Season 5, Episode 2: The Hurt That Will Happen
PLOT: Althea has gone missing in an area filled with irradiated zombies, and Strand has to seek the help of Daniel Salazar.
REVIEW: Fear the Walking Dead showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg, who took control of the show last season, really seem to have fun working with their writers to come up with unique zombie situations, cool zombie-related visuals, and ways to make the flesh-eating dead even more dangerous. Under their watch we've gotten zombies coated with oil, zombies covered with cactus needles, water park zombies, and the previous episode's zombie in riot gear, among other things. In this episode we get a new one: irradiated zombies.
On a rescue mission that turned out to be a distraction, most of the show's characters have now found themselves stranded in an area a couple miles from a nuclear power plant that recently had a meltdown. So not only do they have to avoid the contaminated areas, they also have to deal with the plant employees who died of radiation poisoning and now walk the countryside as the living dead. They're warned of this danger by Grace, played by Karen David, who used to work at the power plant herself. Smart and capable, Grace would be a solid new addition to the cast… but unfortunately, it doesn't look like she's going to be around for long.
Most of The Hurt That Will Happen follows Morgan (Lennie James), Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey), John Dorie (Garret Dillahunt), and June (Jenna Elfman) as they work with Grace to wipe out as many contaminated zombies as they can, at the same time searching for their missing pal Althea – who isn't in this episode because someone possibly involved with the group that flew Rick Grimes off of The Walking Dead in a helicopter also seemed to abduct her at the end of the previous episode. That allows for some nice action moments that are also unsettling because you don't want our heroes to soak in too much radiation themselves, but it doesn't seem like this story element is going to amount to much in the long run, especially if Grace can't stick around. The most lasting consequence may be that Morgan has to ditch his beloved bo staff because it can't be decontaminated. I don't think anyone other than Morgan is going to be upset by this turn of events, though, and I'm sure he'll have a replacement soon enough.
I thought it was lame that Luciana (Danay Garcia) was badly injured in this season's premiere, because we've already done the whole "injured Luciana" story before. Thankfully, while it's going to take her some time to heal, it doesn't seem like they're going to sideline her for too long. Although she's taking meds that make her woozy and preoccupied with the thought of accordions, Luciana is back on her feet already in this episode.
Irradiated zombies, Luciana not being treated like she's on her deathbed, that's all well and good, but the real draw of this episode is the fact that it features the return of Daniel Salazar (Ruben Blades), this show's greatest and most under-used character. This guy comes and goes; he disappeared for half of season 2, he missed season 4 completely, the other pre-season 4 characters haven't seen him in years… but Daniel is still out there! His return was briefly teased in the premiere, and here he gets a few scenes. I'm glad to see that Daniel seems to be doing well. He's got a nice set-up, multiple vehicles (including a plane), a cat named Skidmark. And he still doesn't trust Victor Strand (Colman Domingo).
It was good to see Daniel and Strand exchanging dialogue again, and I really hope that we're going to see a lot more Daniel in the rest of this season. That is best thing they could possibly do with Fear season 5, fill it with badass Daniel Salazar moments. And also make sure Alicia, Strand, and Luciana survive no matter what, because I still don't want to see this show get completely taken over by the newbies.
Speaking of the newbies, we get another Morgan motivation speech here. It gets really tiring listening to this guy pontificate all the time. His speech is directed toward Alicia, though, so hopefully it will be helpful for her. That's where the title of the episode comes from, as Morgan advises Alicia she can't shut other people out, she has to open the door to them, even though connecting with someone will inevitably lead to some kind of hurt. It's good advice, even if I'm tired of hearing Morgan give advice.
The events may not all have lasting impact, but The Hurt That Will Happen is pretty well packed with stuff going on. It even manages to deepen the mystery of places being decorated with severed zombie heads and spilled guts.
BEST ZOMBIE MOMENT: Daniel has his compound protected by parking lot wheel stops and rebar. We see a zombie walk toward the compound, trip on a wheel stop, fall forward and impale its head on rebar. This isn't 100% effective; sometimes they don't trip.
GORY GLORY: Plenty of zombies get dispatched in this episode, and some of them are quite gross looking.
FAVORITE SCENE: Daniel and Strand, reunited and neither of them feels good about it.
FINAL VERDICT: