, the wound already red and infected. It has to come out. He heads back to the boat in search of supplies and grabs a knife, fishing wire, and a bottle of liquid courage. He takes a few swigs—because hurting Carol, even to save her, isn’t exactly in his wheelhouse.
“Let’s Never Give Up”
After patching her up as best he can, Daryl keeps watch. That’s when he spots a group of masked men on horseback, their faces hidden and their helmets crowned with horns. They ride straight toward the makeshift camp, where Carol, fever spiking and drifting into delirium, threatens to give them away with her groans. Forced to keep her quiet, Daryl gently covers her mouth, holding her close until the danger passes.
The men ransack their camp for supplies, taking everything they’d gathered for the journey home. With Carol weakened from infection and hunger, Daryl slips fully into protection mode, hoisting her up as the two of them set off into the woods. Eventually, they stumble across a weathered sign written in Spanish. Carol questions, “We can’t be in Mexico” and that’s when Daryl realizes they washed up in Spain. His eyes catch movement above them, where walkers are trapped and suspended in nets. Someone has been getting creative with booby traps to keep the unwanted out. They’ve been in Spain less than a day, and Daryl already hates it—though that hate becomes his motivation to keep moving. He steadies Carol and guides her carefully through the woods until they find shelter, where he’s forced to perform a second, even rougher surgery on her wound.
Afterwards, Carol is weak, feverish, and uncharacteristically wordy—her emotions slipping free now that her defenses are lowered. She points out how Daryl hides from his own truths, both from his past and from his heart, but he promises her he’s never lied to her.
As she begins to drift off, he keeps her awake by admitting something he hadn’t shared earlier during their talk about Sophia. She wasn’t the only one who had an experience in the Chunnel. After his fight with Codron, Daryl was ready to give up—until Isabelle came to him and reminded him of hope. That prompts Daryl to make Carol promise, together, they will never give up. They have to keep living. To lighten the mood, they pass the time playing a childhood game of I Spy, their laughter soft but genuine in the midst of danger.
The following morning, Carol wakes to find herself alone—Daryl has gone hunting for breakfast. When he returns with a rabbit in hand, panic strikes him to his core: Carol is gone. Through the trees, military jeeps rumble across the forest roads, forcing Daryl to take cover. Every instinct in him screams Carol is in danger. He waits until the patrol clears, then calls out for her—hoping she hasn’t fallen into a ravine or, worse, been taken by the horned raiders who stripped their boat bare.
The episode closes on a cliffhanger, as it so often does with these two—just when they’ve reunited, fate tears them apart again. Now, in a foreign country, Carol is missing, feverish, wounded, and far from her usual warrior self. She could be wandering the unknown—or worse.That idea isn’t far from Daryl’s mind, as he scours the woods in a desperate search. Across the quiet wooded landscape, his voice breaking the silence; he screams her name. The only answer is more silence. Wherever Carol is, she did promise to keep fighting for their future, and when Daryl finds her, he seems intent to hold her to it.