Review of “The Walking Dead” season 11

Since the beginning, the Commonwealth plot has been a complete jumble. The neighbourhood is going through an identity crisis. Is this an authoritarian government that quickly represses dissenters, or is it a semi-liberal society that shares many of the same fundamental liberties as the United States? There are competing forces at play here, with Lance Hornsby, a renegade agent, and Pamela, the head of the Commonwealth, making cunning moves like The Walking Dead behind her. Yet why? I’m perplexed by Hornsby’s motivations and actions since I don’t fully get the politics and governmental setup of the Commonwealth itself.

Episode 17

The Walking Dead, In the meanwhile, the Commonwealth enthusiastically hires Connie, an investigative journalist, when she arrives with the other survivors, despite seeming totalitarian and using Imperial Stormtroopers to keep people in line. An investigative journalist would only work outside, killing zombies, if I were the ruler of such a town. You don’t light matches and pour gasoline thus near to the kindling and then pretend shocked when a fire breaks out.

When a mystery exposé without a byline surfaces, the people of the Commonwealth demonstrate in the streets. Pamela makes an effort to convince them that the accusations made against her son Sebastian are all falsehoods, but for a while she lets the demonstrations go on. She also inquires with Yumiko about her journalist friend’s knowledge of the author of the piece.

All of this is confusing and odd to me. Again, if I were a post-apocalyptic ruler, I would have every single newspaper staffer detained and brought in for interrogation the instant an item like this was published. Every new resident and every person with links to the newspaper staff would be gathered up by me. I would use my fascist security forces to put an end to any street protests right away.

I can’t help but sneer at the protesters themselves in the meanwhile. Would residents of a tightly controlled, totalitarian survival colony take to the streets to demonstrate? Sincere uncertainty exists. These are individuals who, by all rights, ought to be quite safely under the control of the powerful since they are fully aware that the outside world is dangerous and that the rule of law is the only thing keeping everyone within safe.

I’m not suggesting that no one would protest, but the possibility that this piece would mobilise the entire neighbourhood to demonstrate is quite slim—especially when we consider how few people actively demonstrate against government wrongdoing and the myriad tragedies we witness in our daily lives.

We are allowed to do so, and it is doubtful that anyone who protests in the modern United States would suffer serious repercussions. But in the Commonwealth, it seems far more plausible that a swift, ruthless crackdown would take place, making prospective demonstrators much more terrified of the repercussions, which might easily include exile to the outside world and the legions of the undead who waiting outside the protection of the city walls.

None of that is depicted in this. The Commonwealth is weak and feckless. Pamela finally disperses the crowds after curfew as a response. Only Hornsby is behaving in a real dictatorial manner, and he is keeping it a secret. The actual power structure in the situation is too poorly established for our heroes to know how they might use Pamela to stop him. Who has greater power? The obvious choice would seem to be Mercer and Pamela, but Hornsby may have other plans in mind.