They always tone it down a little before the break.

Yeah - it seems the seasonal pattern is 2-3 really good episodes, 2-3 filler/catch up episodes, 2-3 really good episodes, fall break. Repeat for the winter/spring.

CM Punk was on Talking Dead and he made a really good point. How in the hell does Carol not hear the car coming? It's the only car running for a 20 mile radius and she just walk right out in front of it.

Yeah, I wondered about that. That and the van landing upright were two eye-rollers for me. The episode felt like filler to me...meh.

Yes especially since the camera shot inside the van showed virtually no rotation that i could see, then magically made the rest of the rotation to land like a kitty cat.

I grow tired of these episodes where they fill in flashbacks just to get to the current timeline. I see the point of establishing Beth's location and how Carol got in there, but it sucks that it has to eat up two weeks worth of show to do that.

Agreed. They could've condensed both of those episodes into one... I can't bitch too much about the week before with Abraham losing his shit. I liked that episode a lot.

Just like every season, these are character building episodes.

I'm good with them. These eps will make it more powerful when one or more of these characters die.

Carol is my favorite character so I hope they don't kill her off. Melissa Mcbride is a fantastic actress and is always fun to watch. They can kill off Beth and I wouldn't care. She's just not a very good actress.

I don't think Carol or Darryl are going away any time soon. Carol will fill the Andrea role in the comics. The woman they cast as Andrea was pretty awful, but the character in the comics is pretty integral to the story. This is why some of us here think they're bringing Carol along to fill the role.

And Darryl is a fan favorite. They kill Darryl, they'll kill the show.

I hear this a lot, but I think the one thing TWD struggles with is building characters. I dont give a **** about anyone of these characters. Much less when they die. Dunno. I am watching for the journey, certainly not the characters.

Really? Wow. I'd suspect you're in the minority. Most viewers will connect with and care about the characters - they invest in the show. If you don't care about the characters, why watch? I'm not trying to be an ass, I genuinely want to know. Just to see how everything goes down?

I absolutely care about the characters. When Herschel died last season - even though I knew it was coming - I was upset. I was especially upset watching Rick have to put down Sophia at the end of season 2 - I didn't feel for Sophia, but was upset by Rick having to do it. I was upset by Merle's death, and even Andrea (even though i was glad she was gone). I was upset for Carol when she had to put down Lizzie.

All because I care about the characters.

Dunno, I find a lot of the characters generic. Lizzie was by far the most interesting, but they ended up snuffing her before she could really have some fun. Spending hour long episodes with 2 or 3 characters really drags for me.

But as I said before, what TWD has become is a shell of the potential it had during the pilot. I probably judge it harsher becasue of that.

No love for Dale?

D'OH! I meant to mention him, too.

I kind of like the city survival scenes. Building hopping, scavenging, etc.