![]() ![]() ![]() It's good to see the show putting someone competent like Jesus on Negan's trail, and the addition of Carl as a stowaway generates stakes that Jesus on his own wouldn't. To that end, 'Go Getters' gives the impression that things are finally going somewhere, thanks in large part to Jesus and Carl actually, uh, going somewhere. For all his menace-behind-a-smile presence, Simon is another example of the show spinning its wheels until the time comes for Negan to kill another member of the cast, and for those oppressed by him decide to rise up. So despite watching Simon be an entertaining Negan-lite, he doesn't really offer the audience anything that hasn't been seen before. That flies in the face of Rick's group swiftly dispatching a cluster of Saviors without breaking a sweat in season 6, but as is the way of this show – everyone is as competent or incompetent as the story needs them to be in the exact moment one or the other becomes narratively necessary. At this point, the show has written the Saviors as an unstoppable force, capable of doing anything to anyone. As a group of adversaries, they don't have any other moves there's very little that's appealing or interesting about them as villains beyond their leader's willingness to kill well-liked characters from the show. The Walking Dead has shown the Saviors' routine so many times its beyond redundant. No, it's because war with the Saviors means the show is one step closer to removing a group of villains that have already ceased to be interesting. That's not because Simon is doing his best rendition of Negan during his visit to Hilltop, or that, in an effort to instill a little fear into the oddly unpopulated colony (the budget must have been tight after last week's superfluously super-sized episode), the Saviors send a car playing loud music crashing through the front gates, attracting walkers that Jesus has to jump kick into oblivion. It's a surreptitious act of aggression on the part of the Hilltop community against the Saviors, and after the arrival of Simon (Steve Ogg), it could not have come at a better time. That creates a potentially interesting dynamic that, in some small way, progresses the notion of pending war. It's the sort of shift that, when boxed up in an episode like 'Go Getters' – that jumps around between characters and locations more than any other episode so far this season – is welcome, as it affords the hour a different kind of tension. There is a conflict brewing that hints at Gregory's unsuitability as a leader and the woman who would make for an obvious successor. He also creates a potentially interesting conflict that goes beyond Negan versus the expanded world of The Walking Dead. Burdened by his frustrations at being subjugated by the Saviors, and in Alexandria's inability to neutralize the aggressors, as was their lofty claim, Berkeley makes for a pitiable villain. Xander Berkeley's performance as a callow leader is one of the more enjoyable aspects of the hour. While Rick has shifted to trembling enfeeblement with just a hint of seething rage, and Ezekiel presents himself as an odd voice of reason in a volatile situation, Gregory has become the living embodiment of that shared sense of desperation. ![]()
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