‘The Walking Dead: World Beyond’ Episode 5 Review: ‘Madman Across The Water’ – Forbes

'The Walking Dead: World Beyond'

In Sunday nights episode of The Walking Dead: World Beyond, we discover more about young Elton and his tragic past. We also get to see the teens and their two young adult escorts work together to build a boat to cross the Mississippi.

Its an episode about the group finally becoming something like an actual team, despite Felixs attempt to divide the young peoples loyalties in order to protect them, in his mind, by bringing them home instead of further and further into the wild.

Felix has been working on Elton, trying to convince him to help him convince the others to head back. He and Huck even wonder if they can just get the boys to head back, they can split up and each watch one pair. At least itd be something.

When this is discovered by Iris and the other teens, theyre not too happy. But all is mended in the end. Felix and Iris have an argument but it turns into a bonding moment. Lots of bonding moments in this show, which is nice in some ways. Nice to have some positive characters even if it can be a little hokey at times.

The Walking Dead: World Beyond

The team-building exercise comes in the form of a boat. They need to get across a very wide expanse of river and to do so they need to work together to fix the boat. Hey, at least its not a plane.

This is complicated when a lightning storm rolls in out of the blue (quite literally the lightning comes out of blue skies; Elton says its positive strikes which can hit from miles away from the actual storm). One of these bolts crashes a pole into a nearby restaurant and out pour the empties.

What follows is a mad scramble to get the boat afloat before the zombies overwhelm them and before the lightning storm makes an aquatic voyage impossible, or at least quite deadly.

Its an exciting enough segment, but one buried in yet another very slow-moving, character-centric episode.

Other than this exciting bit, the best parts are Eltons flashbacks. Weve gotten flashbacks for the majority of our characters now, with a new focal character each week. Weve learned about Hopes trauma when her mother was killed. Weve learned about Silass own tragic past and why hes such a loner. And now we have Eltons truly horrific origin story. And we learn how Hope and Eltons stories are intertwined in a tragic, if a bit ridiculously coincidental, fashion.

The Walking Dead: World Beyond

When Hope sees a picture of Eltons mother she realizes that its the same woman who shot and killer her and Iriss mom. The same pregnant woman who Hope then shot and killed. Oh snap.

The final scene this week isnt a post-credits scene or a CRM reveal. Its the arrival of someone they at first think is a zombie, but who is very clearly not. Whoever it is is holding some kind of weapon. Perhaps theyre the madman from the title. Well find out more next week.

Overall this was a decent, if still slow, episode of World Beyond. Part of me is growing to like these characters more and become more invested in their stories. Another part of me is irritated by how its all being presented. Too many narrations over sappy, dramatic orchestration. Too much teen drama (even without romantic teen drama, which I suppose is a blessing).

But Im growing fonder of our six hapless heroes. Maybe someday theyll start figuring out how to stab zombies in the skull instead of pushing and tackling them like morons. Pointy end, young whippersnappers. Stick them with the pointy end.

What did you think? Let me know on Twitter or Facebook.

You can read my latest review of Fear The Walking Dead right here. It was a surprisingly good episode.

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'The Walking Dead: World Beyond' Episode 5 Review: 'Madman Across The Water' - Forbes