The Walking Dead Episode 205, "Chupacabra"

The Walking Dead Season 2, Episode 5: Chupacabra

TV Rating

TV-14

ZPAA rating

Late teen and up

Gore level

7 out of 10--A couple of zombies who wind up with impaled heads; Daryl makes a necklace of zombie ears; Daryl makes dinner from a squirrel he shot, including his bloody fingers and blood dripping from his mouth; head wound to a main character; one character goes through much of the episode with an arrow shot through the gut, which is eventually pulled out.

Other offensive content

Lots of sex talk about previous affairs; brief discussion of women's menstrual cycles synchronizing (I can't believe I just had to write that!); offensive language; callous attitudes toward the lives of living humans; Daryl has a recurring vision of his brother who was left behind in Atlanta; flashback with napalming of the streets of Atlanta during the initial outbreak (though this is only seen from the far distance); human on human shooting (from a distance, so it doesn't qualify as gore).

How much zombie mythology/content

Nothing new in this episode, though the surprise ending isn't a surprise for readers of the comic books. You may ask yourself, "What's up with the kooky title of the episode?" Well, apparently Daryl had an incident with the titular monster in the past. Read about it on wikipedia (the monster, not Daryl's involvement with it).

How much fun

There were some humorous moments. I sure hope they meant to be funny about some characters having to sit at the "children's table" during the dinner scene. These are late teens and 20-year olds, for goodness' sake!

Synopsis & Review

The search for Sophia goes on, though some people begin to doubt the value of continuing the search. Rick and Shane have a long discussion about it, with Shane advocating the pragmatical approach that there's more risk to everybody being spread out thin during the search than the reward of finding Sophia will justify. Rick still sticks to his humanist guns and wants to continue the search, despite the cost.

As if to emphasize the cost, Daryl gets injured while he is searching and struggles to return to the farm. He undergoes a trial that has him questioning his position in the group and his value to the rest of them. His character has a real chance of becoming more interesting than Rick.

Glenn has a hard time working out his relationship to Maggie. His blundering through romantic encounters would make for a funny romantic comedy, but here they involve a lot of risk, though there's still a lot of humor, mostly at his expense. They both show more than we've seen before. I mean character-wise.

We find out that Lori is indeed pregnant but hasn't told anyone except for Glenn, who asked her point blank since he got her the pregnancy test during the last episode. She is conflicted about what to do about it, especially as she looks on at her recuperating son. I am interested to see how this will play out in the television series. In the comic book, Shane is dead when she finds out and there's unresolved ambiguity about whether Shane or Rick is the father.

Tensions are mounting a little bit with Rick and Hershel. So far it's been civil, but it seems likely, especially after the surprise ending of this episode, things will come to a head very, very soon.