Fear the Walking Dead season 4 episode 11 review: The Code

Morgan is unsure about returning to Virginia, when a trio of new faces comes along to cause more problems than he expected.

As I expected from the events of last week’s episode, we’re going to have a few upcoming ones dedicated to each of the Fear the Walking Dead survivors and what happened to them when the storm hit.

For Morgan, he was lucky enough to come across a semi-truck to take shelter as the wind and rain picked up. Then again, luck like that usually comes at a price — and we’ll get into that in a moment.

Morgan hides out in the truck, eating a few protein bars and falling right asleep. When he wakes up and exits the truck, he realizes he is no longer in Texas but miles and miles away in Mississipi. Admittedly, this is a bit of a stretch. If Morgan was in a semi-truck overnight, even if he was pretty sleepy, you’d think he’d have realized the car was moving?

Well, with that mystery very much up in the air, Morgan gets out of the truck to find himself outside a little convenience store. Inside, the place is very well stocked with food, water and other supplies. Then there’s a radio, with a mystery woman on the other end calling in. Morgan introduces himself and quickly asks what the heck this place is supposed to be.

All he’s told is to take what he needs and leave the rest. We get a little montage of Morgan sipping on some cheap coffee, perusing the supplies, and for a very awkward moment, we get a fantastic image of Morgan using the bathroom. Granted, bathrooms may have existed in places like Alexandria, the Hilltop, heck even the Sanctuary. But what Morgan finds here is there’s running water to go with it.

While Morgan has made this incredible bathroom discovery, his “alone” time is interrupted.

He opens the stall door to find one of the first three new faces on tonight’s episode — Wendell, a handicapped, rifle-wielding, sassy-mouthed individual. The two have a humorous bit that is called back to throughout the episode; Wendell likes to aim his gun at certain areas any man would get nervous about.

His compadre is Sarah, and the two put on this fairly convincing facade that they’re truck drivers who’ve been helping people out by leaving boxes of supplies on the side of the road. They also have an affinity for sarcastic nicknames, calling themselves “twins.” Sarah and Wendell seem nice, but per usual with this show, nice does not last long at all.

Mo Collins as Sarah, Daryl Mitchell as Wendell – Fear the Walking Dead _ Season 4, Episode 11 – Photo Credit: Ryan Green/AMC

Morgan leaves Sarah and Wendell, saying he’s going to go back to Texas to help his friends. But not long into his journey, Morgan thinks twice about diving back into the emotional and physical drama that was Alicia and the others. He reaches out to Sarah and Wendell over the two-way radio, saying a bridge is out so he can’t continue back to Texas. Only the bridge isn’t out, and Morgan is deciding to just abandon his newfound friends to go back to his old ones.

Morgan tells Sarah and Wendell the lie about the bridge, to which Sarah replies “I know helping those people meant a lot to you.” That cuts Morgan deep, but he still decides to stick with his lie and go back.

Do I buy this struggle Morgan is putting on? Not really. It’s a good struggle for the episode to focus on, but in the end, he can’t just abandon people anymore. That was the old Morgan, and the new Morgan isn’t about to be consumed with that guilt.

But before he can realize that, he’s going to have to go through a bit of an ordeal thanks to Sarah, Wendell, and one more new face, Jim. Morgan finds Jim, a brewery owner, on his way back to  the “twins.”

When Jim realizes just who Morgan is returning to, he panics, and surprise, surprise — Sarah and Wendell weren’t to be trusted. They apparently found the owner of the semi-truck, who was doing a good thing by leaving supplies on the road, and swiftly took the truck and ditched the owner. Sarah tells Morgan that if you can’t protect what is yours, then you don’t deserve to have it in the first place. This goes against an earlier “code” Wendell says the two were abiding by, a code to help those in need when they need it.

Now up until this point, Morgan had been doing something pretty foolish. He told Sarah, Wendell and Jim about Virginia and the communities that were growing there. Obviously, Sarah and Wendell want to go there, likely to plunder more supplies, and Jim is a peaceful prisoner, down to go along on the trip. He has a whole speech about how as a brewery owner, he feels his knowledge of beer will bring people together because beer has helped society so much in the past. It was a speech that didn’t offer much to the grander plot of this episode, and to me, felt like a monologue given to a new character who we’re supposedly trying to connect with.

Back to Morgan and his ignorance — he really shouldn’t have told anyone about Virginia. After a clumsy incident with Jim falling over trying to salvage brewery supplies from being tossed out, Morgan is knocked down into a riverbed with a bunch of walkers. He manages to get on top of a car, where he stands trapped, forced to give directions to Alexandria.

Sarah and Wendell, along with Jim, take the instructions and abandon Morgan. Into the night, Mogan pleads over the radio for them to come back. He then admits the reason he didn’t want to go back to Texas — he’s a coward, and he felt if he went back, he’d have made things worse for everyone. As he realizes no one is going to come back to help him, Morgan has to find the strength in himself to escape.

He jumps off the car, struggles but successfully finds a knife to take down the walkers around him, and gets back on the road again. That knife was apart of a box of supplies, left by the former semi-truck owner no doubt. Morgan gets back on the radio to tell Sarah and Wendell not everything left on the side of the road is useless, as one of those boxes just saved his life.

Surprisingly, Morgan is able to meet up with Sarah and Wendell on the road. Despite everything they just put him through, he tells them he’ll help them get to Virginia. But they have to agree to leaving supplies on the side of the road, as the former owner did, and they have to help him find his friends.

As Morgan and this new trio head back to Texas, Morgan talks over the radio to the original truck owner. He tells him or her that they’re bringing the truck back and will be looking out for them on the road.

On the other end of the conversation, we see a finger turn off the radio back at that Mississipi mart. We see yet another new face to Fear, a mysterious woman who we assume is that original truck owner. She’s definitely creepy, writing a message on the side of a walker’s face with a sharpie kind of creepy.

On a danger scale of 1 to 10, our trucker “twins” and brewery bro are a 5, maybe a 6. Morgan could easily take them all out if need be. As for this mystery woman though? Drawing on walkers and laughing about it gives us a whole bunch of nasty vibes.

Beware, Morgan. Beware.

Undead Afterthoughts

• Morgan’s surprise landing in Mississipi is pretty unbelievable, even for Walking Dead standards. We hope there’s less of these kinds of wacky storylines. Yes, it’s a show but even that seemed a bit much to comprehend.
• I wish Sarah and Wendell could show up at Rick’s door, acting like they’re going to pillage the place. Rick took out Negan, so a semi-truck and some guns are not threatening. #BloodyRick!
• Morgan seems to have lost his touch a bit. I know he is on a more peaceful path, but opening up that much about Alexandria and the other Virginia communities was a rookie mistake.
• Granted, Morgan also was able to admit he was a coward for lying about the bridge and not wanting to initially go back to save his friends. So… growth.

Fear the Walking Dead airs Sundays at 8 p.m. CT on AMC.