In This Life
We begin the season 1 finale of The Walking Dead: World Beyond with Leo missing his girls while sitting with Dr. Lyla Bellshaw. He chuckles, believing that his girls are getting into trouble. Well, that trouble comes in the form of Hope holding Huck up at gunpoint and asking just who the hell she is. Huck eventually admits that she’s “one of them” and remains adamant that she’s on her side. Hope knows that she’s been listed as expendable though but as they talk, a group of zombies show after being attracted by Hope’s gunshot. With Huck held up at gunpoint, Hope is put in a difficult position moving forward. Huck tells her to put the gun down so they can fight together and eventually she agrees to do just that. Back to back, they fight off the zombies before them. After thwarting the threat – and losing her pistol in the scuffle – Huck opens up to Hope about what’s really going on. Their father was never in trouble and the messages sent were actually done so by Huck. This was the easiest way to get her to leave the University in a bid to see if she was strong enough to get out of camp and tackle the world. Huck wanted Hope to see what’s worth fighting for – a civilization built by the Civic Republic. Huck admits to intentionally trying to split the group up to save them by killing Tony and Percy. As they keep walking, Huck scoffs and tells Hope she “has no idea who she is.” Interspersed around all these big plot reveals are flashes with Leo which helps to reinforce how Hope is the alleged “chosen one” of sorts. She apparently has a great brain and after cracking the CRM code, Huck is convinced that she’s the one who could make a difference going forward. And yet none of this actually makes sense when you stop and think about it. Anyway, more of that in the episode review portion. On we go… Silas meanwhile happens to be all alone until he notices Elton outside, drawn to the smoke the former caused from an upturned barbecue. Percy’s there too and the trio finally meet back up. There, they learn that Silas is definitely innocent and Huck is the one responsible for shooting Percy and killing Tony. On the back of this, they look at a map on the table and try to work out the best course of action going forward,. Unfortunately they’re rudely interrupted by armed guards arriving, drawn to that very same smoke that drew Elton and Percy there earlier on. Back at the house, Iris and Felix discuss Hope leaving and how out of character it was for her. After getting Felix’s leg patched up, Iris decides they should investigate the one room Huck told them bodies were piled up in. Eventually they open the door and find the place full of medical supplies. They could have used all this to fix up Felix, Iris realizes, and now it dawns on her that Huck is not on their side. For now though they collect up what they can to get the car moving again. That evening, Felix and Iris rock up at the house Hope and Huck happen to be in. Huck eventually shows her face and greets them like everything is okay but Iris remains suspicious. Hope vouches for Huck though and for now, they all seem to be on the same page…until Felix grabs her gun and demands Huck tell the truth. Eventually Huck drops the pretense and tells them she’s working with the CRM and they, in turn, want Hope. She apologizes for betraying them and grabs Felix, throwing him down the stairs while knocking a lantern over and igniting the place. Both of them fight and trade blows while Hope and Iris eventually find Huck’s gun. The fight spills over outside where Hope puts a gun up to her own head, threatening to fire unless Huck stops. Eventually Hope tells Iris and Felix to leave. It turns out she’s “the asset” and after all this, she’s going to go with Huck willingly to visit Elizabeth. Elsewhere, Percy, Silas and Elton all band together to find a way out their predicament. Eventually they make it to a fence on the outskirts of town where Silas decides to sacrifice himself to save the others. Slicing his hand, he prepares to leave after calling Elton his best friend. He gives himself up to the officers as Elton and Percy scurry away. Leo and Lyla’s various scenes continue too, as they both suspect they’re being lied to by the military. After some meaningless conversations about wine and life, they decide to concoct a plan together but quite what that is remains to be seen. Meanwhile, Hope and Huck arrive at a large field where Elizabeth greets them from a helicopter. Despite bringing Hope back to them, Elizabeth is worried about Huck’s judgment and allegiance going forward, especially given the “expendables” are still alive. As the episode closes out, we learn that actually the asset is split into two – according to Hope anyway – and both Hope and Iris are assets in their own way and as they’ve shown across this season (apparently, I certainly haven’t seen anything to show this) they’re smart enough to fight off the threat of Elizabeth and the others.
The Episode Review
After 10 episodes of idiotic characters and forced drama, one thing has become clear – World Beyond’s unwitting desire to stay on the straight and narrow finally shows off how ridiculous this entire premise is. So the plan all along was for Huck to bring Hope out into the open to see what the world is worth fighting for. Alone. Surrounded by dumb (Silas), dumber (Elton) and dumbest (Iris) as they struggle to even take out one zombie early on. That’s before mentioning Hope killing a zombie alone in the middle of the night. So what if she died during this fight? If this “asset” is supposed to be a genius and the chosen one who’s so important, why was she thrown off on such a convoluted quest? And let’s get to the big point here over exactly why she’s so smart. Apparently as a kid she put a computer together. That’s it. That’s literally the crux of the issue. Without getting too geeky, it’s really not difficult to put a computer together. It’s literally a case of slotting and screwing things in – the motherboard slides in, the fan can admittedly be tricky but the rest – RAM, graphics card etc. really isn’t that difficult to figure out. And the code? This probably could have been deciphered by anyone with an analytical brain for numbers. Iris couldn’t figure it out but Hope’s weak attempt at the end of calling her “the other half of an asset” doesn’t do the show any favours either. But the damage has already been done with this one. World Beyond has been leaking viewers every week and this finale may just be the final nail in the coffin. While the sacrifice with Silas and the sub-plot involving the three boys was quite good this episode, given the limited screen-time it received, the rest of the episode completely falls flat. It’s such a shame too as there’s definitely potential here but it’s squandered completely in the wake of trying to be clever and throwing another twist in for the sake of it. Ah well, we’ve got season 2 coming up now and if the fate of the future rests on Hope building a computer, perhaps humanity deserves to be doomed.
