As the residents of Alexandria are left reeling from the attack by the Wolves, they have to learn to pull themselves together. At the same time, Rick’s group is left wondering about those left outside the walls and what’s happened to them. Photo stills and recap of The Walking Dead Season 6, Episode 5 “Now”, which first aired Sunday, November 8 at 9:00pm ET|PT on AMC.
***SPOILER ALERT***
“Now” opens with Deanna (Tovah Feldshuh) walking up a ladder to look out over the walls of Alexandria. She’s in shock, and down below, Michonne (Danai Gurira) is telling Maggie (Lauren Cohan) about having to leave Glenn (Steven Yeun) behind. As if the day hasn’t been jarring enough, Rick (Andrew Lincoln) comes running for the gates with a herd following him.
As Michonne slams the gate closed behind Rick, the focus shifts to Deanna again. The look of powerlessness on her face when she watches the walkers crash into the gate drives it home for her—her people aren’t prepared for what’s outside.
Once everyone has gathered to see what the noise was about, Rick gives his standard speech about surviving and asks the question: “The walls are gonna hold together. Can you?”
This becomes the theme of the episode as we start seeing everyone else break down.
Aaron (Ross Marquand) is consumed with guilt over his backpack falling into the Wolves hands. He confesses to everyone that it was his lost pack that led the Wolves there, and if he had listened to Daryl, none of it would have happened.
After Aaron’s confession, Deanna walks away from the group and doesn’t look back.
Meanwhile, Jessie (Alexandra Breckinridge) is trying to clean up the safe zone by burying some of the dead bodies. Rick stops her before she can get too far and tells her that they don’t bury killers inside the walls. By that point, Jessie is so drained that she agrees with him and stops shoveling.
Over at the pantry, the people of Alexandria have decided since they’re all going to die anyway, that they should take whatever food they want. Spencer (Austin Nicols) arrives and talks some sense into everyone: “Doing this will starts us down a road where nothing matters. Where no one else matters. And then we’ll look back on this moment, right now, as when we destroyed this place.”
After everyone puts down the food and leaves, Spencer turns to find his mother behind him. She looks proud, and it’s the first time in the episode that Deanna seems hopeful.
From there, we move to the armory where Aaron finds Maggie. Even after he points out all the flaws in Maggie’s plan to go find Glenn, she tells him that he can’t stop her. Aaron surprises Maggie by saying he doesn’t want to stop her. He wants to help her, and he knows a better way out of the safe zone.
After watching Spencer handle the food situation, Deanna goes home and starts drawing up plans for the expansion of Alexandria. When she hears a glass break in the kitchen she goes and finds a drunk Spencer with supplies he’s taken from the pantry.
When Deanna confronts him about it, he shrugs it off, saying that if everyone did it, it would be bad, but since it’s just one person, it doesn’t make a difference. Deanna tells him that’s bullshit, and he unloads on her.
Spencer yells at Deanna, telling her the reason everyone is dead, including their family, is because she tried to make them believe that everything was okay when it wasn’t. After he’s done, Spencer leaves and Deanna puts all the food he took back into the basket as the same thousand-yard stare from earlier takes over her face again.
That’s not the only altercation in the episode either. Carl (Chandler Riggs) gets into an argument with Ron (Austin Abrams) about Enid (Katelyn Nacon). Carl wants to go look for her, and Ron threatens to tell Rick if he goes over the wall, saying that someone will end up dead if that happens. They get into a shoving match in which Ron ends up on the ground and Carl walks away back to the house.
It’s the first time Carl has ever listened to anyone tell him to stay anywhere.
After the argument between Carl and Ron, we move to the infirmary with Dr. Denise (Merritt Wever). She’s completely overwhelmed as she tries to save Scott’s life and is sitting among a pile of medical books when Tara (Alanna Masterson) shows up. Their interaction is short but makes an impact on Denise. Tara tells her that it “sucks to be scared” but tells her to keep looking for a way to save Scott.
A little bit later, Jessie is clearing out houses with a small group of Alexandrians when she finds, Betsey, a woman who has killed herself. After putting her down, Jessie words are very reminiscent of Rick: “If we don’t fight, we die.”
The people of Alexandria are slowly waking up to the fact that they aren’t prepared and fighting is their only option now.
The scene switches back to Aaron and Maggie, who are using the sewers that lead out of Alexandria to get around the herd. As they try and move a ladder blocking an opening, Aaron hits his head and falls down into the water. They’re both surprised when a walker tries to crawl out of the space where the ladder used to be and Maggie moves to kill it. At that moment, another walker pops out from the opening and attacks Maggie.
It takes a lot of effort, but Aaron kills both walkers and they continue on down the tunnel.
The scene shifts to Rick standing on the wall as Ron comes up behind him and tells him about Carl. Out of the blue, Ron asks for shooting lessons so that he can take care of himself and his family. Before handing over his gun, Rick unloads it except for one bullet and stands over Ron’s shoulder as he lines up a walker.
After this moment, characters began moving forward in their journeys.
Denise figures out what to do to save Scott and immediately seeks out Tara. She kisses her and it feels like a “thank you for believing in me” moment but goes deeper than that when Denise admits that being afraid really does suck. This was her gaining confidence in her doctoring abilities and moving forward with Tara.
Finally, Aaron and Maggie make it to the end of the tunnel and see there’s no way to get around the walkers that have surrounded the safe zone, and there’s nothing they can do for the group members left outside the walls.
In an emotional moment, Maggie reveals that she’s pregnant. Her words bring them both to the realization that nothing comes from blaming themselves for what’s happened: “I don’t get to know what will happen. I won’t get to know why it happened. What I did right or wrong. Not now. I have to live with that. You do, too.”
It’s such an important concept for everyone in Alexandria to accept. They have to walk through that door, as Eastman said, and quit living in the past.
Later, as Deanna returns the food Spencer took, she has a terrifying encounter with a walker. After Rick takes care of it, she asks him if her dream of having this safe place was just that—a dream. Rick tells her that it’s absolutely possible, but they need her.
Deanna doesn’t believe that, though: “They don’t need me, Rick. What they need is you.”
While we’re wondering what this means for Alexandria, Maggie and Aaron are keeping watch on the wall. She leaves her post and goes to where Glenn’s name has been written on a wall starts wiping it off, showing us she hasn’t given up hope yet.
Then the moment we all knew was coming happened. Rick finds Jessie in her garage and lets it slip that he’s heard what she said about what life looks like now, and Jessie asks him to tell her that there’s more. Rick takes this opportunity to step forward and show her that there’s more to life than fighting and dying and kisses her.
The episode ends the same way it began, with Deanna staring at the gate. This time she’s more collected and determined, like she believes they can actually survive.
The episode split our attention in several different directions to highlight character growth. Personally, I feel like we’re in the eye of the storm. Everything is calm and people are trying to right themselves again, but a big hit is coming Alexandria’s way. Walls just don’t leak blood for no reason.
This leads us into episode 6.6, “Always Accountable”, which airs tonight at 9:00pm ET|PT on AMC. Based on the sneak peek for this one, it appears we’ll see some of Sasha and Abraham, but it mainly focuses on Daryl.
This episode is Daryl’s coda (side-eyes parallels between him and Beth Greene) from the trailer that premiered at San Diego Comic-Con this past summer 2015 (for a refresher, watch it HERE). We’re not given much to go on, but Daryl is going to find himself in a bind with strangers.
In a clip, Daryl tells his captor, “I ain’t who you think I am.” Does this man think Daryl is a Wolf, or worse, does he think Daryl is with Negan’s group?
I feel like this one will be full of surprises, but since it focuses on Daryl, Sasha and Abraham away from Alexandria, I think we can safely say that we’ll be in the dark concerning Glenn’s fate until at least 6.7.
I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait for tonight. Check out the trailer and a few images from episode 6 below:
If you need to catch up, AMC will be airing a mini-marathon starting with Season 6, Episode 4 at 6:30pm ET.
