Summary of Walking Dead: Outpost 22 Season 11 Episode 21

Well, it took a while, though the Walking Dead seems to be on course. In today’s episode, it choo-choo-chooses to collect his characters (well, most of them) for a single, coherent plot line this will lead directly to the final conflict with the Commonwealth. You could even say that the show kicks into high gear towards the end. Did I mention there was a train in this episode?

All that positivity aside, if you look at the individual scenes of Outpost 22, it’s kind of a mess. There’s a lot of dead weight (no zombie pun, believe it or not), and very little of the episode has the above stakes during its run time. After all are captured and shipped out of the Commonwealth last week, Maggie, Rosita and Gabriel – who are helpfully separated from everyone on the bus and guarded only by a sleeping Commontrooper – easily manage to escape. They get separated, but that’s okay because they quickly meet again without significant incident. And Carol and Daryl show up too!

Anyone remaining on the transport will either be taken to a prison camp like Ezekiel, Carrie, and Negan, or the eponymous and mysterious Outpost 22. The prison camp scenes serve primarily as filler; The “exiles” are told not to use names, some random characters we’ve never seen try to escape and get shot, porridge is served. But there’s an exception here, and then Negan sits next to Ezekiel and they talk.

It seems utterly impossible to me that the two characters have never shared a scene together, at least since Negan was incarcerated, but that’s how it’s played out – and for the life of me I can’t remember any other. In any case, it turns out that Ezekiel intentionally avoided Negan in fiction and on the show because he’s still completely furious with everything he’s done to the kingdom and its people. But Negan is so desperate to escape and rescue his wife, Annie, that he asks Ezekiel to lead a “Hope”-inspired mass uprising of prisoners, something he can’t do. However, Negan may be the “spark” that ignites that hope, which will likely result in his being brutally beaten. It should go without saying that this is saved for a later episode.

Meanwhile, Daryl, Carol, Maggie, Rosita, and Gabriel follow the train, discover Connie was put on it, and continue to follow. It will take some time, but it presents us with an interesting dilemma: If they rescue Connie, the Commontroopers on board will radio to Outpost 22, whose troopers could injure the children and anyone else sent there. It’s a dilemma, one they solve by simply… attacking the train and still saving them. It’s stealthy at first and then turns into a big gunfight, but luckily none of the guards ever think to turn themselves in. One of the Commontroopers even gets away with a bike, which, I don’t give a shit, he crashes into a tree off-screen, allowing Daryl to make a sick slide under a half-fallen tree and into the guy’s legs.

So, yes, despite the Walking DeadDespite her claims to the contrary, the whole train/Connie situation isn’t really a dilemma, and we know that because Rosita radios outpost 22 that evening to ask for directions, saying she’s a Commonwealth soldier, who was on the train was attacked. I imagine any guards there will helpfully forget to do anything in retaliation. There’s Commonwealth-conquered Alexandria, by the way, which means if the five attack, they have home advantage. And once their people are free, they’ll take the fight straight to Pamela.

For a season that kept its characters so separate from each other, and for a plethora of episodes where everyone seemed to be working past each other, giving five main characters a very clear mission – get back to Alexandria, save her people, and then fuck Pam’s shit – is quite satisfying, even if we have to wait until then the last three episodes so that everything takes place. But Outpost 22 had other charms! Maggie’s freaking out at being forced to kill the little zombie, Gabriel praying with the dying Commontrooper instead of brutally completing the job himself, the Negan Ezekiel scene — there were good moments amidst the plethora of busyness Work.

Maybe that’s all we’ll get for the remaining three episodes: clear conflict, a few good moments, and some more busy ones Work. It’s a shame for a streak that used to be bigger than professional football, but it’s hardly surprising. “The ending of every story is important,” Carol says to Maggie at one point. Of course she’s right. But obviously, “important” doesn’t necessarily mean “exciting.”

Various considerations:

• Seriously, that was me shocked when Gabriel didn’t murder that guy who asked him to pray with him. That kind of sums up most of my problems the Walking Dead over the years, I find.
• Why did the Commontroopers put bags over everyone’s heads when 1) they were already drugged and 2) they could pull them off themselves as soon as they regained consciousness?
• Whoever was responsible for making it look like Maggie stabbed this kid in the head screwed it up. It’s so obvious under his neck.
• Between the motorcycle and the jeep off the other weekCommontroopers can drive around as well as Stormtroopers can shoot.

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