The Walking Dead – Rendition

By: Kelly Kearney

In the Season 10 bonus episodes we got a peek into what Daryl’s life was like during his living in the woods and searching for Rick years. He isolated himself in his riverside camp and aside from the repeat visits from Carol he didn’t have contact with the living until he ran into a Dog and his not-so-welcoming owner, Leah. A friendship and brief romance bloomed, but when Leah forced Daryl to choose between his family or her (a woman he only had a handful of days with) Daryl took pause and missed the opportunity to leave with her. Life moved on with wars, losses and friends he might never see again, until “Rendition” when Dog leads Daryl to his old flame and her fellow trained killers. It’s a fiery revisit with the scorned woman full of Hellfire and fury on this week’s episode of The Walking Dead.

Scattered in Battle

We begin in the thick of a battle with the Reapers on the road to Meridian. Daryl (Norman Reedus) and the others all run for cover, but these killers are trained at what they do and hiding behind some trees won’t be enough to survive this surprise attack. In the commotion, everyone – including Dog – scatters. When Daryl tries to find them he runs into a masked Reaper, with the assailant getting the upper hand until Dog jumps in to save him. Dog starts chomping and gnashing his jaws at the Reaper, who eventually snatched the whimpering Dog up and throws him down a ravine. Daryl screams and tries to go after the good boy but is immediately surrounded by more masked killers. He throws his knife and manages to miss the Reaper target, but it does give him a second to make a run for it. The search for Dog apparently went throughout the night because when we next see Daryl he is covering himself with walker gore to throw the dead off of his scent. He already has one pack of killers after him, so he doesn’t need to add a horde of dead to it. Fully bloodied, Daryl doesn’t even get a chance to stalk the woods when he hears Dog off in the distance and finds him standing beside a masked Reaper looking pretty comfortable. Daryl, with his blade in hand, orders Dog to come to him, but the pup appears loyal to the killer dressed in black and then we see why. The mask comes off and it’s Leah (Lynn Collins)! Daryl is shocked but there is no time for that because Leah gets right down to business asking him if he was a part of that group she and her fellow Reapers just fought. He lies and denies knowing what she is talking about and instead tries to leave but Dog won’t budge. What is it with this adorable furball? Not only is Dog staying put, but Daryl also isn’t leaving either because a couple of Reaper friends of Leah’s shove a bag over his head and haul him off to their camp until they can figure out how he is tied to Maggie and the others.

War Crimes with the Reapers

Once they make it to their compound Daryl is placed in a dark room where he counts the Reapers on his fingers, he spots through his head covering. Enter Leah, who removes her mask as she takes his hood off and then struggles with what to say to the man, she assumed abandoned her. He promises her that he went back to find her and feels guilty over how she ended up with these people. His excuses don’t matter to her because she is still angry. It must be pointed out that Leah was screaming-mad over his search for Rick, so it is pretty hypocritical of her to accuse him of not searching for her over the years. Even worse, she tells Daryl she chose to leave with “these people” because they were, and are, her family. She explains unlike him “they never stopped looking for me.” She goes on to inquire about his family she heard about all those years ago and if they were the people he was with during the attack. He lies again saying he just met them trading food for supplies and barely knew them a week. Leah acts like she is concerned for him, but she is not buying his story and it is obvious. Her flip-flopping between mild flirtation and anger resurfaces once again when she attempts to wash the blood from his face but instead chloroforms him unconscious.

When we next see Daryl he is waking up to a lovely game of quid pro quo war crimes edition. As Leah orders her men to practically drown Daryl, he doesn’t let the torture force him to reveal any information about Alexandria or his friends. Every breath they let him take he sticks with his story about trading food with strangers. Daryl would die to keep his family safe; something Leah apparently missed during their brief hookup in the cabin. If she had paid attention, she should know this relentless waterboarding will not convince this man risk their lives, even for her. Watching him gulp and gasp for air while his ex-friends-with-benefits chokes the life out of him might not be what fans wanted for Daryl’s first romance, but it does gather up all the warring shippers and put them into one boat: Leah is toxic and Daryl needs to get far away from her nonsense. After a few rounds of watersports with team mercenaries, even Leah can’t stand to watch her ex beg for air any longer. She orders the others to pause the torture and take him back to his cell, but first she offers a warning: if doesn’t start talking “the one we answer to won’t be so nice.”

Now locked in a cell directly across from a captive and beaten down Frost (Glenn Stanton), Daryl does his best to avoid him until he is recognized and Frost tries to strike up a conversation from between the bars. Daryl instantly realizes this is a bad move and pretends like he doesn’t know Frost and doesn’t want to know him. Whether or not Frost understood what Daryl’s motives were is a moot point because Daryl watches as the guards whisk him away presumably for another round of torture. Leah drops back in for more head games and flirtations but gets interrupted by the news two of her own were found dead. Cut to their bodies on some makeshift alter while a Reaper priest chants something in tongues and their leader, Pope (Ritchie Coster), rants like some sort of Kool-Aid drinking cult King in a handlebar mustache spewing enough rage to burn down the entire East Coast or what’s left of it after the fall. It looks like these guys are a religious cult on top their ex-military training. Not exactly lightweights compared to the typical big-bads Daryl, and the others tend to face.

Trial by Fire

After mourning her fellow Reaper, Leah visits Daryl again and explains the man who died, Turner, was like a little brother to her. They served as soldiers together and then later mercenaries in war. She never mentioned to Daryl she was a mercenary, but her tattoo matches Pope’s and the rest of the Reaper group’s so they should be a formidable bunch to take down. When Daryl asks about her work she explains the only difference between being a soldier at war and a mercenary at war is the latter paid better. The conversation turns back to their past relationship with Daryl once again telling her he came back for her, only to find her and her belongings (not Dog) gone. She shrugs him off by saying they wouldn’t have lasted in this crazy world anyway, but that doesn’t mean she never cared for him. Here we go with the sweet-talking whiplash again. It should be noted that the military is not all guns and survival training, they also learn interrogation techniques and playing nice and acting like she is on Daryl’s side is one of those lessons taught. So, it is no shock when she segues her caring speech into another round of digging for information about Maggie and Alexandria. She practically begs him to tell her something she can take back to Pope, so he gives her a taste and says the woman is their leader and she travels with a “tall skinny guy who never shuts up…and a priest who carries a shotgun.” Leah is shocked by the small number of fighters, so Daryl admits he has been counting her people and these people definitely outnumber them. He hopes it will scare the Reapers off or maybe bide him some time to get to Pope, of whom he asks Leah about and when he can meet him.

Later that night Leah goes to Pope to tell him what Daryl said about this group who killed two of their own. She pleads with Pope to trust Daryl but makes it clear her loyalty is to him and the Reapers. No ex is going to shake her dedication to the brotherhood, or Pope, who seems like he is one banjo short of a duel and giving off some major Apocalypse Now vibes. It is an interesting relationship between the two; a bit fatherly and a whole lot of control mixed up with some keenly aimed manipulations that become clearer when he tells Leah she is his favorite above all the others. He more than likely tells them all they are his favorites, but Leah in all her starry-eyed faith buys it. So, you would think she would’ve been shocked when Pope tricks her into preparing Daryl for a meeting with the leader only for him to torch the shed the two of them are in. Daryl jumps into action fighting the flames and breaking through the wood paneled wall to get Leah and himself to safety. Waiting for them outside is a watchful Pope, who Leah instantly joins as the rest of the Reapers congratulate him for passing God’s test. “Forged by fire…ordained by God,” Pope yells, “welcome him!” Without ever being asked, it looks like Daryl’s unwillingness to leave Leah to die just made him a Reaper.

Later, Daryl is escorted to Pope’s pad as the man explains the Reaper’s history and how it led them to this very moment. He talks of the horrors and violence of war and how it seemed like a world God had abandoned. He asks Daryl if he believes, but he says, “Not anymore. Guess I just believe in me now.” Pope calls it a mistake because “you’re not God.” It’s a topic Pope thinks he is an expert in after he and his men survived the bombings during the fall. The group fled to a church as the skies rained down fire on both the dead and the living. Everything was burning to a crisp but somehow the only people to come out of it unharmed were Pope and his Reapers. It was a sign from God he could not ignore. “We were the chosen ones” just like Daryl, who doesn’t have a scratch on him from fighting the earlier blaze. But that’s the thing with cults, they often start off well-meaning but always fall into the hands of a controlling and delusional sociopath and that is exactly what Pope is. After his chat with Daryl about who they are and what he is now destined to become, Pope introduces the newbie to the others and offers him food and drink. It’s a mood filled with comradery around the fire pit as they laugh and enjoy the night, right up until Pope starts to regale one Reaper for his strength and bravery. He boasts that the young man carried Tuner’s body ten miles back home to their camp to insure he got a proper burial but then pauses and questions where he was when Turner was attacked. The young man rambles with fear in his eyes and Pope slaps his back and asks him if he is hurt. Reapers don’t get hurt, but they also don’t run when things get deadly. When the man winces and it is obvious, he didn’t do all he could for Turner, he might as well have written his death warrant because a Chosen One does not break the code of brotherhood and leave someone behind. Pope lulls the Reaper though into a false sense of understanding by explaining that the typical response to fright is flight. However, before the guy can even speak of what really went down, Pope tosses him face down into the flames and holds him there with a boot to his back. The guy screams as his flesh drips from the bone as Pope yells, “God doesn’t only use fire for baptism, it is also his wrath!” Now Daryl knows what trouble he and the others face and it is far worse than what Maggie said. He will have to play along with this death cult and find their weaknesses and just hope Maggie and the others are alive when all Hell breaks loose.