This episode underscores everything that I’ve been saying about the first half of the fifth season: it’s meant to take all the “lessons” since the destruction of the prison and crystallize them into a single message.  And that message is: Trust No One.  Whether it’s the promise of sanctuary at Terminus, or the relative safety offered by Father Gabriel, Eugene’s “mission”, or Dawn’s enclave in Atlanta, all of them are laced with false promises of purpose and safety.  And ultimately, as the showdown with Dawn’s people looms in the mid-season finale, Team Grimes is left to ponder if there is anything like peace left in this world.

 

Ostensibly there is a point to all of it, not just a way to continue piling on the hopelessness again and again.  I would even argue that the encounter with Dawn’s enclave is one iteration too far; there’s a reason why, in the source material, the story took a decidedly different turn immediately after the fight with the Hunters and the revelation that Eugene had been lying the whole time.  Team Grimes was at a complete loss of direction at that point.  What does Dawn’s group really bring to the table?

 

What concerns me slightly is that Team Grimes seems unlikely to be a united front by the time the next story arc comes along, which would needlessly complicate the narrative.  Granted, I’m assuming that The Community is on the horizon, but for the sake of the series, it almost has to be.  It’s as radical and necessary a shift as the prison/Woodbury was, and it turns the entire story on its head.  The alternative is some kind of mixed bag with part of the group perhaps encountering The Community, and the rest still dealing with variations on the same old theme.

 

I’m hoping that this is just the writers getting the road trips out of their system, so that the shift to the next anticipated story arc with The Community can get the attention it deserves.  There’s an argument to be made that once this corner is turned, the show is on its slow march to its endpoint.  The Community kicks off a series of solid story arcs that culminate in a definitive manner, followed by a time jump that might give the showrunners a roadmap for the final few seasons.  It may be a bit early to start looking at the show’s endpoint, given the popularity of the franchise, but suffice to say that the material covered in the first 4.5 seasons is roughly halfway to the possible endpoint I’m referencing.  And eight or nine seasons is a solid run.

 

Some may ask: does the series have to adhere so closely to the source material at this point?  The argument is valid, yet the central problem remains.  The source material progresses in such a way that there are clear sets of dynamics that are explored over the course of the story.  The television series is pointing towards that very direction, so if they veer off onto some other path, it’s going to have to be an equally strong conceptual shift.  And right now, I’m not seeing that happening.