(Spoilers from The Walking Dead will be found below.)
After a pair of uneventful promotional images, we’re finally seeing how Rick Grimes looks these days in his The Walking Dead spinoff with Michonne.
Let me back up a moment. It’s not as though I didn’t appreciate the warm, hand-holding image of Rick and Michonne that AMC already released. The empty chairs were disappointing, but the hands were alright. It’s nice to know that Rick and Michonne are reunited and united in the true sense of the words. Yet if we really go back to where Rick Grimes left off in the action of The Walking Dead — and I’m not talking about the series finale scene that confirms how he’s been under CRM control — a warm, hand-holding image ain’t gonna satisfy. I mean, look at the chain of events when Rick really left the show. It’s like the worst possible scenario (dude should not ride horses) that he could have ended up in while a horde of Walkers approached.
And yet he didn’t give up on returning to his family. He used his belt to un-impale himself. He kept going and blew up a bridge to save his family and friends. And then he got traded away and separated from everyone without anyone knowing whether or where to look for him.
Does a hand-holding image do anything to acknowledge the visceral experience of being Rick Grimes? Does it give us any sense of how Rick Grimes has coped internally or externally after this devastating turn of events, years later when nothing has improved for him until now? No, it does not. And so it is with great appreciation that one notices how Michonne actress Danai Gurira apparently got the greenlight to give us a tiny peek at how Rick’s actually been doing lately.
Clearly, blood has spilled. We don’t know why or how, or whether he’s feeling happy or vengeful. Andrew Lincoln can kind-of convey both at the same time, so let’s simply roll with both. Maybe he’s lost it, a little bit, after his extended ordeal. We do know that his possessions were discovered by Michonne, and she set off to find him, and here we are. Yet it’s nice to know that some things will never change, and Rick Grimes is still messy as hell.
The Walking Dead‘s Rick and Michonne party will debut in 2024.