By: Kelly Kearney
After last week’s attack on Solaz del Mar, Carol and Daryl’s trip home hits yet another detour when Roberto flees the chaos to find Justina. Later, when Carol, Daryl and Antonio come across his overturned vehicle on the side of the road—with signs the young lovers are together and possibly in danger—the duo once again puts their homecoming on hold to help.
Hot Dogs and Side Quests
Does trouble follow Carol (Melissa McBride) and Daryl (Norman Reedus) wherever they go? It’s a question Carol’s been asking herself since Solaz del Mar fell under attack and Roberto (Hugo Arbues) and Justina (Candela Saitta) vanished.
When the fifth episode of the Spanish spaghetti-western–styled spin-off opens, we see exactly what kind of trouble she means. Carol, Daryl and Antonio (Eduardo Noriega) find Roberto hanging from a bridge, dangling dangerously above a pack of hungry walkers like a claw machine in Hell. El Alcázar’s soldiers look on, laughing and debating whether to cut the rope and feed him to the dead. Before they can make their move, gunfire rings out and the soldiers fall to their deaths. Our trio saves the day once again! With the threat neutralized, Antonio cuts his battered son free, embracing him in relief. He’s grateful to the Americans for saving his only child—and Carol looks equally relieved, reminded of the pain she once endured losing hers.
When Roberto regains consciousness, he reveals he found Justina just before El Alcázar’s men ran them off the road. She never volunteered for La Ofrenda, he says, and had planned to expose her uncle Fede (Oscar Jaenada) for rigging the pig races so other young women would be chosen in her place. Rather than face the fallout, Fede had her sent away against her will. Now Justina’s in El Alcázar’s custody, and the convoy is headed for Barcelona—a few days’ journey by car. Roberto vows he won’t stop searching for her, but he’s too injured to travel. He needs medical care, but returning home means facing Fede’s wrath.
Daryl pulls Carol aside to discuss their options. If Roberto lies—claims he was robbed on the road and never found Justina—it might buy him time to heal. Lying, as Daryl notes, comes easy to Carol, but he also makes it clear: finding Justina might already be a lost cause.
Carol doesn’t want to hear that,as this young couple gave her a hope she thought this world erased. She’s ready to go after the girl herself, but Daryl shuts her down. She might be capable, but she’s still recovering from her shoulder wound, and he’s not about to let her risk her life–even if it’s to score points with the guy she is starting to catch feelings for. Still, he knows how stubborn she is—and hates disappointing her. That leaves one man and one motorcycle, fueled by determination to end this Spanish drama, save the girl, and finally take his best friend home. In a humorous goodbye—hopefully not their last—Daryl says, “Hot dogs,” code for their plan to make it home and finally crack open those “last meal” mystery meats. Carol smiles because these two soulmates can go from bickering to love in the blink of a zombie eye.
Once they’re back at Solaz del Mar, Carol lies to Fede about Roberto’s ordeal, hiding what she knows about Justina and his role in rigging La Ofrenda. Fede’s already furious over the fallout from the Primitivos’ attack, and she’s not about to add fuel to that fire. Instead, she tells him Roberto was attacked by the same group—but Fede isn’t buying it. After interrogating one of the attackers, he learned that this faction thrives on chaos—they wouldn’t have let Roberto live. Carol also lies about Daryl’s whereabouts, saying he’s working on their boat. Fede seems to accept that, but Paz (Alexandra Masangkay) doesn’t. She quickly puts the pieces together—it was El Alcázar who ambushed Roberto—and this forces Carol and Antonio to finally come clean to her, who has proven herself to be a trusted ally.
Daryl, the Desert, and the Thirsty Lepers
As Daryl heads out on his mission to save Justina, we’re taken on a tour through the Spanish countryside and into a stretch of desert-like wasteland. Along the way, he spots a man with no eyes begging for water. When Daryl offers him a sip, the man tries to guzzle every last drop of his rations.When Daryl stops him, the creepy blind man laughs and points toward the buzzards circling overhead, warning that those birds mean he’s next. The heat and lack of water have clearly fried this guy’s brain, but the encounter leaves Daryl uneasy.
Shaking it off, he hops back on his bike and rides until he spots something strange—a group of chained walkers being used as a human pulley system to drag a train back onto the tracks. Inside the train car we meet Chofo (Vicente Romero), a man clearly living large in the apocalypse. While others have gone mad from thirst, Chofo is soaking in a bathtub with a woman, enjoying what looks like a luxury setup straight out of another world. When he spots Daryl outside, his interest piques—not just in the stranger, but in his bike. He orders one of his men to fetch it, along with food for his pet iguana, Lola, who’s apparently been surviving on a diet of eyeballs.
Moments later, Chofo’s men chase after Daryl on dirt bikes, kicking up clouds of dust. Little do they know that Daryl is a seasoned rider and out maneuvers them with ease. It quickly turns into a deadly game of chicken, with Daryl driving straight at them, guns blazing. He takes out the gang with shots to the arm, but in the chaos, gets thrown from his bike and loses it. Now stranded, he’s forced to continue his journey on foot, trudging through the desert beneath the same buzzards picking at the walkers below. Was that blind man right? Could Daryl be next?
Thirsty and exhausted, he eventually collapses, dozing off under the blistering sun. When he wakes, it’s sundown—and he’s surrounded by a group of lepers who seem friendly enough. One– named Mateo (Luis Bondia) offers to take him to water and escorts Daryl back to the leper’s camp. Daryl downs a cup of water in seconds, asking for more, but Mateo explains they have little to spare. Their water was stolen by bandits from the train—Chofo’s crew and now this group is dying of thirst. Even in their struggle to survive they still show him kindness, hoping the American might repay it by helping them take back their tanker. That’s when we meet Amaia (Nansi Nsue), the only one in the colony who doesn’t seem to suffer from leprosy. She’s wary of Daryl, but offers him a deal: if he can return their water, he can have use of their truck. The new set of wheels could make the trip to Barcelona a whole lot easier—but the group lets him sleep on the decision. That night, a young girl named Rosa (India Soria) watches Daryl quietly before he falls asleep. Her wide-eyed innocence stirs something in him, and as we have learned over the two-decades with Daryl, he could never say no to a kid in need.
By morning, his mind is made up. With Rosa’s face still in his thoughts—and the promise of a working truck—he agrees to help. Mateo is thrilled, though Amaia clearly doesn’t trust him, suspecting he’ll take their truck and disappear. The only problem still facing him? The “buzzards,” as the bandits call themselves, are heavily armed, and Daryl’s down to just four bullets. Luckily, these lepers are nothing if not resourceful. They rig up makeshift weapons out of rope, nails, and desperation that only unquenchable thirst could do. Later, with their help, Daryl takes out a small group of buzzards, scavenging enough ammo to make his next move—an all-out assault on Chofo’s train.
What follows is pure apocalypse action: in true Batman fashion, Daryl leaps from a bridge onto the moving train, mowing down any buzzard who crosses his path. Below deck, Chofo feeds Lola another eyeball just as the train screeches to a halt—Daryl has freed the chained walkers being used as labor.
Chaos erupts when the walkers turn on their captors, tearing through the guards as Daryl fights his way inside. Chofo and Daryl end up in a brutal hand-to-hand brawl, forced to pause mid-fight to take out a few stray walkers before turning on each other again. Finally, Daryl holds Chofo underwater in his own bathtub, choking him out—a fitting end for a man who lived in luxury while others died of thirst.
With Chofo gone, the lepers swarm the train to reclaim their water. Mateo thanks Daryl, but it’s little Rosa who gives him a parting gift: her thermos, decorated with a cartoon hippo and filled with fresh water. Daryl smiles and rides off into the sunset as Lola the iguana slinks away into the desert, finally free—and off a diet of eyeballs.
Trapped in a Web of Lies
Back in Solaz del Mar, Valentina (Irina Björklund) arrives with her men to check in on Roberto, who’s still unconscious after his attack. Thanks to Doña Marga (Yassmine Othman)—Fede’s mother and the town healer—he is on the mend but his wounds still need her herbs and poultices.
Outside, Carol and Valentina catch up, and the ever-observant ship captain notices something new: the chemistry sparking between Carol and the Spanish farmer-slash-film enthusiast, Antonio. After once assuming Daryl and Carol were a couple, Valentina has clearly changed her mind. With a teasing smirk, she remarks that Carol seems to “prefer the local wine,” nodding toward Antonio to which Carol calls her “a horny old lady.”
While that might be true, she’s not wrong. Carol did ask Antonio—and his son Roberto, along with Justina—to join her and Daryl on their trip home if they ever find each other again. Antonio, who we learned earlier in the season hasn’t left Solaz del Mar since his return after his wife died, hasn’t given her an answer yet. But if the look in his eyes every time he sees her says anything, he’s thinking about it.
That answer might also be the father and son’s only option for survival. When Doña Marga spots Roberto wearing Justina’s compass necklace—the same one the girl had when she left town—her suspicions ignite. She brings the necklace, and her doubts about Carol’s story, straight to her son Fede. If Carol lied about how Roberto was injured, maybe she’s lying about where Daryl is, too.
Acting on that hunch, Fede sends a group of men to the beach to check on Daryl—who, of course, is nowhere near the boat. And just like that, Fede knows Carol lied, putting her squarely at risk in Solaz del Mar—the exact scenario Daryl had been worried about all along.
Once again, we’re reminded why these two always make us uneasy when they’re separated for side quests. Maybe Daryl’s right—other people’s problems aren’t their business. And if they keep getting pulled into local dramas, they might never make it home to finally eat those hot dogs.