SPOILER ALERT: This post breaks down the events that conclude Season 2, Part 1 of “The Walking Dead”. If don’t wish to learn about these events here, please skip this post.

Season 2 of The Walking Dead on AMC has reached its half-way point. On November 27, 2011 the mid-season finale, “Pretty Much Dead Already” aired and its final moment provided a chilling turning point for a group still clinging to the hope of a normal life and happy future. As a writing fan, I thought it wrapped up so many aspects of this season so well that I couldn’t help but laud it here.

In the beginning of Season 2, under the attack of a band of zombies on the highway, 12-year-old Sophia runs into the woods to escape her attackers and gets separated from the group. The group takes shelter at a local farm, seemingly isolated from the zombie hoards outside its gates, while they search the surrounding area for the missing girl.

As the mid-season finale nears, we learn that the farm’s old barn is filled with the zombified relatives and neighbors of the landowner, Herschel. He believes them to be curable and refuses to cause them any physical harm. While Rick tries to peacefully negotiate with Herschel, in hopes that his people will be allowed to stay long term, Shane snaps at this news and decides to eliminate the zombie threat.

In the episode’s final moments, Herschel watches in horror as his undead family and friends are freed from the barn to be executed by Shane and the others. With over a dozen bodies littering the ground, a final monster emerges from the darkness: Sophia. Rick steps forward, revolver in hand, and does what no one else can bring themselves to do, delivering her fatal blow.

This was a great final moment to conclude the first half of Season 2, bringing together so many of the elements of good television writing that I admire:

1. It was unexpected. Both for the audience and the characters, this revelation was a surprising reversal.
2. It answers the big question of this season. This season’s events have been in pursuit of the answer to the question of Sophia’s whereabouts. And the answer to that question was steeped in dramatic irony. Not only do they find her, she’s been a hundred yards from their tents for some time.
3. It forces characters to question their convictions. Shane and the others have to challenge their philosophy that the zombies are not people, when they come face to face with one of their own.
4. It forces our main character to take a bold action. With no one else willing to step forward, Rick shows his leadership and allegiance to the group by owning Sophia’s terrible end.
5. It leads to more questions that will springboard us into the next season. How can this group now reconcile life with Hershel, having disregarded his wishes and killed people he once loved and hoped to save?

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