The Walking Dead 6.12 Review: “Not Tomorrow Yet”

The Walking Dead 6.12 (written by Seth Hoffman) was a multi-faceted episode, playing like a character drama and action movie all at once, while never letting up on the tension. “Not Tomorrow Yet” asked more of those unanswerable questions about humanity and morality, exploring what happens when survivors are forced to make agonizing choices in the most unimaginable circumstances. In the end, we learned those choices will almost always have unforeseen – and dire – consequences.

It’s interesting to see what’s happened to our main group members since they arrived in Alexandria. Carol, who started out playing a part as Suzy Homemaker in order to infiltrate the community, seems to have found some comfort in actually embracing the role. She bakes acorn cookies for The Safe Zone residents, actually taking the time to speak with them, and quietly lays one at Sam’s tombstone. She even finds a little romance with Tobin, who marvels at her ability to do what’s hard. In the privacy of her bed at night, she keeps a running tally – now at 18 – of the people she’s killed. Carol’s always had the humanity to feel the weight of what she’s had to do in this world. But now, she seems to have found a place that has humanized her all the more.


Rick, however, who at one time just wanted to be a pacifist and farmer, has come to the conclusion that protecting his family and the walls that now surround them is worth any price. But his shoulders are a lot lighter than Carol’s. Whether he’s indignantly asking “What?” to the Hilltop residents after killing one of their own, or justifying a preemptive murderous strike against another community, he seems resigned to the notion that survival in this world means perpetrating brutality on others.

In this episode, Rick gathers the Alexandria residents into the church an makes an impassioned speech about the benefits of proactively attacking Negan and The Saviors, calling up what happened to Daryl, Sasha and Abraham on the road and the situation with The Hilltop Colony. It’s pretty clear that Negan and his people are violent animals – the bullies of the zombie apocalypse. But is it inevitable that they would make their way to The Safe Zone? Is it worth taking that chance? Rick and his people definitely have a dilemma. Rick’s solution – “We kill them all.”

Surprisingly, everyone is on board – except Morgan, (which, of course is no surprise). Morgan wants to talk to Negan and warn him to stay away from their group, but Rick, who initially asked everyone to speak their peace, shoots Morgan down and basically tells him he doesn’t have to kill, but he must accept the plan – or leave the community. Turns out Rick wasn’t all that open to people speaking their minds, after all.

What followed were a lot of interesting character beats as everyone prepared for the raid. Glenn and Maggie discuss it (including what Maggie’s role should be), which is the way they handle everything – together. Abraham breaks Rosita’s heart in the most callous of ways. This goes along with the brusque nature of who he is, but he’s written especially cold here for a reason, I’m sure (Softening the blow of what’s to come, perhaps?) Tara declares her love for Denise, but more as a distraction from facing the upcoming mission. Denise, however, won’t reciprocate until Tara comes back from her two week run, probably in order to give her a reason to stay safe and return. As an aside, the whole two week run is kind of silly, obviously put into the story to accommodate Alanna Masterson’s pregnancy at the time. It would have been much easier, though, just to have her not show up in later episodes. It wouldn’t be the first time characters drop out of scenes without explanation.

After Andy draws a map of The Saviors’ compound, Rick and the others make a plan of attack. They decide to use a zombie head similar looking to Gregory’s so The Saviors will think Hilltop upheld their end of the deal. As luck would have it, they find three fresh walkers to choose from that all resemble Gregory. It was an eye roll moment, but it was easy to look past given the rest of this memorizing episode.

Carol’s changing attitudes are exemplified further as she tells Rosita to keep quiet about The W Man and Morgan, knowing Rick would surely exile him for sparing The Wolf. Carol also wants to protect Maggie and her unborn baby, scolding Rick for letting Maggie go in the first place. Carol’s perspective on the value of violence vs the cost is clearly shifting.