On December 11, 2016, The Walking Dead fans witnessed one of the most satisfying, horrific, emotional, and heart pounding mid-season finales thus far. This epic episode kicked off with Maggie at the Hilltop paying her respects to her fallen husband, Glenn, but this time wears one of his hats from season 1 and 2. Maggie climbs the guard tower and sees Gregory. While handling an apple, Gregory tells Maggie about how thankful the people of Hilltop are for her and Sasha. Unphased by the complement, Maggie asks Gregory if he was going to eat the apple. A nearby guard shames Gregory into giving the apple to Maggie.

Back in Alexandria, Negan was in Rick’s home in one of the bathrooms with Carl and Judith standing by as Negan shaved. A clean-shaven Negan requested lunch with Carl, Judith, and Olivia, and ordered Olivia to get him home-made lemonade that she got from Tara. Negan requested a seat for his date, Lucille. Negan grew tired of waiting for Rick, and claimed Lucille was hungry, and that concluded cooking with Negan!

At the Sanctuary, Daryl debates whether or not to leave his cell and make a run for it. He did and ducked into the nearest bedroom for a change of clothes and a jar peanut butter. It was obvious that he was starving because he devoured that jar of peanut butter!
Back with Rick and Aaron, Rick finds a canoe and Aaron breaks off a pieces of a sign so the two rowed to the other side for supplies for the Saviors.

Eugene, Rosita, and Spencer were greeted by the Saviors and were demanded to give the Saviors half of their stuff. One of the female Saviors flirts with Spencer, but yells at Eugene for eyeballing their small romantic moment. Known as “haircut” to the female Savior, she told Eugene to get lost!
Morgan visited Carol in her new home near the Kingdom and comes bearing fruit. Carol asks for Morgan to leave because she wants to be left alone. Carols visits have left her with an abundant supply of fruit! One of the Kingdom’s soldiers, Richard, drops in while Morgan is there and requests to speak to Carol and Morgan.

As Rick and Aaron rowed through the lake riddled with walkers, they were attacked by ferociously hungry walkers like from a scene from a Hungry Hungry Hippos movie! Rick and Aaron use pieces of the sign they broke off as weapons to kill the walkers until Aaron went overboard and almost died from a walker attack. Luckily, Aaron escaped from the walker mob and swam back to Rick and the canoe. Once they reached the other side of the lagoon, they found an RV with guns, almost no ammunition. While Rick and Aaron were putting what they found in the back of their truck, the camera showed a pair of combat boots worn by a mystery person! Dun-dun-dun!!!

Enjoying her ride with the red headed Savior, Michonne tries to speak with her, but the Savior refuses to speak. Michonne tells the Savior that she doesn’t want to kill Negan–she wants to win the war.

The people of Hilltop thank Maggie and Sasha once more by baking them a pie! Maggie wanted to see Jesus one more time before he went out on his run, but Sasha covered up for Jesus and told Maggie that he left the night before. Enid knew that Sasha was lying because she saw Jesus heading for the Savior truck. Sasha lied to plot her revenge against Negan without Maggie’s involvement due to her pregnancy.

At Carol’s house, Richard told Morgan and Carol about how the Kingdom and the Saviors first met which wasn’t pretty. King Ezekiel thinks that the Kingdom and the Saviors are on good terms with Negan and the Saviors, but Richard is worried for the day that the Saviors turn on the Kingdom and kill everything and everyone. Richard asks Morgan and Carol to ask King Ezekiel to strike first against the Saviors, and destroy them! The downfall of Richard’s plan is that Morgan doesn’t believe in taking one’s life and Carol just wants to be left alone.

Rosita examines the bullet Eugene made for her at the church with Father Gabriel. Father Gabriel asks Rosita why she’s planning on doing this. Rosita explains to Gabriel the suffering she went through at the hands of Negan and the Saviors. Gabriel shares a compelling point of view with Rosita–in case she doesn’t survive, the group needs her! Rosita leaves plotting the plan’s execution.

When Spencer entered his home, he finds stuff thrown about by Rick looking for two guns in an earlier episode, Spencer cleaned it all up and changed his clothes and wiped off all the blood from his face. He walks to a nearby mirror and practices his hellos as if he was trying to impress someone.

An angered and saddened Richard goes into an underground home over Morgan and Carol not wanting to fight by his side.

As Spencer walks towards his destination, he is stopped by Rosita who asks if he has a date tonight. Spencer said that he wants to be introduced to Negan. Rosita tells Spencer that she was using him to get over Abraham. Spencer asked Rosita if she would like to join him for dinner that evening, and she says yes!

Daryl makes a run towards motorcycles and runs into “Fat Joe!” Joe persuades Daryl to spare him, and that he won’t tell anyone about Daryl’s escape, but Daryl shows no mercy and uses a lead pipe to kill “Fat Joe!” Daryl encounters Jesus who witnessed the killing and helps Daryl escape.
Spencer finds Negan asks one of his people if he can have a word with Negan. The Savior refuses Spencer, but overhearing the exchange, Negan makes an appearance for a conversation with Spencer.

Michonne and her captured Savior stop at a site that overlooks the Sanctuary. The Savior tells Michonne that they’re all Negan, and to go back home. Michonne kills the Savior and does what she tells Michonne to do–she goes back home!

Rick and Aaron arrive at Alexandria and are greeted by the Saviors demanding Rick and Aaron show them what they got for them.

As Spencer and Negan are talking, Negan already considers Spencer his best friend for telling him that they can play a game of 8 ball outside.
The Saviors find a note written by the person that lived in the lagoon which stated “You win, but you still lose” with a giant middle finger on it! Obviously the Saviors weren’t too happy with this and mercilessly beat Aaron!

As Negan and Spencer played pool, everyone gathered around to watch them play and to see if anything happened. Spencer tells Negan that as the son of the former leader of Alexandria and heir, he wants to be Alexandria’s leader! Spencer says that ever since Rick and friends came along, his brother, mother, and father tragically died. Spencer wants Negan to kill Rick! Growing increasingly agitated, Negan responds that while Rick is out scavenging for Negan and the Saviors for the safety of his people, he waits until Rick is out of site and wishes for a hitman to go after Rick.

Negan is curious why Spencer doesn’t kill Rick himself? Negan concludes that Spencer has no guts; and stabs Spencer causing his guts to spill onto the street in Alexandria! Shocked and full of fear, the people of Alexandria witnessed the bloodiest and most gruesome death in TWD history. What made it more impactful was when Negan took the knife and ripped open Spencer’s guts! Spencer holding his own flesh and guts slowly collapsed onto the ground and died in front of the people of Alexandria! Negan wronged himself saying that Spencer had no guts while there right there staring right at him. Negan demanded for someone to clean the mess up, but Rosita drew her gun and shot her only bullet at Negan!

Rosita’s shot missed Negan, but hit Lucille infuriating Negan! One of Negan’s men threw Rosita to the ground and pointed a knife at her throat and face. Negan said that his men would cut her face if she wouldn’t tell Negan who made the bullet. Rosita said that she did it, which only infuriated Negan even more because she was lying! Negan gave her another chance, and she still lied while Negan’s soldier cut Rosita’s face. Negan ordered his men to kill someone, and the Savior killed Olivia with a single shot Olivia’s glasses and straight in the eye! Negan demands to know who made the bullet, Tara lied and said she made the bullet, but Eugene stopped this mess and told the truth–he made the bullet! Negan took Eugene and stuffed him one of his trucks!

After the fight between the Saviors and Aaron concluded, Rick carried Aaron to where everyone was gathered, and Negan explained to Rick what just happened from Carl invading the Sanctuary to now! Rick asked for them to leave, and Negan and his Saviors left!

Michonne finds Rick in their household cell to tell him that she heard everything that happened, and tells Rick that she doesn’t want to survive the way they are right now–she wants to fight for the greater good of the people they have met throughout their journey.

Rick, Michonne, Carl, Tara, Rosita visited the Hilltop to see Maggie and tell her that they’re ready to fight. Daryl and Jesus are at the Hilltop, and Rick and Daryl hugged it out, which made all of TWD’s fangirls cry! Together, they walk into the Hilltop’s main office to develop a game plan for the “All Out War!”

That concludes the mid-season finale of TWD; I’ll be back in February with my review of the mid-season premiere!

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Before TWD went off the air, they showed viewers a clip of what the second half of season 7 has in store for the audience including a clip of the gang walking out of the Hilltop. Jesus stole a walkie talkie that can communicate from miles away, so they can hear the Savior’s plan. In the meantime, Jesus wants to introduce them to King Ezekiel, an ally for the “All Out War!” Back in Alexandria, the mystery person in combat boots found their way to Alexandria by following Rick and Aaron! This could be the debut of the Whisperers, or the return of Oceanside! What do you think?

For those who are curious what I’ll be doing for the break, I’ll be comparing the episodes of season 7 to the comic book issues relating to season 7.

This is Pedro Vasquez signing off ready for “All Out War!” Ta-Ta Patriots!