For the sake of that show, Rick needs to be the one who dies.

rickRick SHOULD be the one who dies.

Now that the sting has worn off the craptastic season finale of TWD, let’s stop , put our writing hats on, and look this thing over.

Someone died.  In the comic book it was Glenn, but that don’t mean much since Carol died in the comic far earlier.  So, anyone is fair game and I say it should be Rick. I know it won’t be for a bunch of reasons, but it SHOULD be…for the sake of the show itself.

This show has turned into a boring, tedious , unending circle of the survivors picking up the pieces, finding someplace safe, having half assed internal issues with some contingent getting separated , then a massive external threat pops up in which they somehow persevere but are once again adrift, they pick up the pieces…rinse repeat.  I wouldn’t call it lazy writing exactly, more a case of writing yourself into a corner. With the dynamic these characters have with each other , the world they live in AND Rick being the glue that holds them together, that’s about all you have to work with. Unless you want to turn it into a sitcom with an occasional zombie getting lose in the yard.

You kill off Rick and suddenly the show is wide open.  Now when people wander off…there is actual concern that they never come back, because they have no real reason to believe there will be any core to come back to, without Rick and his asinine half time speeches holding people together.  There could be drama in them determining a new leader, characters could grown into the role simultaneously, creating tension.  An external threat now has several paths of intrigue, will they overcome? Will they split up? Will the new leader rise to the occasion or need to be replaced?  Everything becomes far more interesting if Rick is gone.

AND…

Rick is the only character that warrants the dramatic pause, who’s death won’t lose viewers.  If you Kill Glenn or Carl you take away any semblance of hope.  Both of them represent hope for the future to the viewers. If either of them die the world of TWD just becomes a miserable , mean, unpleasant place.  A place people will stop going to every week, because -who wants to be bummed out every Sunday night?  If you kill Maggie…people will get sick to their stomachs and probably turn off the t.v. as soon as they find out. If you kill Darrell your female viewership will drop by about 75%.  They ain’t going to kill Michone then because people will really start to wonder out loud about how many Black Characters get killed off ( although why no one but me ever brings up that if you are a blonde female on that show you might as well start digging your own grave, I can only scratch my head about)

If you Kill Sasha, Rosita, Arron, or Abraham..it’ll seem like a lot to do about nothing, these are 2nd tier characters and any of their deaths would be a cop out.  If you kill Eugene people might not be upset but you will take a lot of elements away from that show.  He is unpredictable without having to act out of character.  A character like him gives a writer a lot of tools to work with.

But Rick…no one will miss Rick.  Let’s be honest, he’s the lead character because he’s the lead Character.  He’s not all that likeable anymore, he’s not interesting, and he’s never going to do anything we haven’t already seen him do.  Carl ain’t going to miss him, it’s his fault he lost an eye, got shot in the chest, and Carl ain’t ever going to get to be a normal contributing member of the group, complete with the ability to earn his keep and have his voice heard, with Rick around.  “His” daughter sure ain’t gonna miss him, I think we’ve seen the Governor spend more quality time with his zombie daughter than Rick has spent with his, and the Governor never tried to feed his daughter crusher up acorns. For all she knows, her dad is whichever black guy is currently taking care of her.  I guess Michone might miss him, but that’ll give us some nice touching scenes with her and Carl.

Rick should be the one who dies.  It’ll be the big -holy sh*t- moment that we’ve been promised, it’ll help the direction of the show, and people will forget all about him in a few episodes.  If you like, you can have him come back occasionally as some hallucination Carl sees..with the one eye he has left, thanks to Rick teaching that a-hole kid how to use a gun.

When Douglas isn’t complaining he and his work can be found here

www.arseniclullabies.com

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2 Comments

  1. Funny, I came to the same conclusion about a week ago after a conversation with my boss. Rick has done some pretty unforgivable things this last season, like killing off the supposed bad guys without doing any research first. Sure they rurned out to be bad, but really he’s not much better than the supposed bad guys. Plus, as you say, it’d be that holy shit moment the show could really use. Too bad it’ll never happen.

    • yeah, as far as “character development” they’ve pretty much taken that guy in every direction there is at this point. Kill him off and let the show grow. If you kill him in the season premier, two seasons from now more people will still be talking about how they miss Shane than Rick.

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