TV Review: Fear The Walking Dead (Season 1, Episode 5)

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

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EPISODE 5: Cobalt

THE HOOK: Daniel takes a soldier hostage in hopes of finding out where their people were taken, but he soon discovers a darker secret.

The following contains MAJOR SPOILERS, so I don’t recommend reading this if you haven’t watched this episode

THE LOWDOWN: Tonight’s episode was ripe with intrigue—good thing too, as next week is the season finale. There’s still a nice serving of nonsense, but for the most part ‘Cobalt’ gave us a turn for the better. My only major complaint (which I’ll get out of the way first), is with the terribly awkward Alicia and Chris scenes. They were all wrong from start to finish. Alicia pulling up on a pink bike pretending to be the town sheriff was just awful. Talk about taking absolutely nothing transpiring around you seriously. She then proceeds to haul Chris off to some rich family’s house where they play with toys, try on clothes, drink booze and then (for no particular reason) start breaking shit. What was the point of all that? The only thing that could have made the whole thing worse, was them getting it on, which I thought was going to happen for a second there. Thank God it didn’t.

Travis decides he can ‘talk’ the situation out. Sigh. Yes, Travis, your skills of coercion and diplomacy will win the day. Maybe if you had an ounce of spine and a hint of balls, but you don’t. The diner shooting scene was unnecessary, but combined with the opening scene at the fence, it spoke wonders for the state of moral within the ranks—which is lacking to say the least. Of course Travis won’t shoot the walker, I doubt the guy’s even shot a damn pellet gun, but I am sure we didn’t need any more reasons to loathe the good Lt. Moyers. When the group of them rushed into the overrun building to try and save the other squad, I figured nothing but walkers were coming out and Travis would commandeer the vehicle and continue to the base…but then again, that would take spine and balls. Some of them come back (the Lt. is MIA), and at this point, I’m wondering if his men seized this distraction as a means of taking him out, if he actually died, or simply got left behind. Something tells me we’ll see him again, and it won’t be pretty.

And then there’s the man of the hour, a mysterious hustler known as Straid. I like this guy. The way he dissected useless Doug was brilliant. This is a guy who knows what the f*ck is up. Sure, one has to question his logic for bringing Nick into the fold as his wingman, but then again, desperate times I suppose. That said, I have no doubt, that to Straid, Nick is an expendable means to an end, one that I’m anxious to see come to fruition. It’s odd seeing Madison take the back burner here, but I feel like she’s been benched. I’m not complaining, because let’s be honest, she’s not exactly contributing big points to the end game. I have to mention it though, because it just feels weird, seeing as how they initially made her out to be this show’s Michonne. I know, I cringed as I wrote it. Michonne she most definitely is not.

FEAR THE WALKING DEAD SEASON 1’s fifth episode lit the fuse, and call me crazy, but I’m curious to see how many people get engulfed in the flames. So long as Daniel lives, I’m happy. What a great fleshing out of his character tonight. It was clear from the beginning that he had a story to tell, and that he was a badass gunslinger (of sorts) from back in the day who holstered his weapons for his family. That’s the vibe I got off him anyway, but to see it in action was the highlight of the evening. Again, we have a guy who knows the score, what needs to be done, and has the cojones to flay a man if need be. Good thing too, because Travis is too busy tripping over his own dick, all Madison does is bellyache over drinks, and their kids…well, their kids are all kinds of f*cked. Luckily for Nick, he may actually be with the one ‘Governor’ type dude to walk out of there on top of things. I don’t like the look of that huge walker stadium though. Something tells me those chains aren’t going to hold, and when they go, there’s going to be one hell of a population problem. Next week caps it off, are you still amused or have you jumped ship?

PARRALLEL CONNECTIONS: The doctors/nurses are a little better informed than I thought, so I’m thinking this ground zero experiment could be the source of CDC’s intel that gets shared with Rick and his crew.

BLOOD AND GORE: Surprisingly enough, we don’t get much on the walker front…again (something I think will be rectified next week), but we get some sick looking peeps, a couple different types of headshots, and Daniel’s rather specific type of intel gathering.

COOLEST SCENE: : I like Straid’s people skills, I sincerely do, but Daniel continues to impress as his backstory comes to fruition tonight, and yes, it’s extremely satisfying. Calm. Collected. Cool.

FINAL VERDICT:

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