The Walking Dead (10×22) Here’s Negan Review

For our review of the last episode of The Walking Dead, click here.

Synopsis: Carol takes Negan on a journey, hoping to minimize the increasing tension. Negan reflects on the events that led him to this point and comes to a conclusion about his future. (IMDb)

Now we finally get to see how Negan started and meet the actual Lucille and it was definitely worth it as Jeffrey Dean Morgan delivers a phenomenal performance.

Here’s Negan begins with Maggie taking Herschel out for a walk through Alexandria until Negan just had to ruin it. They’d have to get along eventually. However, he wasn’t saved but was rather banished but Carol and Daryl set him up with a place. Suffice it to say that the isolation didn’t do Negan any good as he was confronted with his former self though he wasn’t easily fazed.

To figure things out, Negan had to go back to find the key to everything which was of course Lucille. The baseball bat version was buried near the infamous tree. But who was the real Lucille? That’s a question that has yet to be answered until now and to that, the episode went further back into the past, twelve years back as the world was going down the drain. Lucille (Hilarie Burton Morgan) was his wife who suffered from cancer. Nevertheless, it was clear that he cared about his wife but this episode saw Negan more vulnerable than we’ve ever seen, trying to do all he could to take care of his wife. During that journey, he met former savior Laura (Lindsley Register) and a man named Franklin (Miles Mussenden) who ran a medical trailer to try and help people.

Things were tough for Negan and Lucille in the midst of the walkers outside but they did their best to make it work though they knew it wasn’t going to last. Regardless, watching them care about each other, simply watching Negan actually care about someone else, was so compelling. Hitting some adversity, Negan made plans to seek out that trailer. Seven months prior, their relationship had its issues after he lost his job as a PE teacher. He wasn’t there for Lucille in her time of need. Her cancer diagnosis understandably changed things.  There was still some guilt there and Negan didn’t want to give up and leave his wife.

The trailer just happened to have everything Negan needed, he was also given a bat. Everything thus far was a story he told to a few gang members who held him and the drugs he needed to deliver to Lucille hostage. They wanted to steal from Laura and Franklin and where they got their drugs. Once he got back to Lucille, it was too late. From there, Negan struggled with what he inevitably had to do. The result was the persona we have come to know and it was definitely a powerful moment. He took that energy, barbed wire bat and all, using it against those gang members and helped out Franklin and Laura which was also a powerful moment, Negan monologue and all.

To figure out himself, Negan had to come to terms with the shame he felt for how his relationship with Lucille ended. The episode ended with most powerful moment of them all, saying goodbye to both Lucilles and face Maggie who gave him an epic stare down.

Now this episode makes those extra 6 worth it if only to remind us how much of a great actor Jeffrey Dean Morgan really is.

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Keith Noakes

The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.