Fear the Walking Dead
8×12: “The Road Ahead”
Directed by Michael E. Satrazemis
Written by Ian Goldberg & Andrew Chambliss

* For a recap & review of the penultimate episode, click here.
It’s all come to this, the end of Fear the Walking Dead.
Madison searches the woods for Tracy, who’s hiding in a hollowed out tree with her St. Christopher medallion. Everyone’s searching for the girl. Tracy sees them nearby after the group comes across Russell. The only one who doesn’t want to stick around or really help Tracy is Daniel, who’s worried about what Troy’s remaining loyal followers will do. But off they all go, doing what they must, and Tracy gets herself out of the tree only to run into walkers. Tracy saves herself briefly until Grandma Madison finds her. But she’s not thrilled about that, either. She doesn’t want to go with Madison after what happened to Troy. She isn’t going anywhere with a bad ankle, though. Madison’s not doing the greatest as it is, but she can at least walk. She’s still intent on finding Alicia to “put her to rest.” And now she’s intent on doing whatever’s necessary to make sure Tracy not only survives but survives and understands the world they live in.

“Pretending the world’s different than it is? That’s what gets people killed.”

Madison forces Luciana at gunpoint to help her and Tracy. She wants Luciana to drive them across the country. Luciana thinks that maybe if Madison can find Alicia’s body and put her daughter to rest it may help show Madison there’s more to life. Nothing’s easy, though. Madison wants to prove to Tracy why she’s done what she’s done. The girl doesn’t trust her grandma. She hands over the St. Christopher medallion, she doesn’t believe in it. She takes her chance to grab Madison’s gun, but it’s not loaded anyway. Madison loads it when Strand turns up. She doesn’t want to go with them to PADRE. She doesn’t believe it’s any good. Madison doesn’t believe in second chances anymore, not after Troy and all that happened with Alicia. Strand tries to get Tracy out of there, but Madison fires off a few rounds, drawing walkers. Even Daniel’s trying to talk Madison out of some crazy shit. He doesn’t want Luciana wrapped up in it, either. Nobody can go anywhere now, as they’re pushed back into the garage to take cover from walkers.

Frank, June, Dwight, and the others are all having their own “problem with the dead.” Troy’s remaining people have a barge filled with walkers they’re about to release onto land; a whole other herd to deal with, as the zombies plunge into the shallow water at the shoreline and begin heading towards shelter. Inside, Russell wants to make a deal: hand over Tracy and they’ll make the walkers go away. He promised Troy he’d take care of Tracy, but Madison won’t give up her newly discovered granddaughter. Russell then claims that Troy only left Alicia for dead, “he didn‘t see her die.” He was sent back to check on Alicia after Troy escaped with Alicia’s arm stuck in his belly. Russell and other men found a bloody mattress, but no Alicia. He lied to Troy and said Alicia had turned. There’s a possibility that Alicia’s still out there alive. And Madison won’t give Tracy over now for sure since maybe she could reunite their remaining family.
But as things go, PADRE’s in trouble when shit goes sideways. Russell and his men have a plan to get everybody out of the island. A few grenade launchers have torn the place up bad. June’s geared up and ready for a fight with John’s pistols, and everybody else is preparing to do what they can to draw the walkers away, to do whatever’s possible to thin out the zombies and get themselves to the dock. Dwight uses Russell as a shield, as they open their gates and start to work on taking out a mix of zombies and Troy’s remaining followers. A wild scene.

In the garage, things aren’t any better. Daniel is losing his shit on Madison and Victor. He blames everything in his post-zombie apocalypse life on the two of them, which is nonsense. He’s done plenty to fuck himself over without them. Daniel goes so far as to bring up Travis, after all this time, which doesn’t sit well with Madison. He tells Tracy to run away from them. He yells at Madison and Strand more, blaming them for being responsible for the deaths of everyone he’s ever loved. Nasty business, especially coming from someone with a past like Daniel’s, which is soaked in blood. At the same time, Frank and the others are still fighting to get to the docks, so Victor urges everyone at the garage to go. But Madison isn’t prepared to fight, and she also needs to find Alicia. Victor needs her, his old friend. This doesn’t mean that Madison will go with him. She has to try looking for Alicia, no matter the result. It hurts Victor that he left his own family in peril to help Madison, now she’s leaving him.
Sadly, after an emotional talk about how Madison arrived to where she is now, Tracy decides to grab Madison’s gun and shoot grandma. Madison’s happy in a way: “This is what happens when you try building something better, you end up giving people hope, end up putting them in danger—you end up getting them killed.” She wants Tracy to go find Alicia, but the girl doesn’t want to, not willing to believe that Alicia’s actually her mother. And the girl leaves Madison bleeding out. In the woods, Tracy finds her zombified dad. She tells him she thinks everybody on the island died, and that she shot Madison. Then she raises the gun to shoot zombie Troy, too. She takes the time to bury the man she called her father. That’s when she’s found by Strand. It turns out that Madison managed to save her friends on the island. She was saved from death by the cartridge with the St. Christopher’s medallion inside it; the bullet lodged in it, only cutting Madison up a bit. This allowed Madison to see the error of her ways, so she went to help her friends, to help show Tracy “what‘s worth fighting for” after all. Once again, Madison proved she’s a hero. She used an old tactic she once did, back a long time ago, to save everybody. She lured the dead into PADRE, where she then blew the place sky high to allow everyone else time to escape. Madison wanted Tracy to know that “fighting for something better can get you killed” but it can “let you live forever,” too.

Tracy worries about having nobody left now, yet Strand says the girl has everyone else who remains, who cared about Madison and who care about her. This doesn’t satisfy Tracy, who grabs the gun and runs off into the night again. Later, we see Tracy by the shore somewhere with a dying Madison. Except when Tracy places the St. Christopher medallion next to her grandmother, Madison coughs and wakes up. Somehow Madison has survived. Tracy went back into the rubble of PADRE to haul her grandma out in hopes of saving her. Surely Madison’s lungs are in bad shape, even worse than before, but she’s still alive. And now, Tracy still has someone left from her family. Grandma and granddaughter soon receive an unexpected visitor: Alicia, still alive. An amazing reunion after so much time. Alicia’s brought along Skidmark the cat, too! Yay! She heard stories about a woman who she knew was her mother and had to be sure. This led her back to find Madison again, finally. We also discover that Alicia isn’t actually Tracy’s mom; it was Serena all along. Troy lied to make sure that Tracy would survive, knowing that Madison would fight for her own blood fiercely. Madison then wonders who told Alicia stories about her, so they head back to a freeway, where there’s a potential route running through, after Alicia heard chatter on the radios.
June’s planning to go back to John’s cabin and Dove wants to go along so June can teach her medicine. A good way to help future friends. Everyone is planning to go somewhere, to do something. Dwight and Sherry are looking towards a real future for the first time in a long time; he wants to use the Sanctuary, to give it a new life under better conditions, and to use its built-in defence positions to their purposes. Sherry worries this will go bad for them, however, Dwight thinks they could make the Sanctuary “worthy of its name.” Even Daniel and Strand make up a bit. Daniel admits his issues with Strand are the issues he has with himself beneath it all. “I‘m tired of war,” Daniel says in German, saying goodbye to Victor.

Suddenly, Daniel is reunited with Skidmark. Then Strand finds a familiar blue flower in his truck. Although neither man sees Alicia, they feel her presence. That is until Strand notices Madison, Alicia, and Tracy standing together in the distance; a family, even if they’re not all actually related, brought back together. Like Alicia mentioned earlier, the story of what she did worked better than what she was actually doing. So perhaps she and her mother now prefer to work behind the scenes, to do what they can in secret. “They don‘t need me,” Madison tells Tracy. She knows that her memory will help them more than she can help them now. Madison wants to go back to Los Angeles. There may be people left in the city who need their help.
Great use of “Mama Tried” by Merle Haggard at the end.
An interesting end to the series. Not quite what I expected, but good enough.