The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live
Ep. 4: “What We”
Directed by Michael Slovis
Written by Danai Gurira

* For a recap & review of Ep. 3, click here.
* For a recap & review of Ep. 5, click here.
Great use of “Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree” as we see Michonne pull Rick with her out of the helicopter and into the ocean. Now Rick and Michonne are back to safety, but they’re really only out of the frying pan and into the fire. At the moment, they’re in a pretty modern apartment with digital heating, all sorts of beautiful furnishings, and much more. When Michonne gets out of her wet clothes her X scar is visible to Rick. While he was trying to save her out of love he also neglects to realise that he wasn’t the only one who went through hell to get where they are now, together.
Michonne’s definitely not happy with Rick. She’s especially mad that Rick would choose to abandon the kids. This is the first time Rick hears about RJ, too, whose name is also Rick. Even after hearing about his son, Rick’s determined to stay. Michonne tells him point blank: “I don‘t like who you are with them, what they make you.” Rick reveals that Jadis will kill everybody they love if he and Michonne leave together. Michonne thinks they could get away; Rick doesn’t believe it’s possible. She believes it’s a simple job: destroy Jadis’s evidence, kill Jadis, go home. The problem is that what’s happened to Rick has fundamentally changed him. It’s taken away a part of him where hope lives. And it shakes Michonne seeing it up close. One bright spot: the helicopter went down. Michonne saved them. They also appear dead to the CRM. Even this can’t convince Rick to go home.

What is it keeping Rick from going back home?
Michonne talks about how RJ calls his father Rick “the brave man” and started calling himself “little brave man.” She’s having trouble understanding why Rick wants to stay with the CRM. Rick keeps saying it’s to protect Michonne and their home. But it’s more about Okafor’s mission, to change the CRM from the inside. While, yes, this is a noble idea, is it even possible? And if it’s possible, is it really worth throwing away his family? Michonne thinks Rick’s keeping himself in a prison, whereas Rick believes it’s better than “crawling around in the dirt” like their group of survivors was doing out in the wasteland. Michonne reminds Rick of his responsibility to his family. He’s stuck on some strange sense of responsibility to Okafor’s mission. She’s sure there’s something more to it. Yet she’s fed up now and decides it’s time to leave considering Rick is ultimately being ungrateful for all she did to find him. She warns it’ll be too late before Rick understands he’s wrong. Michonne walks off but stops, hoping that Rick will come after her. He doesn’t, so she keeps on going. He eventually runs out after her and just misses the CRM helicopter on its way towards their location.
Downstairs in the building there are all kinds of walkers. They get a glimpse of Michonne, as she prepares to fight them. Then the helicopter begins firing on the building, first to take out evidence of the initial helicopter. Rick finds Michonne and they run back upstairs together, but an explosion has let zombies inside. The whole place is rumbling with the force of more explosions. At least whatever happens next, Rick and Michonne are together; for now, anyway. They are argue a bit over what to do next, though nothing’s looking like a great option with zombies all over the place and the building literally starting to split apart. Rick and Michonne find evidence left by survivors in the building; it was a place called Greenwood, it was seeking to restore a proper way of living.
They discover a suicide note from the leader of Greenwood: “When I conceived of Greenwood it was so clear: like–minded innovators in various fields seeking to live off the grid, to create a new, more sustained, and hopeful tomorrow. Our motto, Progress and Redemption Through Innovation, is now like a sick joke to me, but I can‘t face how much I have failed everyone. I cannot go another day continuing to watch our mission die. I am sorry. Let me be remembered as one who refused to leave the world the same way I found it.” It’s just further evidence for Michonne that Rick’s fucking up by staying with the CRM. The couple argue more and more. Michonne believes Rick is no longer the same man. They have to stop arguing to get themselves out of that place, which also means killing a whole bunch of the undead. They even fight over the zombie killing, too.

The building is treacherous, made worse when a chandelier nearly kills Rick and Michonne. They make it through more zombies and come to another part of the building where the structure hasn’t buckled yet. They start to get physical together and they fall into bed. Is this really the time, though? Probably hard for them not to, honestly. It’s been so long since they were together, let alone sexually. Can’t blame them. After the lovemaking, Rick and Michonne talk about their son and his “good, kind heart.” They also talk about Greenwood and its innovations, wondering if there were any crops. Rick talks of changing the CRM because he believes it will help “future generations,” kind of like the story of his father and the crops he recounted a while back. He then hears about Michonne’s old friend and the X, as well as how much she and Daryl searched for him after the bridge. She recounts how the woman kidnapped Judith and other kids, then gave her and Daryl their scars. Rick recounts his own scar: his missing hand.
But in the end, will Rick make the choice to go home?
The nice evening’s interrupted by the building beginning to split more. Michonne won’t go until Rick decides where they’re going next; not only geographically. She questions why Rick came after her before. He says it’s because she’s like his heart and seeing her go was like having it ripped out. So, why’s Rick insisting on staying? Michonne says that Judith stopped answering her on the walkie. She doesn’t know if Judith is okay. She says their love, their family, it’s real. Rick’s hopes for the CRM are not yet real; they might never become real, either. Michonne says all this is hurting her and she needs to understand what happened to Rick, to make him into this new man. “What did they take from you?” she asks. Rick says it was Carl: “I lost him again.” He talks about meeting Carl in his dreams to survive psychologically. Then, suddenly, Carl was gone, and Rick began dreaming of Michonne. Then Michonne was also gone. Rick tells Michonne: “Without you, I die . . . I know how to be dead and live.” He’s afraid of what happens if he loses Michonne again, and if it’s a loss he knows, one he must witness, he believes it’ll finally kill him. Michonne hands Rick one of Benjiro’s drawings: a doodle of Carl in the Sheriff’s hat. She asks Rick what Carl would want him to do with this new chance. She reminds him what she went through to find Rick, after all these years. Why throw everything away after giving up so much? Michonne believes that love is the answer; for as long as they’re alive, love is the key.

In the morning, Rick and Michonne prepare to go. They have a smooch, then head into the collapsing building’s hallways. They fight their way through zombie after zombie like the old days. They still can’t keep their hands of each other, as they makeout in the elevator on the way down to the ground floor. They’re able to get out of the building and find vehicle; funny how they have to switch seats because Rick can’t drive stick. Today, Rick is his old self filled with hope and determination, and it thrills Michonne to see it again. As the couple pull off onto the road, Greenwood collapses in a pile of concrete and dust. But who knows what’s next for them.