'The Walking Dead' Recap: 'Remember'-ing How to Live and To Survive

Beardless Rick. Clean shaven, freshly showered, ears recently lowered Rick. That’s what “Remember” was all about. Once the gang is welcomed with open arms into Alexandria by Deanna, their former congresswoman leader, they have to reacclimate themselves to civilized life as they try to figure out if Alexandria is more than meets the eye. “Remember” certainly was not the most tense episode of The Walking Dead but it puts the show into a territory it has not been in quite sometime -- and, depending on Alexandria, may have never been before.

It’s a testament to The Walking Dead that after the many years on the road, trudging between failed safe houses and settlements, the audience is just as distrustful of Alexandria as many of the characters. Everyone has been conditioned to believe the worst out of strangers and with Rick and company entering into the most normal community yet seen on the show it’s hard for the audience to not be leery of everything in this seeming utopia. Sure, Rick worriedly launching off after Carl and Judith when they disappear around the corner seems like a bit of overkill but it certainly makes sense for where the character has been. Likewise, Jessie’s husband smoking on his front porch in the middle of the night spikes your neck hairs up thinking there is a sinister, hidden underbelly of Alexandria. Hopefully there isn’t an Alexandrian underbelly but for the audience to immediately suspect one with something so, usually, innocuous as someone smoking on their front porch shows just how conditioned the audience is to expecting the worst.

But Alexandria is, at this point in time, perfect. A self-sustaining community built just before the apocalypse, Alexandria has reinforced walls, solar panels, and its own water system. There’s electricity, huge food stores, and more than enough houses to go around. Deanna was sent there by the army at the beginning of the outbreak and was slowly joined by other survivors, though she admits Rick and his gang are the first they’ve accepted since those first few days. The people who live there are all given jobs -- Carol quickly becomes cook for the elderly -- and contribute to the well being of the community. Deanna’s own husband was responsible for designing the well fortified walls.

Since Alexandria is such a utopia, it means it and its residences have been largely untouched by both zombies and other survivors. They are weak, or at least would be, against any sort of onslaught. This is echoed by Carl, Carol, and Daryl and that they are worried this new cushy lifestyle would ultimately weaken them, as well. This thought seems to come a little too quickly after only spending a day or so in Alexandria but it makes sense. It also, of course, gives them a reason that Alexandria may not work for them other than not being able to rejoin a civilized society -- which would be more interesting.

The weakness of the society is exemplified when a few of our survivors go out on a supplies run with two of the Alexandrians (Aiden and some other guy), who are in charge of making these runs. The Alexandrians have no sense of the danger the walkers or the outside world pose as they reveal they have strung up a zombie to punish it for killing some of their fellow men. This quickly gets out of hand once they realize the zombie has gotten free and the Alexandrians tell Glenn and Tara not to kill the zombie and just try to corral it, which does not go well. Once Glenn kills the zombie there is a kerfuffle back in the settlement over Glenn disobeying Aiden’s orders and Glenn saying they almost got everyone killed. Aiden ends up getting cold cocked, which Deanna feels is justly deserved. In the fallout of this incident Deanna tells Rick and Michonne they will be town constables and Rick, after Carol lets him know she’s worried about everyone becoming weak, replies that they will take Alexandria if the others are too weak to survive. Fairly shocking for the once all-inclusive Rick.

There are other aspects of this episode, like Daryl not being able to settle in, everyone sleeping under the same roof the first few nights, and Carol at least pretending to fall back into the helpless housewife she was in Season 1, that were interesting moments from the episode. But mainly “Remember” was the ultimate table setting episode. Alexandria still presents many mysterious (Enid anyone?) and different challenges that The Walking Dead hasn’t addressed in quite some time. Hopefully Alexandria will last for a while and won’t end up destroyed like everything else.