That was my read as well.  Wasn't his last line to Hershel in the earlier episode "I don't think you can talk me out of it?"  I thought it was clear that Rick never seriously considered standing his ground — he seemed reconciled to sacrificing Michonne by the time he got back to the prison.

I liked that Rick isn't showing all his cards to the prison gang yet.  He still has the option of tricking Michonne into coming along willingly to the Governor's trap ("Hey, uh, Michonne, we're going to sign a peace treaty and we thought you'd be a good witness.")

"Not safe for TV"?  We don't necessarily need to see this stuff for the TV show to hint at it.  The Governor's perversions are a big part of the character in the comics — in particular, they give us a good reason to hate him.  Take that stuff away, and we don't hate him anymore.  He's just a bland ruthless but…

Careful, J.J. Abrams might be reading this forum searching for ideas.  A few years back George Lucas re-edited ROTJ to include a Force-ghost Hayden Christensen that only Luke can see.  And we know that Luke is in this movie.  And, well, Sebastian Shaw has been dead for 20 years, but something tells me Hayden…

Other ensemble series make it easier to focus on a few characters at a time.  The problem here is that the group doesn't split up unless there's a good reason — when there's a scene at the farm or the prison, the whole gang generally has to be on set, and then the writers start thinking, "Hmm, Carol hasn't said…

It hasn't been that short a time span, though.  It's been about a year since Z-day, right?  Judith was conceived a month or so after the apocalypse started, we skipped over most of her 9 month gestation, and she's about 6-8 weeks old now.

The above is correct — Matlock often got the charges dropped against his clients by finding the *real* killer, which is totally how real-life defense attorneys operate, and so he often was directly responsible for sending young people to prison.  Typically after getting them to accidentally confess on the witness…

That's what's missing here.  Comic-Governor brutally raped Michonne for hours, psychologically tortured Glenn, and cut off Rick's hand for no good reason.  They came in peace and the Governor sadistically tortured them to find the location of the prison, despite the fact that they presented no immediate threat.  He…

I also thought that the Governor just has zero respect for Andrea and is supremely confident in his ability to smooth talk her out of believing the entire mountain of evidence against him.

That's a good point.  How come the walkers only become less suspicious when they see another walker is on a leash?  Seems like that would only make them more suspicious. Because it's not like they consider the living "camouflaged" when they're standing in the middle of a group of walkers — they know exactly who to…

Andrea and Shane had quickie post-zombie attack sex in a car — you know, after Andrea learned to "use the force" and scored like six zombie headshots despite only having an afternoon or two of gun training.

Ah, but what about episodes in which multiple characters die?  For example, Burt Gervasi, Bobby Baccala, Phil's mistress and her father, and some random motorcycle guy all die in "The Blue Comet," but your method would have you subtract 5 episodes from the Sopranos total, when they're all contained in one episode.…

I've always agreed with the basic premise that the zombie genre is extremely limited and unsuited to a long-running serial drama on TV.  Maybe the characters can only have conversations about "Who put you in charge?" and "You only care I'm sad because it makes you sad," and "[Here's a story from back before the world…

Yes, that's also a possibility!

Yes, that's also a possibility!

Agreed, Little Carmine doesn't hold much water as a possibility, although he is a pretty slippery one — he turned on Johnny Sac while his dad's body was warm.  I will also point out that we don't really know about Butchie's motivation in the last episode.  He seems to go along with Phil's orders until Tony escapes and…

Agreed, Little Carmine doesn't hold much water as a possibility, although he is a pretty slippery one — he turned on Johnny Sac while his dad's body was warm.  I will also point out that we don't really know about Butchie's motivation in the last episode.  He seems to go along with Phil's orders until Tony escapes and…

That's an easy one — Little Carmine, Butchie, or the leader of some unseen New York faction wanted Tony dead.  We saw very little of New York's internecine conflicts, but it seemed pretty clear that Carmine Sr.'s death left a huge power vacuum that neither Johnny nor Phil could ever really stabilize.

That's an easy one — Little Carmine, Butchie, or the leader of some unseen New York faction wanted Tony dead.  We saw very little of New York's internecine conflicts, but it seemed pretty clear that Carmine Sr.'s death left a huge power vacuum that neither Johnny nor Phil could ever really stabilize.

Well, what are there now, like 20 regular characters in the cast?  And three of them are black?  And two of them have only appeared in the most recent episode?