AMC’s Fear the Walking Dead
7×11: “Ofelia”
Directed by Alycia Debnam-Carey
Written by Alex Delyle & David Johnson

* For a recap & review of 7×10, click here.
* For a recap & review of 7×12, click here.
Daniel and Luciana play a card game together, to help his memory, but they finish up when she has to go with some of the others. He accidentally calls her Ofelia; just a slip of the tongue, or is his mind getting worse? He keeps fixating on one of the cards with a boat on it. When Luciana’s about to leave to go get a cache of weapons she’s asked to stay behind by Morgan, who wants her to keep helping Daniel. Before they can decide, Wes alerts them: Daniel’s nowhere to be found. So, Wes and Luciana are off to find Daniel while Morgan, Sarah, and Sherry go to meet Dwight.

Out in the wasteland, Daniel wanders, calling out for his daughter. He’s attacked by a walker but kills it. Suddenly he hears Luciana in the woods but he doesn’t immediately recognise them, pulling his gun. Luciana and Wes take off their masks to show it’s them, and Daniel pretends he knew the whole time. Then Daniel takes out the boat card, believing that Ofelia’s sending him a message, that she’s out there on a boat somewhere. Luciana tries talking sense with Daniel, yet he believes he saw his daughter yesterday. Oh, my. Daniel accuses Luciana of trying to take his daughter’s place; a hurtful thing for her to hear. The group are interrupted by Arno and his people, which ain’t good.
A while later, Daniel, Luciana, and Wes are back at Arno’s place. They’re made to take off their gear in a kind of wet room before heading further inside, which is like an old rundown amusement park-slash-trailer park complete with zombies which “helps keep the living away.” Arno wants to have a chat with each of the three hostages separately. Daniel immediately grabs a gun from Arno, turning things into a Mexican standoff. He wants to go back looking for his daughter, threatening to kill Arno, and he goes so far as to pull the trigger. Luckily there are no bullets in the gun.
Back to business! Arno’s heard the plans over the radio; he knows the group is attempting to take the Tower, he knows about the guns. First, he takes Wes for a chat. Meanwhile we see Daniel spot a boat and he’s convinced Ofelia is on it. He wants the boat and his daughter, convinced he’ll get it if he tells Arno where to find the weapons. Goddamn, Daniel! Causing so much trouble. Wes is outside hanging in a cage over zombies being interrogated when Daniel and Luciana are brought out. Daniel offers the location of the weapons to Arno, in exchange for Ofelia. Arno’s down to make the deal, claiming Ofelia’s on the boat, he just wants the coordinates to find the weapons first then he’ll hand over Daniel’s daughter.

Arno sends someone to check the coordinates while Wes is set free and re-caged elsewhere with Luciana and Daniel. So, how will things really go down here? Daniel claims “no one‘s gonna get hurt.” He gave up the “wrong coordinates.” How does that help them? Daniel thinks twenty-four hours with half as many guards around, while they’re off looking for the weapons, will give them time enough to escape. That doesn’t change the fact he still believes Ofelia’s out there, hoping to reunite. For now, the old guy’s staying focused on getting them out of there.
Daniel pretends to be out cold, drawing a guard into the cage. He keeps a knife at the throat of the guard, but he wants to go check the boat, sure he’ll find Ofelia. So, they take a detour before escape to visit the boat. There’s nobody inside, as expected, which makes Daniel angry. Luciana attempts to get through to Daniel but the old man cuts the guard’s throat. Then Daniel bars Luciana and Wes from getting off the boat. He says he has to make Arno “pay for what he did” before they leave. Good lord.
It isn’t long before Daniel sneaks up on Arno, shoving the leader into the cage and sending the man down to meet his nasty, chewy fate at the hands and teeth and fingernails of the walkers below. Brutal! Wes and Luciana arrive too late to help Arno, whose legs are chewed to bits. Arno talks a bit of shit about Alicia before he dies. He also says the dead in the massive, radiated pit where the bombs dropped are being let out by somebody, so if people don’t make it to the Tower they’ll all die, too. On top of that, the irradiated zombies can’t even be touched, you can barely get near them. It’ll be tough to figure out how to deal with them.

Luciana tries to rally the rest of the people in Arno’s group: “We need each other more now than ever.” She says they must fight Strand and take the Tower for everyone who needs it. And it looks like those left behind by both Teddy and now Arno are willing to go. For now, Luciana and her friends must trust dead Arno’s friends. And Daniel continues to be cynical about making promises in the post-zombie apocalypse wasteland. Yet Luciana thinks Daniel’s key to helping them, in spite of his mental state. At the same time, Wes doesn’t agree with how Luciana wants to go about things. Because Luciana’s decided to tell a lie; she tells Daniel that Arno said Strand has Ofelia in the Tower. Oh, man, that is a nasty lie for the greater good. Plus, what’ll happen when Daniel realises the truth later? It may break him. Right now, it’s broken Wes and he’s not going any further with Luciana at the moment.

At the sub, Dwight’s back with the others. They were able to find the cache of weapons. All they need now is an army. Moments later, Daniel and Luciana arrive with Arno’s friends. Kind of an army! Next: make plans to go fight Strand. Speaking of Strand, we see Wes outside the Tower, picking up that phone to call up to the heights of power. Wes wants to “make a deal.” Is this for real? Or is Wes going to go undercover on his own?