The Walking Dead – Morning Star

By: Kelly Kearney

In this episode Hilltop prepares for the final showdown with Alpha and her Whisperers. Will they stay and fight for the community they’ve built or will they flee and find another sanctuary from this unwinnable war? With the horde coming, can their small group of able fighters be able to hold the gates or will they come tumbling down at Alpha’s command? “We are the end of the world,” might mean the end of everything this community has worked so hard to protect.

We are the end of the world

After their gruesome hook up in the woods, Alpha (Samantha Morton) initiated Negan (Jeffery Dean Morgan) into her S&M foreplay by ordering him to whip her to prove his loyalty. Nobody said this bald Queen of the dead was sane! At first, Negan doesn’t seem too keen on her brand of flirtations, but after he gives in she returns the favor symbolizing their bond for life. If only Beta (Ryan Hurst) knew he had been replaced by his least favorite snide talking ex-ASZ jail bird.

Speaking of Beta, while his Queen is playing masochistic sex games with Negan he’s gathering the Whisperers for a march towards the communities. As they slowly hobble across Alpha’s border, the masked skin freaks whisper in unison, “We are the end.”

Over at Hilltop, Eugene (Josh McDermitt) is back on the radio having some post-apocalyptic on-mic dating with his mystery girl, Stephanie. The two are becoming closer by the day sharing stories about music, falling satellites and details about their locations, all the while never revealing too much. As much as these two are drawn to each other, none of their communities would not be happy they’ve revealed any details that could put their homes in danger. After all, in this world the real danger lies with humans and not the dead. Eugene does manage to slip up and tell Stephanie that he’s in Virginia, which isn’t a hard guess since both he and Stephanie witnessed the same falling satellite that he harvested the radio parts from. So, the two knew they were at least near each other and Eugene confirming that, while risky, seemed like a good way to get her to trust him. In his favor, dropping a clue to his whereabouts works because Stephanie agrees to talk to her community about Eugene and see if they support a union of these two love struck fools.

Outside Eugene’s radio post, Earl (John Finn) and Alden (Callan McAuliffe) spot an incoming arrival from the ASZ. Aaron (Ross Marquand), along with Rosita (Christian Serratos) and Mary (Thora Birch) pull in through the gates under the assumption that the fight weary threesome need a doctor. When its obvious Mary is a Whisperer, Earl wants to know why Aaron would bring her to a place her people have been actively trying to destroy. That’s when he learns his baby boy Adam is the nephew of their new visitor. Since he’s already lost one son and a wife, Earl wants no part of Mary. He orders Aaron to keep her away from Adam.

The King and Queen

Someone else who isn’t in the mood to deal with surprise visitors is Carol (Melissa McBride). After the tragedy at the cave in and Daryl (Norman Reedus) storming off in a fit, Carol heads to his riverside campsite to be alone. It’s not long before Ezekiel (Khary Payton) shows up offering her a supportive shoulder to lean on and request to finally come home. It seems he heard about what went down at the cave and he knew she would be isolating herself at Daryl’s camp. He doesn’t push his ex-wife into talking. Instead he just sits with her in silence until she finally agrees to go back to Hilltop. Of course, her problems follow her when the first person she sees is Daryl and he angrily turns away from her. Thanks to losing his friends Connie and Magna, it will be a tough road back to BFF-dom for Pookie and Carol.

Speaking of the two trapped in the cave, Luke (Dan Fogler), Kelly (Angel Theory), Yumiko (Eleanor Matsuura), and Jerry (Cooper Andrews), all gear up to head out on a rescue mission when they’re stopped by Daryl and Lydia with some bad news. Saving their friends is going to have to wait because Lydia (Cassady McClincy) says, “my mother is coming.” We all know what that means! Where there is Alpha, there is a horde.

Negan graduates from Savior to Whisperer

Back in Eugene’s radio man cave, Rosita shows up and ruins his secret relationship with Stephanie when she hears the mystery woman talking on the microphone. Rosita runs to answer and Stephanie disconnects. Eugene freaks out and screams at Rosita for forcing him to break his promise. He swore he wouldn’t tell anyone about his new friend and now Stephanie might not ever speak to him again. She’s been the one bright spot in his life and his best friend Rosita might’ve ruined it for him. He orders her to leave him alone before, “I say something I might regret.” Rosita sulks off as Eugene tries to contact Stephanie again, but the woman never answers the call. Could this burgeoning romance be over?

At the Whisperer camp Alpha lets Negan know he’s finally one of her pack and hands him his very own skin mask. He’s no longer her prisoner but a full fledged freak and he appear to be thrilled over it. He uses their newfound trust to try and convince her to drop the attack on Hilltop and force the communities to surrender. What’s better than making them bend the knee to their new Queen? It seems Negan is still loyal to his jailers back at ASZ and their friends at Hilltop. Even though he’s been welcomed into Alpha’s pack, he still doesn’t want death to come to Judith (Cailey Fleming) and her family. Not that he lets Alpha in on this. He just tries to persuade her to handle this in a less lethal way.

Meanwhile, at Hilltop we see Daryl, Lydia, Aaron, Earl and the others hold a meeting about the war that’s creeping its way towards their doorstep. The number of able bodied fighters they have are no match for the thousands of dead Alpha is about to unleash on them. Everyone but Earl agrees, this is a war they can not win. Daryl orders them all to start loading the children on wagons and they will all begin heading to Oceanside and abandon Hilltop. He hoists an unhappy Judith and R.J. (Antony Azor), who is wearing Rick’s hat, into a wagon and heads back to the mansion to gather the others. At the same time Carol finds Ezekiel going through a trunk of Henry’s things and that’s when she spots his rather large tumor protruding from his neck. Carol knows right away what it is and no amount of denial from her ex will convince her otherwise. Whether it’s pity or the fact they could die in this fight, Carol lets her guard down and kisses Ezekiel. The two fall into bed and reunite, possibly for the last time.

Trapped and ready for war

After packing up the get away wagons, Daryl escorts Judith and a few others out of Hilltop. Their escape hits a snag when they run into a familiar scene – a walker hanging from the tree and a barricade blocking all the exit roads. It’s a sign that Negan is with Alpha and they have no choice but to head back to Hilltop and fight.

Their first course of action is to build a barrier around the community. Luckily, Eugene is their resident engineer and he manages to build an electric fence that could keep the walkers at bay. Rosita follows him out to the fence and the two talk about Stephanie. She even tests his love for this new woman by asking him if he wants to kiss her! After years of Eugene being not-so-secretly in love with Rosita, it shocks them both when he realizes kissing her is no longer a part of his fantasies. That’s enough proof for his “proverbial BFF” and she tells him when the war is over he should go find this Stephanie and be with her.

Not only is an electric fence in the works, but Kelly, Yumiko, and Luke are building a spiked barrier that should impale some of the walkers and keep them from Hilltop’s main gates. As they group is hammering away, Yumiko spots a sea of racing rats fleeing the woods. It can only mean one thing…“THE HORDE IS COMING!”

Hilltop burns

To the sounds of Eugene serenading Stephanie, we see Hilltop preparing for a war. Fresh off her emotional chat with Carol we see Lydia is gifted Henry’s armor from Ezekiel. At the same time, Aaron hands Mary a spear just as Alden whisks Adam away from his curious aunt. Everyone is strapping on their war vests and shields and gathering their weapons for a fight that seems unwinnable. As Eugene’s song draws to a close, Stephanie chimes in to finish off the last stanza. Eugene is thrilled his girl hasn’t disappeared into the radio waves forever. In fact, not only has she forgiven him for breaking his promise, she also tells him her coordinates and the two have a standing post-war date! It’s about time Eugene found love, although we can’t say the same for Daryl, who is still in his feels over losing Connie and Magna to Carol’s vendetta. His anger doesn’t stop him from making peace with Ezekiel or asking him to look out for children if something should happen to him. The two adversaries shake hands and bury the hatchet for now. They are much stronger fighting side by side than fighting each other with stare downs and insults.

After the children are taken care of, Daryl goes to find Judith who is insistent that she can fight alongside the adults. Knowing she’s sacred to lose anymore family, Daryl admits that he’s sacred too and needs her to stay safe and out of the line of Alpha’s fire. That’s when Judith hands him a good luck gift she made. It’s his motorcycle vest with one angel wing! With his good luck leather charm, he hugs Judith and heads outside to wait for the fight. He doesn’t have to wait long because after he picks up his new weapon, a morning star, the walkers start trickling out of the nearby woods. Aaron yells for the soldiers to line up and with their Jon Snow inspired armor, they hold the line and wait for the attack. What happens next is beyond any of their wildest dreams.

The horde is massive and Eugene’s electric fence manages to stop a few, but when they wires are torn down the walkers and Whisperers pile on to the second spiked fence. The final gate to their home. At this point, Aaron and Daryl lead the fighters in an attack killing any walker or Whisperer that gets trapped on the spikes. Unfortunately, there is just too many of them and the barrier is showing the stress of their weight. Out in the field we see Beta and some Whisperers loading up catapults with zombie organs filled with tree sap. They fling the sap at the Hilltop fighters and the organs bursts all over the barrier and their clothing. At the same time, Alpha is lighting an arrow on fire and Negan stops her to ask what happened to their plan to force Hilltop to join them. She smirks and reveals a truly horrible fate: she wants to make them a part of her horde! Then, she shoots the flaming arrow at Hilltop. When it lands, it immediately sets the sap covered barrier on fire. Some of the Hilltop fighters ignite and that’s the cue for the Whisperers to follow her lead and shoot their own flaming arrows. With the fire raging and the Hilltop army covered in accelerant, the last fence protecting the community breaks and the walkers and Whisperers march into Hilltop. There is nowhere for Daryl to lead his people. They fight off as many as they can, but the fire surrounds them and they are just outnumbered, out flanked and out maneuvered. They have no other option but to run, but where? The roads are blocked and they are one match away from becoming walking Molotov cocktails. There seems to be no way out of this hell Alpha has unleashed. It’s a fight they are destined to lose.