#Wonder if the staff survives s5

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Rn I'm dying because apparently MK does something really fucked up to Wukong during their fight and like it's so over for me

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TWD S10 Trailer: Analysis

Okay let's dive into this trailer. Lots of great symbols. I’m basically going to list everything we see (because many scenes flash by so fast that people miss them without realizing it) and make some observations along the way.

The first thing you see is the ocean and water. Obviously, Beth = water, so this would make me excited one way or the other. But it also shows that some of the symbolism we saw clear back in S4 is being fulfilled now. I talked about this recently (X) but there's the picture above Hershel which shows a ship on the ocean. We been predicting things that are ocean related (shipwrecks, etc.) for a long time. That’s why we were so excited when Oceanside became a thing in S7. Nothing much has come of it yet, but it may this season. Spoilers tell us that there's going to be a ship wreck this season and a lot of stuff happening with Oceanside. The very fact that it’s the FIRST thing in the trailer is significant.

Perhaps more importantly, we see a walker impaled on some wood. I can’t tell if this walker is bobbing in the water or if he's actually walking through the surf. It could be that the camera is low and he's actually walking. Doesn’t really matter, but he's impaled on the wood piece of wood that looks like a cross (or an X). So, this is pretty much a Christ symbol walking up out of the water. That's kinda huge in terms of symbolism.

Then there’s a group of people riding horses. Nothing huge there. We could mention the Horse Theory but these aren’t black and white horses or anything.

Then we hear Alpha talking. I mentioned this in an Ask on Sunday but she says, “There's only one rule. We are always watching.” 

One reason that's important is because many of us have noticed a theme of TF being watched from afar over the seasons. I don't think it was always the Whisperers doing the watching. It might've been the helicopter people. But if you've been keeping up with my posts, you know this theme is coming together in a big way. So, if they’re reiterating the idea of someone watching TF, that's important. We also see Michelle with binoculars to reinforce the theme.

Negan talks about the skin-colored bogeyman arriving, by which he means the Whisperers.

We then see Eugene running toward a radio. I think that's important given voice we heard in 9x16 and the radio stuff we've seen in Fear this season. We see Rosita with what I'm assuming is her baby and Luke looking scared. Judith holding a walker face, obviously from the Whisperers.

Then Michonne speaks. She says, "Fear is dangerous. It can drive us apart again." While Michonne speaks, we see Siddiq looking ill and then his face is plunged into water, almost as though someone is holding him under. I don't know what that means but it could signify Siddiq’s death.

Then we get something interesting: a hooded person painting, "silence the whispers," in different places around Alexandria. No idea why they would be hooded, but it's interesting.

Then we see Lydia practicing with a quarter staff (Morgan would be so proud) and obviously she and Daryl will have a lot of scenes together. 

Then Daryl challenges Negan, saying to them have never gone toe to toe before. Maybe that will happen in the season. It would be interesting.  

Michonne and Father Gabriel peer at each other from opposite sides of the fence. Later in the trailer, we also see FG in what looks like a jail of some kind. Not sure what that portends, but the interesting thing is that he’s sort of imprisoned a lot in this trailer and, because of his one eye, he’s a walking Sirius symbol, which makes him a Beth proxy. She had a lot of imprisonment symbolism around her because of Grady. So, as with so many things here, I don’t know what it means, but I’m side-eyeing it.

Negan says, "If you don't protect what belongs to you, soon it will belong to someone else." While he says it, there are a lot of family-and-friends shots: Aaron with Gracie, Siddiq holding his and Rosita's baby, Daryl and Connie and Dog, and then horses riding into Oceanside.

Next, Father Gabriel tries to get Negan to fight. Negan says he doesn't want to do anything but pick tomatoes. That's a nod to Carl and Carl's vision of the future where Negan literally picked tomatoes. Father Gabriel insists that Aaron needs fighters and Negan can fight. Then he says my favorite line in the entire trailer, "Peanut butter, meet jelly." 

(Quick refresher: this is a Beth and Daryl symbol. X At the funeral home in Alone, Beth at peanut butter and Daryl ate jelly.) FG points to Aaron when he says peanut butter and Negan when he says jelly. How many times have we said Aaron is a proxy for Beth? Even had a lot of her dialogue in 5B. So, Aaron represents Beth, and both of them are peanut butter. Negan represents Daryl, and both of them are jelly. Very nice!

Next are lots of scenes of people killing walkers in different ways and locales. Rosita punches a punching bag. Then Carol says, "Do you ever wonder if this is all there is?” Daryl answers, 

"Sometimes I think we’re just surviving one fight to the next." During this part, we see people fighting on the beach, Daryl and Carol hugging, a lot of stuff with boats, such as Ezekiel and Jerry trying to keep walkers inside a boat.

Then Daryl says, "No more fighting. Just get on the bike and go." And it shows him and Carol on his motorcycle. Then Carol says, "Head out west." And Daryl says, "See what's left." And then more beach stuff.

Okay, let’s talk about this for a minute. First, it’s worth noting that conversations in the trailer are often spliced together in a deceiving way. These lines may be (and probably are) parts of several different conversations rather than one as we har it in the trailer.

That said, I know this worries many people and a certain ship is going nuts. But there’s no reason to worry. I actually find this very intriguing. First of all, they went out of their way to define Carol and Daryl’s relationship in this trailer, and it’s still one hundred percent platonic and mother/son.

In terms of what they’re saying, Daryl implies that sometimes he wants to leave, get on his bike and ride. But it's interesting that they say “head out west.” Because, where are Morgan and his group? They’re in Texas, which is far southwest of Virginia. And then of course there's Carol. We think she's going to get on a boat at some point and take Michonne’s comic book arc. So, if anything, I think this is a foreshadow. Nobody freak out. I don't think Daryl and Carol will run away together and abandon the rest of the group. I just think at some point, this may come into the story. But I can see Daryl heading west in some way to find Beth over even Rick.

And remember that last year, both Melissa and Norman were seen in places that suggested they were filming scenes for FTWD in Texas. Obviously, we haven't seen either of them on that show and, much like Beth’s missing scenes from S5, I think they filmed this far in advance to try and minimize spoilers. But at some point, one or both of them may end up in Texas. So again, I think this is a foreshadow, but not one that any of us should be worried about. If anything, I kinda like it.

Next, Rosita and Father Gabriel, lots of people fighting, babies. Eugene seems to be measuring what I assume is Rosita's baby. Kind of funny. No idea what's going on there. Yes Eugene, babies do grow.

Daryl hugs Lydia and Magna and Kelly have a romantic moment.

Michonne says, "Somehow, it's harder the second time around. You get used to having someone there. A partner in crime." During this voiceover, we see Judith and Luke together; Daryl and Connie at the head of a group walking through the woods, Carol, and a shot of the H coin from last season. Right after Michonne’s line, we see her kiss Ezekiel.

I talked about this on Sunday as well, but I feel like this is mostly misdirection. Think about what Michonne says here. It’s harder the second time around without the loved ones she misses. Without a partner in crime. She's either talking about Rick or possibly Carl. About how much she misses them. And then it shows her kissing Zeke as though it’s about him? It’s clearly not. So that alone tells me they’re being deceptive.

And yes, I suppose it might be some sort of rebound relationship with Ezekiel, but it’s a little too convenient in my mind. So again, I think this was just put in to get a rise out of the fans. Even if she and Ezekiel are in a relationship, I don't see it being anything long-term or very important.

Then we get into some more Whisperer stuff. Magna says, "If we get caught on their side of the border, that's it. That's war." Right then, Daryl crosses the border. 

So obviously the Whisper War is about to begin in earnest. Alpha says, "What did I tell you about crossing my border? You’ll have to be punished." Then Carol says, "Bitch has to die."

Then more shots of people running, fighting, raising weapons in quick succession. We get a quick shot of Earl fighting. He’s Tammy's husband from last season. I was happy to see him.

We also see a lot of flames. We actually see a lot of fire throughout the trailer. Much of it seems to be at Oceanside. So again, if Oceanside burns in some way, it will mean what happened with the Oceansiders at the end of S8 was a foreshadow. At the time, it seemed really random, and I think I even suggested then that because it was so random, it was probably a foreshadow something. Now we’ll probably see it’s fulfillment.

Next, Alpha has a line I can’t quite make out. Maybe someone can tell me if they can hear better than I can. She says, “This is my ??? now. You'd better run." I’ve listened to it thirty it times and can’t understand what she says right there. And yes, I obviously checked out the subtitles, but they’re translating it as “This is my that, now.” which obviously isn’t correct.

Michonne says, "It's going to get worse before it gets better, but we aren't going to get through it at all if we do not act as one."

Alpha then says, "You should fear me."

Finally, it cuts to the humorous scene with Daryl and Carol when he says that he didn't want his best friend spend the rest of her life on a boat. Carol razzes him, saying, "What are you, ten?" Then she says she could make them matching friendship bracelets. She keeps going, teasing Daryl about the comment until he says, "I got an idea. Let's just eat and not talk."

Naturally, certain shippers are pouncing all over this like it's a marriage ceremony or something. But if you think about what they're saying here, there is no more clear way to define their relationship as a friendship. Not only because she offers to make friendship bracelets for them, but because when she asks if he's ten, it's very much a throwback to Carol thinking of Daryl as little as a little boy. As her son. So this clearly defines the relationship this as a mother son relationship as well as a platonic friendship rather than romance. I thought it was a fun and humorous scene.

It also illustrates one of the major differences between Carol and Beth. Carol is utterly unsentimental. Don’t get me wrong: she can be sentimental sometimes, and she was with Ezekiel and Henry, but she's never been that way with Daryl. 

Actually, this reminds me of the scene on top of the bus in 3x01, where she said, "You want to make out?" And then they both laughed. It had that same ambience. And remember that right after that in 3×01, Daryl stared at Beth while she was singing. By contrast, Beth would've been much sweeter and more sentimental about what Daryl said. It’s not a bad thing on Carol’s part. It simply shows the difference in Daryl's relationship to Carol versus his relationship to Beth.

Finally, there’s a mini coda where Michonne holds Negan’s bat. Honestly, I’m not sure what to make of that. They've been foreshadowing something that has to do with Michonne and Negan for a while now. Last season, remember she went out and found his bat and saw a guy hanging, which was a lot like Librarian the Saviors hung over the bridge at the end of S6. I don't know if this portends something literal that Michonne and Negan will be involved in, or if they're trying to say that Michonne is becoming Negan in some way? That doesn’t seem particularly plausible to me, but as I said, just not sure what to make of this yet.

And this coda was super short and vague, which is different than past trailers. Maybe that’s because AK is showrunner now. It will be interesting to see how this coda plays out in the season.

Okay, some closing, overall thoughts. We see a few shots of Daryl and Connie together, but nothing about them suggests a romance to me. He hugs both Carol (mother) and Lydia (daughter) more than he does Connie, who he doesn't hug at all. We do see the two of them hanging out in various ways. So, I think he's developing a friendship with Connie, much like he has with Aaron or Tara or any other member team family. Honestly, that doesn't bode well for Connie.

If you're worried about Donny being a thing, consider this. At SDCC this past weekend, they announced that Lauren Ridloff (who plays Connie) is going to start filming a Marvel movie. And congrats to her. But in my mind, there's no clearer evidence that she won’t be playing a huge role in the show moving forward.

I don't know they’ll kill her off, or just take her away for a while, like they did with Maggie. But from what we know about TWD actor contracts, they’re ironclad. The actors have to be 100% loyal to the show and often have to get special permission to do other projects. So, if Lauren Ridloff is doing something as big as a Marvel film, it must be with AMC's blessing. That tells me that either her character will die, or she's just not going to play a very big role in the show moving forward, which frees her up to do other work. If someone's going to be Daryl's love interest, that's going to be a huge role in the show. So it's already looking like those of us who assured everyone Daryl and Connie would not be a thing were correct.

The only other observation I have from the trailer is that we didn't see Lauren Cohan at all. No Maggie yet. Not a particularly big deal. The commercial tends to only cover the first handful of episodes anyway, so maybe Maggie won't be back until late in 10a or even 10B.

Overall, I'm seeing a lot of Beth symbolism. No smoking guns about her appearance, but I wouldn't expect there to be. For the most part I really loved the commercial and I'm excited for S10.

[twdmusicboxmystery]

ABCD Theory

This is kinda small potatoes, only because it’s only about half way formed. I’ve talked about this briefly before, but thought about it more since re-watching 5x01, and the talked about it with some of my FB peeps.

We’ve seen lots of As on the show. They showed up at Terminus, at FG’s church, and at Alexandria. More recently we saw one on Daryl’s shirt when they held him prisoner at the Sanctuary.

We’ve seen other letters too. We saw A, B, C, D at Terminus. And we saw them even earlier in the cell blocks at the prison. Let’s look at specific instances:

We know TF lived in C block to begin with. It’s the block they first moved into in S3. 

In S4, when the prison had become a thriving community, we’re told D has been occupied. We know because when they need some place to send those who are sick with the virus, the only block available is A, which was death row. (A clue to what the As represent. I’ll return to it.)

The thing is, B isn’t actually mentioned that I’m aware of. (Please correct me if I’m wrong.) We know TF is in C. Block D is where Karen and Patrick slept. Patrick turned in 4x02 and attacked cell block D. And then they moved those infected with the virus into block A. We’re made to assume block B was occupied, but I’ve never seen it actually heard or mentioned.

Then we have Terminus. This is what I noticed when doing my most recent re-watch. At the trough in 5x01, Gareth says they have four from car A (Rick, Daryl, Bob, Glenn) and four from car D (this includes Sam from 4a; we don’t know the others). A and D are both represented. 

Later, when Glenn lets Crazy Tattoo Guy out of the car he’s in, I noticed this:

This guy was in car C. Once again, maybe I’m missing something, and if I am, let me know, but I watched the key parts of 5x01 several times, and I never see any B in background to indicate which car is car B.

In both cases, the Bs seem to be missing.

Since then, we’ve mostly seen As. Gareth and the Termites put one on the side of FG’s church, which is really an extension of Terminus. Gareth’s way of telling TF they’re still the cattle and will still be eaten.

Then we see Sam (Jessie’s) putting As all over at Alexandria. People have speculated that symbolically the As might have foreshadowed Alexandria all along. I thought that had some merit, but then we saw the on the back of Daryl’s prisoner costume, so I think it’s gone beyond Alexandria now.

The other reference I’m aware of comes from Morgan and Eastman:

In 6x04, Eastman says, “A and B. A–you broke the garden fence, laid waste to a perfectly good tomato plant. You got to fix it. B–Follow me.” He takes him onto the porch and says, “I fixed your spear.” Then he hands Morgan the staff we still see him using in S5-7. Eastman teaches him to fight with it and it becomes part of him.

I remember reading theories, even back before S6 about the As. They suggested perhaps we should think of it like the A and B side of a cassette tape. We saw side A of the story in Beth’s apparent death and TF’s point of view of the story ever since. Side B will be seeing that Beth really didn’t die, and seeing her point of view of the story since Coda.

I think there’s definitely something to this theory. Clear back in 4b, when the Grady cops first took Beth from Daryl at the funeral home, we saw everything from his point of view. We saw him lead the walkers into the basement and then come back out. 

He only saw tail lights, so we only saw tail lights. I’ve always thought at some point they’d show us the episode from Beth’s point of view. I think we’ll see her go out the window, fight the walker she mentions to Gorman later, get hit by the squad car, and be put in the trunk.

My point is, they show us only one point of view at a time. There’s a precedent for it.

Now think of this. Think about the general concepts for Eastman’s A and B. A = something broken that needed to be fixed. B = giving Morgan a weapon and teaching him to use it. Morgan later uses the weapon to survive.

Do you see where I’m going with this? That could easily be applied to Beth and her arc.

In terms of TF, I think the As represent a time of trial which COULD lead to death. They must figure out how to survive it. In S4 with the virus, those in the A block were sick. It was a trial they had to survive. They very easily could have died, and some did. Those who didn’t came out stronger. They’re the survivors.

The same can be said of Terminus, FG’s church, and even Alexandria. There were dangerous times at Alexandria, such as when the wolves attacked (and the As were featured prominently in that episode). 

I also think it’s about learning to work together, accept the Alexandrians as part of the group, and learn to survive together as a community. It really took them all of 5b and most of S6 to do so. For the A on Daryl’s shirt at the Sanctuary, he had to survive his imprisonment emotionally and psychologically as well as physically.

You could argue that in each case, something is broken and needs fixing, as Eastman said. In 4a, they were physically ill. Their bodies were broken and needed healing. At Terminus, the group was still fractured physically. They hadn’t all come back together yet. Psychologically they were also still dealing with the aftermath of losing the prison and Hershel’s death.

Yeah, safe to say they were broken at Alexandria after Beth’s death. 

For Carol, it’s also Lizzie and Mica’s deaths that have broken her. And at the Sanctuary, Daryl is still broken because of Beth, but also because of Glenn’s death.

Morgan and Eastman gave us the definition of what the As represent, as well as what B will…be. It’s harder to pin that down because we have yet to actually see the B.

For C, remember TF lived in cell block C. And then when Crazy Tattoo Guy came out of car C, he said, “We’re the same.” I think C represents TF, but I still don’t understand the significance of Crazy Tattoo Guy. Maybe to show TF could become him under the right circumstances, or by making bad decisions? Maybe it was just an all too obvious way of saying that C = TF, bc this guy was in C and says, “We’re the same.” Or maybe it’s something we haven’t seen fulfilled yet.

For D, remember what I said about the trough at Terminus. There were four from D and they all died, while or 4 guys from TF survived. The same pattern held in 4a. The original TF members were all still in cell block C. D was full of secondary characters who came afterward: Karen, Patrick, Lizzie and Mica and their dad, etc. All those characters are now dead. I think D represents weak or more minor characters. Walker fodder, in other words.

In both S4 and S5, the Bs are conspicuously absent. Especially at Terminus, what or who else is conspicuously absent? Beth. Ty and Judith never actually entered Terminus, but they were there, and reunited with the rest of the group outside it. Beth was nowhere near it.

I do think the B represents Beth and her arc. They’re absent or missing. They’re unseen and unmentioned. And, as per Eastman, they represent the weapon that will help TF survive.

Okay, two other extremely nerdy and reachy observations.

1. You guys are gonna laugh at me for this. It comes from a personal experience and when I thought it, it made me smile. My older sister Erica once went through alphabet flashcards with my younger sister, Heidi. Heidi was only three and getting ready to start preschool. Erica wanted to see if she knew any of her alphabet yet. I watched. When Erica held up the flashcard with a capital B on it, guess what Heidi thought it was? Sunglasses! I couldn’t help but think, B = Sunglasses. And, you know:

Okay, all joking aside. The other one is probably kind of obvious.

B = Beth because her name starts with….B!

Update:

A wonderful Nonny pointed one other important B out to me. On Jessie’s fridge at Alexandria are several representations of Beth. Details HERE. 

One of them is what appears to be a blond superhero with a B on the shirt. Yeah, B totally = Beth. ;D

Okay, that’s it for today. Anyone have any insights on the ABCD theme?