The Walking Dead – Variant

By: Kelly Kearney

In “Variant” we see Eugene go into hiding as Pamela Milton hunts down the man she blames for killing her son. After he played that tape of Sebastian admitting the awful truth about The Commonwealth, all Hell broke loose, and youngest Milton wound up succumbing to the rotters as well as the townspeople’s apathy. Now she wants payback and orders Mercer to hunt the man down and bring him to justice. Meanwhile, outside the walls, Aaron’s group runs into trouble on the road to Oceanside and discovers a new variant of the dead; ones who can open doors and climb walls! New walkers mean reevaluating everything they’ve known about surviving in this world and it couldnt come at more chaotic time.

AN EYE FOR AN EYE…

Sebastian (Teo Rapp-Olsson) is dead and his mother wants justice, or at least to make an example out of the man she blames for the recent uprising that ended in his death. The tape Max (Margot Bingham) made of Sebastian admitting to his crimes that Eugene (Josh McDermitt) played over the Founder’s Day sound system set off a riot that was partnered with a walker attack inside the walls and culminating into many deaths–Sebastian included. Now Pamela (Laila Robins) is on the warpath and orders Mercer (Michael James Shaw) and his troops to find Eugene Porter and arrest anyone he’s involved with, including Rosita (Christian Serratos) and all of the newcomers. What about Max? Pamela hopes she can be reformed and the first step is for her brother to arrest her boyfriend.

On the road, we catch up with Elijah (Okea Eme-Akwari), Lydia (Cassady McClincy), Aaron (Ross Marquand), and Jerry (Cooper Andrews), who are heading back home by way of Oceanside, to deliver supplies and update everyone on the deal Carol struck with Pamela. Their hard times will soon be over–or so they think. The road out of Commonwealth is blocked by a roaming mini horde of walkers that seem far more sentient than your average meat-head hungry for a taste of human. Aaron is determined to keep going and says they’ll take their carts through the woods. Jerry disagrees but he’s overruled and they all detour away from the walkers and into the trees.

Back at the Commonwealth, Mercer puts his bad cop hat on and interrogates friend and colleague, Rosita, on her whereabouts during the riot. He presses her about the last time she saw Eugene and even goes as far as threatening her and her friends, but Rosita remains tight-lipped. She’s disappointed in her friend who should know she is loyal and would never sell out her friends.

THE SEARCH FOR MAX

Speaking of Eugene, the wanted man himself is hiding out in Father Gabe’s church under Daryl’s (Norman Reedus) less-than-enthused protection. Rosita and Daryl are hoping to sneak Eugene out with the rest of their group later that night, but for now, he needs to stay hidden. One problem: Max has disappeared and Eugene is not leaving without her. Rather than risk him taking off to find her, Rosita volunteers to bring Max back to the church and the two of them can escape with the others. In the meantime, Daryl and Eugene listen as Pamela Milton says over the loudspeakers that anyone who is caught helping Eugene will suffer his same “swift and final justice.” If they don’t get him out of there, and soon, Pamela is going to order his execution.

Outside of The Commonwealth and Aaron’s off-roading idea was the right move now that Aaron and company found what looks like the sturdy remains of a renaissance fair–medieval replica castle and all! Jerry points out the walls are sturdy and the water supply is not far off, but Aaron is in a mood and really can’t concentrate on these Kingdom 2.0 dreams, Instead, he teams up with Lydia to take the first night watch. Speaking of Lydia. Elijah tried to kiss her but she shyly turned her head away and now her volunteering to join Aaron isn’t surprising if she’s looking for some advice. As the two talk we see in the distance that same smart-zombie attempting to climb up the Ren Fair’s walls. This is a zombie with skills and considering the title of the show, probably some variant of the undead our protagonists aren’t used to dealing with.

Back to the grieving Governor, who is seen wiping the blood off her dead son’s face as she talks about this being an end of their cycle of disappointing each other. Almost on cue, zombie Sebastian wakes and the look of disgust on her face while she tells the guards to put him down, says it all. Maternal love is not her strong suit, but public executions for payback and political points is, and that’s why she’s going to execute Eugene. Later, Princess (Paola Lázaro) questions Mercer’s cold attitude towards Eugene but his number one priority is his family–not hers, and that’s what Eugene is to her–family. She reminds Mercer how Eugene saved her from certain insanity and never once judged her. Just societies do not nexecute good men like Eugene and men of honor typically don’t support it. Their argument gets interrupted with news of a Max sighting and Mercer leaves Princess to go find his sister.

LOSS IS INEVITABLE

Aaron and Lydia have a heart to heart about what he witnessed when Elijah tried to kiss her. She admits she’s struggling with their blossoming romance because it reminds her too much of Henry and she isn’t sure she will ever be over that loss. Aaron gets it, when he met his husband, Eric,  he continuously turned the man down for a date until eventually giving in. He wishes he could get one of those nos back now.  He leaves her with advice similar to what Carol gave her last week, “loss is inevitable; it always has been. The only thing we can control is when we say yes.”

But sometimes saying yes means getting caught up in a treasonous plot to take down a power hungry Governor and that’s what happens to Max when she’s caught by her brother’s men before Rosita could take her to Eugene. Now she’s sitting in an interrogation room with Mercer, who’s ordering her to sign a guilty by reason of temporary insanity affidavit. This is Pamela’s way of offering Max a pardon. It’s her life for Eugene’s. She is disappointed in her usually honorable brother and says their father, a General, would be too. She’s not signing the papers even if they execute her for treason. Exposing the truth was the right thing to do and she won’t apologize for it.

While Max is sitting in lock-up, Eugene is at the church ready to fight Daryl just to break his way out and find Max. He backs down as soon as the deady reality of getting caught sinks in, and thinks this proves he’s always been a coward and a liar. He can stay and fight and probably die in the process or he can leave with his friends; at this point, Daryl isn’t going to stop him either way. While he tries to figure out his next move, his friends are all banding together to make sure he gets out of The Commonwealth, and now that Princess has seen Mercer’s other side, she’s ready to leave too. In fact, she pops in for a visit with Ezekiel (Khary Payton) who breaks the unfortunate news to her that he is staying. The former King is sort of a surrogate father for Princess, and as she recounts the awful upbringing she had that taught her to never trust, it’s clear she does trust him and will miss him if she leaves with everyone else.

FEED THE BABY

Next, we head to The Commonwealth’s jail where Pamela has a sexually charged visit with Lance (Josh Hamilton). She reaches into his pocket and digs out his favorite coin and flips it to decide his future. It’s a live or die moment but Lance ends up winning the coin toss and promises to be a good little Milton servant from here on out. That’s exactly what she had in mind because in comes a very hungry “rotter” Sebastian along with the body of a badly stunned man. Pamela never put her son down and now she expects Hornsby to feed him. Welcome to the family, Lance! Now feed mommy’s rabid pet! Lance’s love of Pamela’s degradation is kinky, toxic, and undoubtedly deadly; but for whom, it’s still too early yet to tell.

In romances with far less red flags we have Princess and Mercer, who can’t agree on Eugene’s “justice” so the pink fuzzy jacket is walking right out of her boyfriend’s door for good. She explains why with a little backstory about growing up with her stepfather and stepbrother. They would tie her up and lock her in closets until she urinated on herself. Every time she complained they would tell her to be grateful for the roof over her head and food in her belly. When Mercer tells her there are worse places outside the walls than what’s happening inside of them, all she hears is her stepfather’s voice. For self-preservation she has to go. Before she leaves she makes it a point to say she was always afraid of men and thought of them as monsters, but he is not a monster. It’s a bittersweet goodbye for this adorable short-lived pairing.

Over at the Ren Fair from Hell, Aaron and Lydia hear something and after checking to secure the barrier, they can’t imagine what it could be. They soon find out it’s the sentient walker from earlier and it looks like he let a hundred of his friends inside! It’s night and almost instantly the walkers overwhelm Lydia and Aaron–who wind up yelling for Eijah and Jerry to back them up. In a cinematic kill montage, Jerry slices through walkers as everyone takes cover in a house. That’s when they can’t believe their eyes; one of the dead turns the doorknob and opens the door! Aaron panics thinking it must be a Whisperer and thanks to his heavy dose of Alpha trauma, starts to lose it. They all head to the roof where an injured Jerry tries to bandage his leg while the others think of an escape plan. When nobody is looking, a walker climbs up the roof and fights with Aaron, who then pulls the thing’s face off. He realizes this isn’t a Whisperer but how are the walkers so fast and able to problem solve? The next morning the dead have cleared out and Aaron tells Jerry he’s heard of walkers that can climb walls but always assumed they were just stories. Maybe there are other types of walkers out there too. He hopes not but the world is big and if people are all different than so are walkers. After their ordeal, Lydia wastes no time kissing Elijah. As they roll out and head to Oceanside, Aaron tells Jerry the location is indeed fit for King Jerry, and his dreamer pal likes the sound of that.

Back at the church, Daryl is packing up to go just as Rosita walks in to tell Eugene that Max was arrested and she’s not coming with them. “Then I have to bid you adieu” he says, and that’s Daryl’s cue to leave these two friends to hash out this suicidal plan. Eugene gives his prized necklace to Rosita for Coco and then turns himself in to the trooper station. Mercer can hardly believe his eyes when this self-proclaimed coward announces he was the one who recorded Sebastian and played the tapes, no doubt in an effort to take all the heat and leave none for Max. When Mercer tells his sister what her boyfriend did she’s devastated but not as bad as she will be when she realizes his sacrifice was for nothing. Pamela gets her man and still goes back on her word when she arrests all of the newcomers from Eugene’s group, with the first being Rosita. So much for that deal Carol made!