The Walking Dead: What Does Tonight’s Episode Mean for Rick?

After tonight’s episode, it seems as though there’s a strong likelihood that “the Ricktatorship” is dead, or at least dead as we know it.So far this season, The Walking Dead has been building up Rick. Last year, many fans and critics complained that he was too soft, too indecisive, too willing to compromise and too slow to make the truly hard, brutal decisions that being the hero of a story like The Walking Dead seems to demand.We talked about this once before, actually, in the context that it seemed early on in this season that those days were over.But they may have come crashing back again in the final moments of tonight’s episode, as we saw Rick collapse to the ground sobbing at the loss of his wife (and of what little remained of his son’s innocence).Ironically, as much as the fans demanded that Rick be colder, crueler and more decisive, it was exactly that which cost him his wife–admittedly indirectly, but still.Think back to that second episode, when everyone collectively whooped and said, “That’s what we’ve been asking for!” Rick split Tomas’s skull with a machete and then chased Andrew through the prison, eventually locking him out and leaving him to be consumed by walkers.