‘The Walking Dead 4×02: Infected’ Review [Spoiler-Free]

Stars: Andrew Lincoln, Lauren Cohan, Norman Reedus, Emily Kinney, Chandler Riggs, David Morrissey, Danai Gurira, Steven Yeun | Written by Angela Kang | Directed by Guy Ferland

The following review will contain spoilers from the previous week’s episode.

Last week’s premiere episode of the fourth season of this zombie apocalypse drama show gained over 20 million viewers to make it the highest rated non-sports cable television premiere of all time. That is some achievement, and it isn’t difficult to see why, the episode itself was a great one and the show just continues to grow in popularity due to its well drawn characters, slow burn storylines and explosive payoffs. Not to mention the zombie violence, yeah, there’s still some of that in there too.

The first episode introduced us to new characters and re-acquainted us with familiar ones, such as Daryl, Rick, Carl, Carol and the rest of the gang that was left standing at the end of season three. We found the survivors still residing in the prison though they seemed to have things much more organised than when we last saw them. There are crops being grown, animals being bred for food, more survivors than before, some of whom patrol the fences with pokey stick type things to ward off the flesh eating hordes. We all know how little zombies like pointy things. It seemed like all was well in the Rick Grimes lead camp.

However, we saw that Rick isn’t quite stable in the old noggin’ as he followed a survivor he stumbled on whilst out hunting and ended up being pounced upon and almost stabbed by this woman who he had been attempting to save. He watched as the woman buried a knife in her own guts and died in front of him. It opens up doors as to where Rick is inside his head at the moment.

We also saw a scavenger hunt in a derelict supermarket go awry as the group of survivors, including Daryl, found themselves surrounded by a large number of brain eaters with rumbly-tummies.

Episode two picks up where we left off in the premiere, and there is a walker loose in the prison. The episode begins with us seeing this former survivor walking the halls of the cells and the chaos that follows.

This episode is another excellent one and provides us with some nice back-story to existing characters and makes of point of showing us that the prison isn’t as secure as we might have hoped. We follow Rick and Carl as they question their positions among the group, and Carol, who is attempting to teach the children in the group how to handle themselves physically against the threats around them.

There’s plenty of gore once again in this episode which will certainly appeal to those who didn’t feel like there was enough in previous seasons.

A top-notch second episode then, with a lot happening in its forty-plus minute running time. It answers a few questions, opens some new ones and provides plenty of exciting developments. This season has opened well, perhaps better than any yet, and I’m excited to see what we get in episode three.