The Walking Dead Review: What It Always Is (Season 10 Episode 5)

There are reminders during The Walking Dead Season 10 Episode 5, “What It Always Is,” that the past doesn’t stay dead, just like the walkers. Negan’s learning this from a newfound groupie, and Magna is learning this as her relationship with Yumiko deteriorates.

It comes from reputation and judge of character, and it’s where the episode finds a lot of success. The past is a powerful weapon, and it can be the proof needed to show that redemption and change are possible, as evidenced in Negan’s case.

The role Negan finds himself in on the episode is one of his reputation preceding him, one he’s smartly tossed aside for years. Brandon treats Negan like a beacon of the past that must come back, even bringing out Negan’s famed Lucille bat and his leather jacket. For a character who once prided himself on his reputation, it’s an interesting turn that when faced with idolization now, Negan flinches from it.

Negan doesn’t want to do what’s right necessarily, but what’s best. Helping the two stragglers find safe passage to one of the communities is something the past Negan would have never done unless there’s something in it for him. Now, though, he is avenging their murders when he could simply walk away.

Brandon’s murders comes as perhaps the only rule Negan stands for: don’t hurt the innocent. His acts of kindness reflect something in Negan’s heart, underlined when Brandon messes up his legend with Carl. He may be a bad person in the grand scheme of The Walking Dead, but Negan does have a line. Brandon stepping over that line is a dark, miserable outcome, where goodness doesn’t always prevail.

Negan has grown, and it gives Jeffrey Dean Morgan a lot to chew scenery with. The simple act of sitting on a bus with Brandon, there’s so much going on with his posture, with Morgan’s laid-back manner as though he’s always in control even when he’s not. He’s a character that is lost in a world he’s no longer a significant part in, and wandering into Whisperer territory appears to be his move to be significant again.

It’s hard to tell if it’s an act of desperation or there’s a plan in the back of Negan’s mind. For now, though, he’s confidently accepting a pretty harsh change in command with Alpha.

The reveal of Ezekiel’s thyroid cancer comes as something hinted at during The Walking Dead Season 10 Episode 4, “Silence The Whisperers.” Is this the reason he wanted to end things during that episode, before Michonne saved him? Ezekiel has managed to suffer loss after loss on the show, and so battling cancer in a world without the proper care is a hard direction to take his character.

That the cancer is something that his family suffered over their lives is another sign that the past continues to rear its head. Sometimes characters deserve a little peace in their life and Ezekiel, of all characters on the show, certainly deserves that rather than more pain.

There is hope, though, on the episode. It comes through decency and being there, as Negan is for the mother and son, as Daryl is for Connie as they search for Kelly, and as Siddiq is for Ezekiel, and vice versa. It’s being there during all of the hardships where The Walking Dead continues to provide a good example of doing the best under the circumstances.

The Walking Dead Season 10 Episode 5, “What Is Always Is,” is a harder episode, punishing its characters as they try to find some peace in their difficulties. There are rifts starting to form between characters, like with Magna and Yumiko, where trust no longer exists. But there are signs of compassion, as Siddiq and Ezekiel show in their conversation together.

With Negan potentially joining up with the Whisperers, either as a suicide mission or to cause some damage, and the Whisperers poisoning the well, so to speak, the main crux of the Whisperer war looks to be accelerating. It’s been a relatively slow build to get there, but it’s been a shadow war of little cuts, as Alpha admits herself. The hard part comes next.

 

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The Walking Dead airs Sundays at 9/8c on AMC.

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