If you would have told me back in season two of The Walking Dead that by season five, Beth would get her own episode, I would have said, “Who? Oh, right, that blonde girl who never talks or does anything.”
And yet, here we are in season five with Beth getting an entire episode completely devoted to her own plotline, as she navigates the feudal system of a hospital in one of the series’ most creepy offerings, despite being brightly lit and full of non-dead humans most of the time.
Beth’s storyline represents yet another facet of the Scott Gimple tenure as Walking Dead showrunner, where a good story can be pulled out of nearly anything, including relatively obscure characters. Over time, Beth has been built up from background character to nanny to fully fledged member of the team, perhaps culminating in her pairing with Daryl in a few memorable season four episodes.
Now, she had an entire episode of arguably the most popular show on TV right now all to herself. That’s quite an accomplishment for Emily Kinney, the nearly 30 year old actress who has everyone believing she’s no more than 15 on the show.
In last night’s episode, Gimple uses Beth as a symbol for what power has become in the new era of the apocalypse. The entire premise of the hospital set-up is that only the weak are saved under the system. The women (and some men like Noah) are abused (sexually or otherwise) in return for “protection” from the police force and as payment for their rescue and the resources they consume.
But placing Beth, arguably the most seemingly fragile member of The Walking Dead crew, in the situation, only to have her kill her attempted rapist, a dozen walkers and help another pseudo-prisoner to safety shows that the traditional definitions of “weak” don’t really apply any more.
This is the kind of nuance that the show hasn’t really explored up until recently. Previously, The Walking Dead cast was largely separated into the traditionally strong and the traditionally weak. “Badass” members like Rick, Daryl and Michonne protected “weak” members like Lori, Beth, Carol and so on.
But between the premiere and this episode, the show is really trying to give its “weak” characters, usually women, a type of strength they’ve never seen before. The premiere of season five of The Walking Dead had Carol, who in early seasons was best known for moaning endlessly about her lost daughter, singlehandedly destroying Terminus and freeing her entire group. Now, she’s clearly been sent into the hospital as a sort of plant to take down the system from the inside.
This is quite a turn of events, as now the show’s formerly two weakest characters, Beth and Carol, will now pair up to take down an organized system of strong, armed male cops. Granted, Daryl is probably going to show up with his crossbow and assist as well, but the fact that these two characters have been allowed to actually grow is something that has really aided in getting The Walking Dead from mediocre, to good, to great. It’s evolving before our eyes.
The show isn’t abandoning weakness entirely either, however, but it is finally allowing weak characters to be men. In this season alone we’ve met father Gabriel, the cowardly priest, and in this past episode, Noah essentially leaves Beth behind even after she risks everything to save him. He may be the one bringing back help, but still, he’s been set up as a relatively weak character (though he would have you believe he’s stronger than you’d think). The show doesn’t need to eliminated weakness, but it is nice to see it’s changing how its portrayed.
I have a feeling the next two episodes of The Walking Dead are going to be pretty intense as the situation at the hospital unravels now that Carol’s inside. A Beth/Carol team-up in season two probably would have made for the most annoying episode in the show’s history, and been deemed filler. But now? The characters are miles away from how they once were, and everyone is looking forward to seeing them burn yet another corrupt mini-society to the ground.
[Photos via AMC]
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