WARNING: Below's recap of The Walking Dead obviously contains spoilers from the season four premiere episode. Do not read further if you haven't watched and don't want to be spoiled!
Welcome back, walkers! We've missed you and your decaying bodies, blank stares and need to eat anything in your path.
Season four of The Walking Dead kicked off tonight with the premiere episode titled "30 Days Without an Accident", and that number was knocked down to zero by the time the end credits rolled. But at least we got a cool montage of zombies literally falling from the skies! Well, it was actually from the ceiling, but still. It was pretty cool.
Rick the Farmer: Rick (Andrew Lincoln) is adjusting to life in the prison, which looks pretty good right now. He's growing crops, raising farm animals and according to Hershel (Scott Wilson), pretty soon there will be enough food inside the prison to keep everyone fed without anyone having to venture outside the fence for supplies. When Rick goes to check on the snares outside the prison, he runs into a woman who begs for his help. She wants Rick to take her and her husband back with them. Rick agrees, but only after he meets her husband and asks him three questions.
When he gets back to her camp, the woman attacks Rick and he realizes that her husband is a zombie and she lured Rick there to kill him for food. After Rick swats away her feeble attack attempt, the woman stabs herself, saying she wants to be with her husband. Rick watches her die, and then heads back to the prison in search of therapy, i.e. Hershel.
Blame It on the (Zombie) Rain: Daryl (Norman Reedus) wants to lead a group of people outside the prison to search for supplies. Carol (Melissa McBride) tells him that she can't spare that many people because a lot of folks are on zombie-stabbing duty, meaning that a group of men and women stab and kill zombies through the fence. She also notes that there are more zombies lately, and they aren't spreading out around the fence anymore.
Daryl, Glenn (Steven Yeun), Michonne (Danai Gurira), Tyreese (Chad Coleman), Bob (Larry Gilliard, Jr.), and Zach (Kyle Gallner) all head out to what appears to be an Big Lots turned army safe haven turned abandoned death zone. Sasha (Sonequa Martin-Green) drew out the walkers a couple days ago by blasting music, so the building is all clear for some much-needed shopping. Or so they think. The zombies are actually on the roof of the building, along with a crashed helicopter and lots of blood.
Bob is in the wine and beer section and obviously battling his alcoholism and impulse to grab some booze. He takes a bottle of wine and then puts it back, but then he manages to knock the whole shelf over on top of him. That noise draws the attention of the roof zombies, who start walking. As the group tries to free Bob, zombies start falling through soft spots in the roof. It's literally raining walkers! Awesome.
Everyone gets to killing, with Bob still trapped beneath the shelf. Daryl and Zach eventually rescue him and he scrambles out, but Zach is bitten on the calf by a zombie, dragged under the shelf and killed. Damnit, Bob! This is all your fault.
Daryl is tasked with telling Beth (Emily Kinney) that Zach died, and she takes it like a champ. She also has a sign that says "30 Days Without Accident" in her room, but she has to take away the 3 to make it zero days. Bummer city.
No Bun in the Oven: Maggie (Lauren Cohan) tells Glenn that she is not pregnant, and while he is relieved, she admits that she wants that kind of life for then in the future. So she's not knocked up...for now.
Poor Carl: Good ol' Carl (Chandler Riggs) is stuck between being a kid and wanting to get out of the prison to help gather supplies like a man. When some kids are waving at the walkers outside the fence and giving them names, Carl yells at them. The walkers don't have names, they aren't alive, and they kill people, he insists. He's not wrong.
Later in the day, Carl wanders into the library for Carol's storytime, which turns into a demonstration for the kids on how to use knives. When Carol sees Carl, she asks him not to tell Rick what she's doing. Patrick (Vincent Martella), one of Carl's friends, tells Carol he's sick and asks if he may he be excused. Ruh-roh.
Sure enough, at the end of the episode, Patrick stumbles from his room looking pale as hell, and he makes it to the bathroom before passing out underneath the shower. A few moments later it's revealed that Patrick is now a zombie. The prison team has been infiltrated by a walker, and they don't know it yet!
What did you guys think of the premiere episode? How cool was that raining zombie scene? Let's chat in the comments, yes?