The Walking Dead: “I Ain’t A Judas” Episode Recap

Their security threatened, Rick and the group must make a choice. With Woodbury in a police state, Andrea grows uneasy.”I Ain’t A Judas”Rick begins the episode by insisting through gritted teeth that they’re not leaving the prison. Except for Glenn, everyone seems to disagree with him…most especially Merle, who is locked up on the other side of the same doors we’d previously seen Tyreese’s group confined to.He warns the group that simple cover isn’t enough to protect them–that Woodbury has the guns and the numbers necessary to simply surround the prison and starve them out.Hershel insists it’s time to leave, and when Rick tries to walk out, he demands that Rick come back, saying that now Rick has to step up and lead.Rick responds by heading out to the gates, where he can see dozens of walkers lining up around the inner gate (since the outer one is compromised by the panel truck). He looks through binoculars into the woods, where he sees someone hiding behind a tree, but doesn’t have time to identify them before he hears Carl coming.Carl tells Rick that he doesn’t believe Rick should be leading the group anymore, saying that Hershel and Daryl should handle it, as Rick deserves a rest.Back in Woodbury, Milton and the Governor are preparing to amass an army, with Milton estimating that there are 35 people ready to train above the age of thirteen. Andrea joins them, and immediately confronts him about his trip to the prison. She doesn’t have the details but, since they lost people, knows that there was a confrontation and turns on Milton, accusing him of withholding the information when they talked about the Governor’s whereabouts earlier. He claims that he’d been informed this morning.Andrea tells the Governor that she’s going to go see the survivors at the prison and that she’ll negotiate a ceasefire, going with the Governor’s claim that Rick’s group is aggressive. He further informs her that they’re training all the able-bodied citizens of Woodbury to defend themselves.She asks for a single car to take her out and back, but the Governor rejects it, saying that the roads are blocked and even his group barely made it back.When she prepares to leave, he tells her that if she goes to the prison, she’s not welcome back.Outside, she’s stopped in the street by a mother worried about her fourteen-year-old son being trained to go to battle; when she tells Martinez that he’s supposed to be training people for defense, not raising an army, he tells her that there’s no difference.Back in the prison, the group is debating the strategies they have available, saying that there’s no way to reinforce the fence without burning through their ammunition taking out walkers along the way. Glenn objects, saying that their options are limited since Merle now presents a threat from within, to which Daryl takes exception and storms off.Glenn, who finds himself rejected as he tells Rick and Hershel that they have to get rid of Merle, suggests that delivering him to the Governor in exchange for a truce might be a path forward.In his quarters, Merle is duct taping a shiv to his stump when Hershel approaches him. They exchange stories about how they lost their respective limbs, with Hershel producing a Bible to quote from it, with Merle completing the verses for him.Merle tells Hershel that when the Governor returns, his first priority will be the ones he knows, followed by the rest of the survivors to punish Rick, who he’ll kill last.At Woodbury, the Governor is appraising his potential recruits, trying to keep up his magnanimous face.In his cell, Carol goes to see Daryl, telling him she’s glad he’s back. She tells him that the prison is their home, but Daryl tells her it’s a tomb. She tells him that’s what T-Dog said, and she believed him until hers and Daryl’s relationship started to take shape. She tells him not to let Merle bring him down.At the Woodbury gates, Andrea asks Milton again whether he knew anything about the prison, and he again denies it. She tells him that he has to cover for her while she goes to the prison, and that the Governor can’t know. Milton tells her he can’t risk the Governor finding that out. She tells him that all she wants to do is stop what’s happening before more people get killed.The next shot is of the Governor, removing his makeshift, bandaged eyepatch and attempting to cauterize the wound with a lit match, but losing nerve. Milton knocks and before he enters, the Governor turns and puts on a “permanent” eyepatch. Milton tells her that she’s going to the prison and has requested his help in escaping. The Governor tells him to help her, and then tells Milton good work.In the woods, a walker with a deformed jaw is stumbling through the trees when he passes Milton and Andrea, camped out around a large tree. Milton has one of the tools that the Woodbury residents used to corral the walkers, and jumps out from around the tree to grab the zombie with it. When the zombie moves toward him too quickly, Andrea leaps out and pins it down, asking Milton to pin it down from behind while she removes its hands with a hatchet. Picking up a rock, she puts it under the walker’s head and stomps it, face-down, into the rock, breaking its teeth off. When another walker makes toward them, she kills it, and they get the original walker on a leash, only to be accosted by another walker. Tyreese takes that one out, coming out of nowhere.In the prison, Merle approaches Michonne, who is working out. He attempts small talk, but she ignores him altogether. He tells her that he hopes they can get past their history together, saying that it was just “business.”Back in the woods, Milton offers to bring Tyreese’s group to Woodbury, despite Andrea’s reservations. Andrea makes her way through the woods with the incapacitated walker, rejecting Tyreese’s offer of help.Back at the lookout, Carl is watching through the binoculars when he sees Andrea and her pet approaching. He calls Maggie over, telling her that there’s something weird, but Maggie identifies Andrea before she pulls the trigger and tells Carl to get Rick and the others.Making her way through the yard with her pet, Andrea starts to be noticed by some of the walkers and has to kill one to remain ahead of the pack; Rick and the others take up a military formation and demand to know she’s alone before they allow her entry. She doesn’t answer, exasperated with the question. They let her into the prison, but immediately force her against the fence and tell her to get her hands up. Finally she tells Rick that she’s alone, at which point he welcomes her back and pulls her inside.In the prison, Andrea is quickly embraced by Carol, even while nobody else in the room much seems to trust her. She’s shocked to see Hershel’s leg, and generally seems shocked by the group. Rick has to tell her that Shane is gone, but Hershel breaks the news about Lori and Carol chimes in about T-Dog.Rick and Hershel take turns explaining to Andrea how the confrontation in the previous episode went down, to Andrea’s growing disbelief. She’s also stunned by the fact that they distrust her, even while Merle is allowed to stay at the prison. She tells them that they have to work it out, and Rick says that there’s nothing to work out–they’re going to kill the Governor. Merle tells her that she knows better than that and Hershel, trying to be the voice of reason, asks Andrea whether the Governor has expressed interest in negotiation. She tells him no, and warns them that Woodbury is training to attack. She warns them that they need to try and negotiate, and Rick tells her that if she wants help, get him inside Woodbury. When she says no, he says they have nothing to talk about.Outside, Andrea accuses Michonne of poisoning the group against Woodbury, with Michonne telling Andrea that she was under the Governor’s spell. Andrea says that Woodbury needs her, and that she’s trying to save the prison.”I didn’t know the messiah complex was contagious,” Michonne says, earning her (in this writer’s opinion) the best line so far of the season.As Andrea spins to leave, Michonne reveals that the Governor sent Merle and others to kill her, saying that he would have sent them after Andrea, too, had Andrea joined Michonne in attempting to leave. She said that the fact that Andrea “chose a warm bed over a friend” was the reason she went back to Woodbury to expose the Governor.Back at Woodbury, the Governor joins Tyreese’s people in his apartment, offering food, shelter and medical equipment but saying that they can’t offer any weapons or transportation as everything is rationed in preparation to defend themselves against attackers. He tells them that when they leave Woodbury, they should head west, avoiding the north, and the group says that’s where they came from–from the prison. This piques the Governor’s interest, and he asks about Rick. Tyreese and his people tell the Governor and Milton that they’ll join the fight against Rick if that’s what it takes to earn their keep. Milton asks for help mapping the layout of the prison, and Tyreese says he can try to help, but the Governor tells him to take the night, sleep on it.Back at the prison, Andrea meets Carol and holds Judith, asking what happened to Lori. Carol told her the story, and the story of losing Shane; this leads Andrea to believe that Rick is cold and unstable. Carol tells her that she needs to seduce and murder the Governor.Outside the gates, they give Andrea a car and enough rations to send her on her way, and everyone stands around in silence as she leaves. Before she can turn the key, though, Rick hands her a gun and a clip, telling her to be careful.That night, as she returns to Woodbury, she’s greeted at the gate by more than a half-dozen well-armed guards. They realize that it’s Andrea and allow her entry into the town, where she visits the Governor in his apartment, telling her where she’s been. She reports back on the conditions at the prison, playing down the degree to which they’re a threat, and telling the Governor that she came back of her own free will. He asks why, and she doesn’t have an immediate answer. He tells her that it’s because she belongs in Woodbury, and the two embrace and begin to kiss.Back at the prison, Rick is holding Judith while the rest of the group is sitting around a little makeshift “fire” made of their lanterns when Beth begins to sing. Rick joins them, followed by Merle. Andrea’s presence has them rattled, with Rick telling Daryl that he’s going on a run, but that Daryl can’t join him because he needs someone to keep an eye on Merle. He plans on bringing Michonne and Carl.Outside, Carl is peering through the lookout as walkers swarm lazily through the outer yard. In Woodbury, things are on alert everywhere except in the Governor’s bed, where Andrea digs a knife out of her bag but can’t bring herself to do anything with it.