“The End Is The Beginning”
We open at night in a campsite. A man, dressed as an outlaw (complete with an overcoat, cowboy hat, and steel axe), prepares beans over a fire. Another man, Walter, rushes toward him begging for help. The stranger calms Walter down and offers him his beans. A hound dog appears and Walter excitedly says that’s who’s been chasing him. When the stranger calls the dog Rufus, Walter is shocked he knows his name. “Of course I do, he’s my dog,” the man says before decapitating Walter with his axe in one violent swing. He places his re-animated head in a box titled “Walter” and then gets a radio call from Virginia, who says she’s looking for a Morgan Jones. The man writes Morgan’s name on an empty box and heads out.
A bloodshot-eyed Morgan wakes up in a limo in the woods. His hair has grown out and his arm is in a sling from the gunshot wound. A walker is killed outside by four people on horseback, who ride away without spotting him. Morgan hobbles out and a walker walks right by him without incident, assuming he’s one of them. Morgan challenges it and eventually takes it down with his staff one-handed. Morgan painstakingly climbs an empty water tower, where he’s built a shelter. He writes coordinates on a bag and heads to a nearby town.
There, he finds an unloaded gun and collapses on the road. He’s saved by a man who nearly mistakes him for a walker. The stranger, a former Marine named Isaac, takes Morgan to his hideout to help him out. They bond but Morgan warns he doesn’t want to get to know him. Suddenly, the outlaw from earlier arrives with Rufus and calls Morgan’s name.
Isaac walks outside to confront the man, who’s gutting a walker. The man asks if he’s seen Morgan and Isaac repeatedly says no, until he dog sniffs the door. The man reasons if he has nothing to hide, then he can take a look. So, the two enter the store to find Morgan’s blanket. Isaac explains Morgan must have stayed there and wandered off but the stranger ain’t buying it. He warns Morgan better be down the road like he said.
Isaac uses the coordinates on Morgan’s bag to find him in the water tower. He tells him he found his tape from the truck stop and he needs him to come with him, but Morgan refuses. Suddenly, the water tower tilts and quickly falls as we see the outlaw pulling it down with his truck. Walkers get attracted to the crash as the stranger approaches Morgan, telling him he’s already dead. Morgan shoots him in the arm as Isaac helps him into the man’s truck and drives away.
Miles away, Morgan tells Isaac he has to save the water tower. He explains how a stranger saved his life and he was fixing the place up for them as a safe haven. Isaac reminds him it’s not safe anymore but he knows a place that IS safe. He tearfully promises if Morgan takes care of his family, he’ll take care of his. They agree and walk off into the woods.
During their journey, Isaac asks about the people Morgan talked about on the tape, but then mentions Virginia, who Morgan didn’t name. Morgan swiftly uses his staff to back him into a tree, and Isaac explains he used to be one her rangers. “I would have told you but I didn’t think you’d trust me,” he explains. Isaac also says he was inspired by Morgan’s hopeful tape and tried to do his own version with his family. Isaac offers to take the bullet out of Morgan but he refuses.
They make it to a damn, where Isaac hands Morgan his supplies to deliver to his pregnant wife while he takes a longer way in. Once again Morgan blends in with the walkers and nearly avoids detection until he falls and screams. A walker nearly bites him until Isaac saves him. Surrounded, Morgan and Isaac muster up the strength to single-handedly dispose of the walkers without getting bit.
Isaac and Morgan walk through a hole in the dam to a valley where a very pregnant Rachel is waiting in a house. That night, the outlaw somehow tracks them down and Morgan decides to sacrifice himself to save Isaac and his family. Just as the man swings back his axe, Isaac attacks. The man shoves him down and prepares to kill him but then Morgan knocks him to the ground, Isaac then reveals he’s been bit for a while, which is why he brought him here to watch over his wife. The man gets up and throws Isaac to the ground. Morgan almost gets the best of him the man digs his finger into his gunshot wound.
The man strikes again but Morgan blocks it with his staff, breaks his axe, throws him to the ground, and stabs him through the chest. Morgan then takes his axe and violently strikes his neck, killing him. He then tells Isaac the message he gave the stranger that saved him was “to live.” A baby’s cry rings out behind them and Morgan tells Isaac to go meet his child as he takes a rest.
The next morning, Morgan wakes up bandaged and finds the bullet in a bowl beside him. Rachel explains, “He didn’t think you’d mind,” and reveals her baby is a girl – named Morgan. He asks where Isaac is to thank him but her look indicates he’s dead. They visit his grave and Morgan tells her he wouldn’t be here without him. Morgan then inspects the man’s re-animated head and finds the key necklace he stole from Walter. A walker approaches and Morgan grabs the man’s axe to kill it.
Elsewhere, Virginia and her people stop at a road block where they find a box with “Morgan Jones” written on the top. She confidently smiles before opening it, revealing the man instead. She laughs in disbelief and tells Morgan over radio that if he tries anything else she’ll kill his friends. He responds, “Morgan Jones is dead. You are dealing with somebody else now.” Zoom out to Morgan watching her from afar before riding off into the woods. Elsewhere, a man spray-paints “The end is the beginning” on a wall. He disposes of a walker and his friend says “they” should have been here by now. The first man reminds him they need the key. The two depart as we zoom out on a massive land-locked submarine.
What did YOU think of the episode??
