One of the most interesting characters in “The Walking Dead” has been Morgan, the stick-wielding zen-pacifist who has gone on a journey from bereaved father to get where he was, a man who refused to kill the living, even though plenty needed it in the zombie apocalypse. However, in “Bury Me Here” we find that pacifism is not possible in a world where someone like Negan prospers.
Some spoilers follow.
The tragedy is actually caused by King Ezekiel who thinks that Negan and the Saviors can be appeased. His attitude makes one of his followers, named Richard, so desperate that he concocts a scheme to force a war between the Kingdom and the Saviors at the cost of his life.
The idea was to make sure that the latest tribute is short, provoking the Saviors into killing him and thus opening the eyes of Ezekiel. The plan both works and goes horribly wrong.
Young Benjamin gets killed instead,
The incident drives Morgan around the bend. He tells Carol, who thinks she can isolate herself from the world, about how Negan killed Glenn and Abraham. She is now ready, in effect, to make the Saviors war lord look at the flowers. Morgan strangles Richard in front of the Saviors and then vows to go on a killing spree walkabout, killing ever Savior he happens to come upon. Meanwhile, Ezekiel now realizes that it is time to fight.
To be sure, the episode teaches the often learned lesson that, as with Hitler, ISIS, and every other human-caused evil in the world, only one solution exists for someone like Negan.
It is time to pick up weapons, join forces with the other oppressed communities in the world gone mad, and fight.
The problem with people like Negan and his minions is that they always go too far when it comes to wielding power over others. Hitler invaded Poland, ISIS started burning people alive, Negan’s men killed people over one less cantaloupe.
A smart tyrant would have kept the pressure on just enough to keep the communities bending the knee but not so much that they are driven to leaping up and going for the throat. They never learn, but we don’t either for letting the Negans of the world prosper to start with.
