‘The Walking Dead’ Retro Recap: ‘Better Angels’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

It has often been said that few things in this world are more dangerous than men with nothing to lose and well… there’s good reason as to why we speak those words often. Because they are in fact, one hundred percent true. For time and time again, on the news or in our everyday lives, we’ve seen men that have reached rock bottom or believe that the world has abandoned them. Putting them in a desperate mindset where they need to act out violently or irrationally to matter or find purpose, and when that occurs… all we do is feel pity, remember those all-important words, and wait for the cleanup or healing to begin. For we fortunately live in a world where emergency services and others can step in and prevent or minimize the damage when a broken man lashes out and that gives us quite the sense of safety when the whole mess is done. 

But while we do indeed sleep better at night, knowing that there are people that stop those kinds of men from completely unleashing their fury on the world, there is always that part of us that wonders how bad things might get if guardians weren’t standing at the proverbial gates. Which is a thought we quickly squash down deep into the recesses of our minds. But some, mostly creative types, cannot let that kind of thought go and they’re eager to explore it in fiction and it just so happens, that the penultimate episode of season two of The Walking Dead, took the time to explore that pondering in a powerful and heartbreaking manner. For ‘Better Angels’ saw Rick Grimes opt to relinquish Shane of his ‘right hand man’ standing in the group and hand that over to Daryl and well… that move, and Lori’s apology, finally forced Shane to face some unfortunate facts.

Because Shane came to realize after being set aside, that he really had little in this world. In fact, he more or less lived vicariously through Rick and enjoyed the rush of being a cop and never gave much thought to his lack of impact on the world or his legacy. But that all changed when the dead came back to life, since he was sprung into the role of true hero and lover and father and that gave him a rush he never thought would be rivaled. So, to be cast down from heaven in what he viewed as a thoughtless and cruel manner… was the last straw, and in that moment… he had nothing to lose and everything to gain and that’s where the grand exploration got underway and well… what we came to learn about how it might go when a desperate man lets loose in a world without protectors was quite frightening to say the least.

For Shane operated with impunity and was able to get Randall out of his makeshift cell and use guile and fury to lead him into woods to promptly murder him and his evil didn’t end there. Since he harmed himself and used those wounds to fool the group into thinking trouble was on the loose. All in the hopes that he could isolate Rick and kill him and sell lies to the group before resuming what he thought was his rightful role as the leader of this ragtag group of survivors. Which really did make for quite the scary sequence, one that hammered home the reality that if left unchecked, men like Shane would do horrific damage to the world around them when they reach their breaking point. But thankfully, there was a line of defense here. For once Rick realized what Shane had planned, he was able to gain a sliver of trust from his fallen friend and use that to put him down instead, for the betterment of the group and thanks to his son’s concern, he was also spared from having to deal with the flesh-eating iteration of his friend and well, in the end, this episode was nothing more than a grand tragedy.

One that saw a broken man fall to pieces right before our eyes in a heartbreaking manner. Since we knew what Rick knew. In that, if Shane had found some semblance of purpose, he might have been a valuable member of the group. But instead, he got inside his own head and let his own fears consume him and the end result, is another casualty to the end to the world and another reminder that anyone on this show can die at any time and well, now that this grand exploration into a dark and dreary corner of the human condition has come to a close, it’s time we turn our attention to a different kind of episode. One that is devoid of deeper commentary and instead works to remind us of how powerful a force the walking dead are. For just over the horizon, a grand herd of the dead are on their way to investigate all that gunfire and their arrival, will change everything for the Greene family and Grimes Group as well. Until next time.

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