I stopped watching The Walking Dead before the last couple of episodes of season 6. I became bored, apathetic and uninterested so I stopped watching. Recently the entire show through season 8 is on Netflix and I decided to re-watch it and see how far I get this time.

After watching it again I both appreciate it more and hate it more. And I realized that I actually love to hate it. I like the way that it engages my mind in critical thinking and scrutiny over how these people deal with their circumstances.

The following should clarify my hatred for this show but it also reveals my love.

SPEARS!

Why the fuck don't they utilize spears? Or at least more swords, machetes, and other less loud options? If the walkers smell then how were they able to hide under the busses in season two when all the herd walks by? It doesn't make sense that they can only smell themselves which is why putting their stench on you makes you invisible to them. If sounds attract walkers then why you would ever just start shooting them? Just walk the fuck away or around them as they are slow as fuck. They can not run so if you go at a steady jogging pace you should be fairly safe. Or you could quickly kill them by thrusting a sharp spear into their heads one at a time.

It is not hard to learn how to use a spear and a sword for simple purposes and is manageable by even the simpler humans. But no, they go off and start shooting just for fun, wasting precious bullets. I imagine that in a world where the majority of the population is no longer capable of owning property that with a moderate amount of searching you could find all the melee weapons imaginable. Even if 10% of the population has a decent melee weapon in their house and most of the houses are already raided you would find something longer than a knife to kill the easily killed walkers.

Also, there are dozens and dozens of stores and building with ready-made melee weapons or opportunities to fashion makeshift weapons with ease. Also, why don't they manufacture body protection for bites? A little armor for the arms and neck and such would ensure less of a chance for a fatal encounter with a walker. This can not be that hard to come up with on the fly. A thick enough leather coat would at least help the situation but during all their downtime and salvaging runs they can't figure this out?

What about trenches? Why not reinforce an area by manipulating the environment to your advantage? Such as digging fucking trenches for the walkers to fall into. Or make the trenches wide enough and fill it partially with water. Or take down trees around the fort and lay them down as obstacles.

What about motherfucking distractions? They learn nearly immediately that walkers are attracted by noise so why not always carry about little noise making devices? Kids toys, electronics that still work, firecrackers would be the best or just use a fucking rock and hide. Walkers are really fucking stupid and if you could combine this tactic with getting their stench on you more regularly you would never have to deal with walkers.

Why not train everyone in your tribe to utilize all the weapons? And train them in basic medical and walker specific medical practices. And train them to avoid and defeat walkers.

How is it that after a month or two people would still be soft? After a month or two of being without a citie's transportation, communication, electrical and emergency infrastructure would render most people dead just from starvation so to have lived for that long subsisting off the leftovers and land and fighting walkers and dealing with desperate people and witnessing horrific deaths and transformations you would be either dead or hard as fuck. At least hard enough not to whimper, whine and cry when a walker came at you.

Carl died because be tried to use a knife instead of a fucking spear! Why get close when you have long sticks all around you to stab walkers with.

It is probably deliberate but there are nearly no cultural references about the past. People would talk more or less the same as they did and they would randomly bring up references and metaphors.

I realize that this show is a drama first and realistic last. It does a great job of creating suspense and drama and the action is a lot of fun. I just can't help myself from criticizing the logic and pragmatics. It reminds of Sons of Anarchy because it is a soap opera geared toward the male audience and it does a good job of getting you hooked on the characters, no matter how flawed and annoying they can be. It is a fun exercise to think about what I might do in such situations and pretend that I might do well.

I decided to write a couple of fan fiction stories. Check out the links below and let me know what you think about them.

https://joesnotesblog.com/blog/2018/10/7/30-days-of-fiction-day-25

https://joesnotesblog.com/blog/30-days-of-fiction-day-26