I came across this pretty cool “VFX Reel†from Stargate Films following the season finale of Walking Dead Season 3 and was initially just going to post this and carry on with my life.
But then I got to thinking about the season finale of S3 and very quickly realised that, on reflection, the season finale was a total let down in almost every conceivable way [SPOILERS TO FOLLOW].
The end of S1 was decent – Centre For Disease Control explodes, Rick finds out some secret he won’t share with everyone, the gang drives off into an uncertain future, there was enough there to make me want to keep watching.
The end of S2 was the most intense holyshitwhathappensnext cliff-hanger I’ve seen in long time.
Think about it, Rick murdered the shit out of Shane who then turned despite never being bitten only to get gunned down by motherflippin CARL. The gunshot attracted a herd of Walkers who sacked the farm and caused the group to split up in their scramble to get the fuck outta there.
That night, Rick confesses that he’s known all along that you don’t need to get bitten to turn, which in itself was a huge “oh fuck†moment. Andrea, who’s been separated from the group, gets saved from becoming zombie-noms by some cloak-wearing, ninja-sword-wielding freak who walks around with dismembered zombies on muthufukkin CHAINS!
What a great way to end a series! I was so excited for S3 I could hardly sit still and when it finally came, the first half of it was awesome!
But the second half, eish…
Merle bizarrely changes from being this creepy guy who no one can trust to being a creepy guy who comes to his senses after some gentle coercion from Michonne, releases her for no apparent reason and gets himself killed in an idiotic move that doesn’t really change anything.
The final showdown with The Governor FINALLY happens and, despite the fact that The Governor has 10x the firepower, at least twice as many men and is hell-bent on killing the shit out of Rick and his merry gang, he and his thugs bail the instant bullets start flying and are essentially chased out of the prison by only two fucking people (Glenn and Maggie armed with automatic rifles).
The Governor guns his own soldiers down because he’s a bit miffed they all bailed on him and disappears with the two remaining ones. Rick goes back to Woodbury and everyone’s like “Yay, let’s go live with Rick and these total strangers IN JAIL†before which Andrea dies because instead of picking the fucking pliers up with her goddamn toes and freeing herself, she decided to chat endlessly with that dying nerdy guy!
It was an ending without a cliff-hanger. The only loose end is that The Governor is still out there somewhere, but Rick’s men now out-number the Governor’s and with the added help of the newcomers, I’m pretty sure they can fortify the shit out of the prison and live happily ever after.
Look, I’ll still watch S4 because I’m invested in the characters and story so I can’t not watch it, but I think the end of S3 could have been so much better.
Here’s hopin’ they take it up a notch for S4. In the meantime, dig the zombie-killing good times this VFX supercut from S3:
-ST
