Walking Dead: What Lies Ahead

     The long 10 month wait for the return of The Walking Dead is finally over.  And, boy, was it worth the wait.  What Lies Ahead was able to capture everything that makes The Walking Dead one of the best shows on television.  It was gory, suspenseful, gory, emotional, gory, thought provoking and... did I mention gory?  Not five minutes into the show the writers have the viewers hearts in their throats and don't let off the pedal, even as the show comes to an end.  After an hour and a half of hiding under cars, hunting lost children, mutilating zombies, arguing amongst survivors, where left with a cliff hanger that makes me wish I had let a few episodes build in my TIVO before I started watching.  Almost everything about this episode was perfectly crafted, making the long wait worth it.
     If there was anything that bothered me about the episode it was how much it seemed to rely on the gore at times.  I realize that most zombie fans are tuning in just for the gore, I mean what else is a zombie story if not extremely gory, but I always thought what made the comic special was how it dealt with issues away from the zombies and I've always believed in the premise that what is not seen is scarier then what is.  At times it seemed like the show makers were going out of their way to make the scenes as gory as possible and as much as I understand that this helps depict the horrible circumstances these people now find themselves in, it just felt gratuitous.  I would like to see the show dial back the gore and rely more on great story telling and old fashioned suspense.
     Not that there wasn't plenty of great story telling in this episode.  The argument between Dale and Andrea and the survivor's doubts about Rick's decision to leave Sophia are both classic The Walking Dead.  I've always felt the show is best when it deals with the moral dilemmas a zombie apocalypse would cause rather then just killing zombies.  Both these scenes did a great job of just that.
     What Lies Ahead is a great start to season two.  Lets hope it's more of the same going forward.