Fear the Walking Dead - Season 1

[Darth Biscuit]

I love TWD and I thoroughly enjoyed Fear.  I thought they had exactly the right amount of suspense and zombie stuff for the first episode.  Also loved the intro and theme stuff.

 

[Hotsauce]

Yes the music score was better, the pacing was not what I expected.  I'm glad they didn't go gore-fest and are focused on character development. I can't wait however for when poo hits the fan. LA is going to go nuts!

[lightsout]

Good episode. It's going to be a big time slow burn this season because the finale almost has to be set around the time Rick wakes up and everything is gone. I'm guessing it'll take a month in show-time for that to happen, maybe 2.

My girlfriend hated some of the reactions of the main characters to the events, particularly those around Nick. I explained it much like Zaximus. This family has a drug addict son who is saying he saw his friend eating people. They write it off as he was hallucinating, because drugs. The step-dad doesn't want to get him in trouble by calling the cops to go there and search, and find the drugs or whatever may be there. So he goes. Finds the blood, but like his wife told him, people get hurt there all the time. Could be anything. Then she wanted to go herself once he escaped the hospital just to see what her son was living in, as a concerned/guilty feeling parent. She feels she failed her child, and that is why he is a drug addict.

The reaction to the traffic accident victim that turned was the initial shock and disbelief for the main characters, and they started connecting dots as far as Nick goes. He was talking about exactly what they saw on the video of the first walker.

They didn't believe Nick initially about Calvin because again, drug addict. They go and don't see him, but see the gun and start wondering. They see walker Calvin, and have their first personal walker experience, and it's mostly shock and surprise. Not knowing how to process it.

Basically, their reactions weren't exactly what they may be IRL for us, but as a dramatic TV show, it makes a little sense. In TWD pilot, Rick had more pure fear because he awoke after the fall of society and saw sheer horror. His reaction to walkers was pure fear and confusion. Their reaction right now is denial and shock.

To quote a Batman villain, "now is not the time for fear. That comes later".

[TheRed]

Yeah, I enjoyed it.

People are so used to the established characters from TWD, this one is probably going to take awhile to grow on some.

[Proudiddy]

I get the family with an addict angle, but I don't feel that was why they avoided calling the cops...  plus, I've never heard of cops going into an abandoned dwelling/drug den and arresting someone after the fact.  I don't think that was their concern, so that part was just awkward to me.

I also get that they're slowplaying the fall of civilization, but in TWD, it is clear that whit hit the fan quickly and things fell apart just as fast.  It never seemed like anything happened slowly in the "event."  I do believe the officials know what's going on and feel it's best to keep quiet and hope to contain it, but the way the virus spreads, and this is L.A. we're talking about, I don't see it happening this slow.  That was frustrating.  I also found it curious that they didn't play the soundbite from the trailers of the radio dj saying "5 more cases diagnosed of the mystery virus" or whatever it was...  I'm wondering if that will be used next episode?

Oh, and I wanted to point out, it looked like from the previews that Nick gets bit and the principal turns.

[lightsout]

I get the family with an addict angle, but I don't feel that was why they avoided calling the cops...  plus, I've never heard of cops going into a abandoned dwelling/drug den and arresting someone after the fact.  I don't think that was there concern, so that part was just awkward to me.

I also get that they're slowplaying the fall of civilization, but in TWD, it is clear that whit hit the fan quickly and things fell apart just as fast.  It never seemed like anything happened slowly in the "event."  I do believe the officials know what's going on and feel it's best to keep quiet and hope to contain it, but the way the virus spreads, and this is L.A. we're talking about, I don't see it happening this slow.  That was frustrating.  I also found it curious that they didn't play the soundbite from the trailers of the radio dj saying "5 more cases diagnosed of the mystery virus" or whatever it was...  I'm wondering if that will be used next episode?

Oh, and I wanted to point out, it looked like from the previews that Nick gets bit and the principal turns.

It won't hit that fast. I can't see the fall of civilization taking less than a month with how we've started. We know that kids keep skipping school from being "sick" and "flu shot" keeps getting mentioned. This one episode covered, what, 3 days? So I think next week is going to cover about 3 more. They'll start seeing signs that this is getting worse. The radio broadcast you mentioned. Other things that point towards this being really bad. Then the next episode may be a couple of days ahead of where we left off in episode 2. By episode 4, we're looking at being 2 weeks in show-time. By the finale, we're at a month and civilization has fallen.

Also, Nick is totally gonna get bit. They don't see the fear of being bit and what it does yet. Interesting though, with witnessing Calvin being a walker and only being shot in the chest, they'll be able to put together that everybody is infected already faster than Rick and gang did.

[Montsta]

I get the family with an addict angle, but I don't feel that was why they avoided calling the cops...  plus, I've never heard of cops going into an abandoned dwelling/drug den and arresting someone after the fact.  I don't think that was their concern, so that part was just awkward to me.

I also get that they're slowplaying the fall of civilization, but in TWD, it is clear that whit hit the fan quickly and things fell apart just as fast.  It never seemed like anything happened slowly in the "event."  I do believe the officials know what's going on and feel it's best to keep quiet and hope to contain it, but the way the virus spreads, and this is L.A. we're talking about, I don't see it happening this slow.  That was frustrating.  I also found it curious that they didn't play the soundbite from the trailers of the radio dj saying "5 more cases diagnosed of the mystery virus" or whatever it was...  I'm wondering if that will be used next episode?

Oh, and I wanted to point out, it looked like from the previews that Nick gets bit and the principal turns.

I could have sworn on TWD Shane or someone else mentioned how at first it was just weird stories on the news. Seems like it may have been months between the beginning of the "virus" and the end of civilization as we know it.

Without knowing what month it is in FTWD, it seems like the timeline would be something like this:

New Years: First reports coming out

MLK BDay: Reports around five states of mega-flu

Groundhog Day: YouTube videos of people getting shot by police and not dropping. Kids increasingly staying home sick from school. Events of FTWD pilot take place. 

Valentines Day: poo is getting bad. Rick Grimes gets shot around this time and slips into a coma.

St. Patrick's Day: Rick Grimes wakes up to full blown apocalypse. Hilarity ensues. 

 

Now again, I'm only speculating and only using these holidays as a frame of reference. If anyone can add concrete times or dates that are mentioned I'd gladly edit. I don't think Rick could be unattended in a room for that long with no water without dying. IV fluids can only do so much and the bag is only so big. 

[Proudiddy]

I could have sworn on TWD Shane or someone else mentioned how at first it was just weird stories on the news. Seems like it may have been months between the beginning of the "virus" and the end of civilization as we know it.

Without knowing what month it is in FTWD, it seems like the timeline would be something like this:

New Years: First reports coming out

MLK BDay: Reports around five states of mega-flu

Groundhog Day: YouTube videos of people getting shot by police and not dropping. Kids increasingly staying home sick from school. Events of FTWD pilot take place. 

Valentines Day: poo is getting bad. Rick Grimes gets shot around this time and slips into a coma.

St. Patrick's Day: Rick Grimes wakes up to full blown apocalypse. Hilarity ensues. 

 

Now again, I'm only speculating and only using these holidays as a frame of reference. If anyone can add concrete times or dates that are mentioned I'd gladly edit. I don't think Rick could be unattended in a room for that long with no water without dying. IV fluids can only do so much and the bag is only so big.

Here you go Montsta, found this from  a poster on TWD forums:

 http://www.walkingdeadforums.com/forum/f47/long-rick-coma-398.html

They don't make it clear in the TV show or the comics, but in episode 5 (Wildfire), Jenner says it is "Day 194 since wildfire was declared and 63 days since the disease abruptly went global". This would be the fourth day since Rick woke up. This means the disease has been spreading for over 6 months and has been an international pandemic for 2 months. 

When he wakes up, Rick seems to have several weeks of beard stubble on his face, and the flowers on the nightstand have been dead for at least a couple of weeks. When he meets Morgan and they go to the police station, Morgan says the gas lines have been shut down for "maybe a month". Since the gas lines are in the same town as the hospital, we can assume the hospital shut down around the same time as the gas. In episode 6 (TS-19), Jenner says he has "been in the dark [meaning he hasn't had communications with anyone else] for almost a month". It is hard to believe the CDC would collapse as quickly as a small-town hospital in Georgia, but that seems to be the case.

The problem is that none of this tells us anything about how long Rick was comatose, only how long he was comatose AFTER the hospital was overrun - about a month. The stubble on his face proves that, but the hospital (or Lori) could have been shaving him while he was in the coma right up until the hospital went down.

In the first episode (Days Gone Bye), just before Rick gets shot, he and Shane are chatting about women and relationships. That would lead me to believe the disease is not in the USA yet, as they would be preoccupied with handling the outbreak (they ARE cops, and cops would be the first responders in a zombie crisis), or at least DISCUSSING it. 

So if "wildfire" began outside the US, and only got to the US when it 'abruptly went global', Rick was probably in the coma for at least 2 months - at least one month while the hospital was still operational, and about one month after it was abandoned. If 'wildfire' began in the US, however, Rick has probably been in the coma for about 6 months - 5 months before the hospital shut down, and one month after.

In any case, we can be sure that he wasn't in the coma for more than a month or so after the hospital was abandoned. Although he WAS hooked up to an IV fluid drip, those bags only last a few hours to a day at most before going dry. Tube feeding would have stopped immediately upon the nurses leaving the hospital. 

It is true that a person can live without food for over 2 months (though they usually lose consciousness after a month or so), and possibly longer if they are in a coma; however, we die very quickly without water. Even in relatively cool weather, going as little as 3 days without fluids can be fatal, and very few people have survived more than a couple of weeks without drinking. I've never heard of anyone living for a month without water, but it might be possible. Anything more than a few weeks to a month and Rick would never have woken up.

The only other possibility is that Rick was shot AFTER the disease became a global problem, and yet he somehow heard nothing about the outbreak or the zombies until he woke up and found Morgan.

 

Idk why, but I keep thinking in one episode once Rick shows back up and Lori was trying to cut things off with Shane, for some reason I keep thinking she said Rick was only in the hospital for a few weeks.  Idk that I'm right, but I keep thinking she game a time frame and that was kind of why I was under the impression that it happened FAST.  But, I can't pinpoint when or what episode that conversation took place. 

 

Regardless, I just thought it would escalate much quicker in a place like L. A., because of the dense population and the different methods from which the walkers would be created (for instance, I was thinking due to their homeless population in heavy traffic areas, how quickly that would spread).  All that being said, i still would expect officials to keep it under wraps for a as long as possible to avoid complete breakdown and hysteria. 

[Montsta]

Thanks @Proudiddy that is solid. I'm leaning toward it was already going on when Rick got shot, but it was so remote that it might not even be a talking point between he and Shane in the car. Similar to if you heard about cases of swine flu or H1N1 on the news. You and your buddies wouldn't even give it a second thought because who thinks it's an extinction event. 

I think Rick may have been in the hospital for maybe a month and a half, 3-4 weeks of it being deserted. Much longer and I would think severe dehydration and muscle atrophy would have had him fuged up when he got up. He certainly wouldn't have been walking down some stairs or riding a bike back home. 

This also confirms my belief that Lori is a whore, and she was fuging Shane a lot sooner than I would like my wife to be fuging my best friend after my presumed death. 

[lightsout]

 

This also confirms my belief that Lori is a whore, and she was fuging Shane a lot sooner than I would like my wife to be fuging my best friend after my presumed death. 

So here I am, eating in my car...and this just caused subway tea to come out of my nose.

[Jangler]

Oh man, I wonder if Subway tea is the cause of the outbreak?

Good start, but tbh could be too much character build up for people we know are fycked.

lol Couldn't get the dead guy out of the hospital room quick enough...

[Proudiddy]

Lol @Montsta, we're about to turn this into a different thread man, but I agree.  I really disliked Lori up until the end (and then I felt bad for her) because I still was under the impression that she started effing Shane within days, if not hours, of him leaving Rick in the hospital.  Not to mention how she wouldn't let Shane leave once Rick came back and kept pitting them against each other, which basically led to Shane's death. 

[lightsout]

Oh man, I wonder if Subway tea is the cause of the outbreak?

 

M'tell you somethin'', man, you dead wrong.

[SmootsDaddy89]

Not judging this episode since it's a lot of setup and backstory. Hopefully next week will be better.