The Walking Dead: Season 2 Episode 3 “Save the Last One”

Episode 3

"Save the Last One"

"Got bit.

 Fever hit.
World gone to shit.

Might as well quit"

– Tree Walker's Suicide Note

In this latest episode "Save the Last One" we get back to the faster pace of the first episode and away from the long, heartfelt, but gore free dialogue which makes me and I'm a lot of other people out there very happy. This episode seems to take its title from the "Last" child being Carl currently still alive, as Sophia has yet to be found and could quite possibly be dead. There's also a lot of character development going on at both the RV and the farmhouse with Maggie and Glenn meeting and bonding over religion and grief and Andrea and Daryl bonding in the woods over 'opting out' and life and death and so on. By the end of the episode it had seemed that everything was wrapped up nicely, sacrifices were made, lives were saved, until the producers dropped a huge twist in the last five minutes which made jaw drop right into my lap.

*** Warning Spoilers***

The episode starts out with an ambiguous Shane scene where he's taking a bath and giving himself a haircut. Slightly confusing as the hot water and electricity give of a pre-Walker time or maybe he finally made back to the farm. Either way it was certainly not the present as Shane and Otis have yet to come back from the high school and sure enough it cut backs to Shane and Otis running for their lives through the dark, dank corridors of a high school. Meanwhile overlayed over this is Rick's voice telling an apparently frequently told story of Shane's playful antics (which I might say includes the theft of a car and creative vandalism). Otis and Shane manage to get stuck on some kind of scaffolding or gym equipment where Otis decides to distract the Walkers by running off while Shane escapes through a tiny window and making a 20ft drop to 'safety'.

I gotta say this about Otis, he has balls or is extremely stupid (knowing men probably some combination of the two) and whilst he manages to divert almost all the walkers attention onto him we can plainly see he's not light on his feet and has absolutely no stamina. I also believe the producers of the show really fleshed out (no pun intended) his character from what I can remember of his character he wasn't the most impressive of characters, was made out to be kind of stupid and I think even his crazy wife had more character than him. At least in the show you can see his character as a real man who hasn't really come to terms with the world his living in (using guns to hunt, blubbering like a baby when he shot Carl), but none the less a decent, big hearted man who dove straight into this suicide mission to redeem himself and to save Carl. Otis' distraction works and Shane manages to break a window and get ready to jump which turns out too long as a Walker manages to grab onto to him, messing up his landing and injuring his leg in the process.

Back at the RV Daryl can't sleep between the noise of Andrea constantly fiddling with guns and Carol crying in his sleep so he goes to take a walk and continue his search for Sophia at night and Andrea decides to come with. Their search ultimately turns up nothing, but a hanging Zombie in a tree with the above mentioned suicide note, his legs stripped to the bone from where Walkers fed on his legs and Andrea swaps a question for an arrow to end his suffering, the question being if Andrea still wanted to kill herself. Even though there's very little Zombie killing or much action we do get to delve into Daryl's past with his story of how as a young child he got lost in the woods for 9 days and how he managed just fine, even made it back home by himself because no one was looking out for him. Back at the RV Dale gives Andrea back her gun and apologises for his old man meddling and Andrea tries to forgive him, only time will tell really if she actually does.

At the farmhouse Glenn and T-dog arrive and meet Maggie again as they're escorted into the farmhouse where they see Carl for the first time since his incident and as they go get T-dog's cut treated Hershel tells Lori and Rick that if Shane and Otis don't come back soon they may have to operate on Carl without the respirator which means he could die or not do the surgery at all and let him slip away quietly from blood loss. Lori becomes conflicted at this and argues with Rick that maybe it wouldn't be so bad if Carl was to die; at least he would be away from the nightmare that is now their reality. Rick can't accept this argument especially as it was Lori who begged Jenna the scientist to give them to chance to just keep going. Carl wakes up briefly before going into a seizure talking about that damn deer which means signals Carl chances of surviving getting lower and lower. This is then well contrasted with Shane and Otis' own fight for survival as they try and escape the mass horde of Walkers on their tail, Shane too injured to walk faster than a limp as they try and make it back to the truck before it's too late.

Jumping back to Carl's bedside the time has come to decide to operate without the respirator, Lori finally gives her consent and everyone rushes around to get Carl ready for surgery. Just when they're about to get started the sound of a truck coming closer to the farmhouse alerts them and everyone rushes out to see Shane limping from the car with all the medical supplies intact. Shane, obviously in shock tells the story of how Otis died off screen trying to cover Shane and eventually giving his life so he could distract the Walkers long enough for Shane to get away. The people at the farmhouse are, understandably devastated at losing one of their group members, but they still manage to get the job done and Carl pulls through after his surgery.

Meanwhile Shane avoids Otis' grieving wife Patricia and goes to take a shower and so we loop back into the scene in which we started in at the beginning of the episode except as he strips the camera focuses on a hunk of missing hair, scratch marks and bruises that seem to tell a different tale of how Otis really died. We are than pushed back into the past with Otis and Shane running for their lives, low on bullets Shane looks at Otis mumbles an apology and then promptly shoots him in the leg! Otis not going down as easily as first though scuffles with Shane as he tries to take the backpack off Otis' back which explains the missing hair and marks. Shane then leaves Otis injured on the ground as he's slowly eaten alive by Walkers giving Shane enough time to get to the truck and escape. Whether this was proof of Shane's growing darkness similar to his erratic actions in the comics of if it was just a hard decision made out of love for Carl hopefully will be explored more in future.

Either way a great ending to a excellent episode!!!