‘The Walking Dead’ Recap: Season 6, Episode 7 – ‘Heads Up’

Sunday night’s “The Walking Dead” was the episode fans had been waiting for. 

(Spoiler alert! This
is a recap, and recounts what happened on Sunday’s show! This is your last
chance to look away!)

Four weeks after the hit AMC show left viewers hanging, wondering
what happened to Glenn Rhee (Steven Yeun), the show gave us an answer. 

PHOTOS: ‘The Walking Dead’: More Pics From Season 6

Here’s what happened on “The Walking Dead” Season
6, Episode 7 – “Heads Up”: 

It’s a rewind to events of four weeks ago, when the episode
opens — to a black screen. “Thank you,” we hear Nicholas saying. As the
picture fades in, we see Nicholas fall, taking Glenn to the ground. Glenn writhes
in physical and emotional pain. And then we learn Glenn’s fate (as moving piano music plays). If you had Glenn-crawls-under-the-dumpster-to-safety in the
office pool, prepare to do a victory dance on Monday, because that’s exactly
what he does as Nicholas’ torso is ripped apart by walkers (Nicholas fell on
top of Glenn). Although a few walkers try and paw at Glenn under the dumpster, he
kills them with his knife and they provide a blockade of sorts from the others
trying to get at him. And then there’s an aluminum food can that somehow rolls
past the walkers near the entrance to the alleyway, distracting a large number
of them away from Glenn’s hiding spot.

READ: ‘The Walking Dead’: Steven Yeun Speaks Out (Finally)!

Glenn stays in the spot overnight. In the morning, he crawls
out and sucks down the tiny drops left in a water bottle. “Hey, heads
up!” someone shouts at him from a rooftop above, as they toss a water
bottle to him (it breaks on the concrete) — Enid! “Sh**,” she says
as it breaks. “I said, ‘Heads up,'” she says before disappearing. Glenn
jumps inside an open window nearby to try and find her. 

“There’s another water bottle in the corner, take it
and go,” Enid says, from her hiding spot. Glenn grabs it and takes several
swigs, looking over the place. She’s been staying here.

“What happened in Alexandria? We heard that sound. The
gunfire?” Glenn asks. “What happens is what always happens — people
die,” Enid replies. He gets no reply when he asks her if the walkers broke
through the walls or if his wife, Maggie, is all right. Enid is on her way out
of there, sprinting down an alley. Glenn goes after her.

Back at Alexandria, Rick is busy with his daily check of the
walls. He sees Morgan practicing Aikido, and Maggie atop the wall, waiting for
a sign. “You don’t have to be up here so much,” Rick tells her.
“When we go out there, it’s never easy, it’s never simple, it’s always a
fight. We’ve come back from harder things, from further away. Glenn, Abraham,
Daryl and Sasha – they will too,” he tells her. Instead of waiting, Rick
has an idea — they should work on clearing the walkers so their friends can “walk
right in” when they get back. 

But first, Rick has some training to attend to. Despite Jessie’s request, Rick, with the help of Carl,
is giving Ron a gun lesson. “You’ve got to be strong enough to wait for
your moment,” Carl tells Ron, as Rick talks to the young man about aim (this is a
bad idea!). Since he’s practicing with an unloaded gun, Ron asks if they can
use silencers so he can do some real target practice, but he’s met with an
are-you-joking look from Rick.

Once gun training for the day is complete, Rick finds Morgan
(who has been hinting to Denise about some medical stuff he needs help with)
and says the two should talk. Five people with W’s on their foreheads tried to
kill him when he was at the RV, Rick tells Morgan, as they sit inside a house.
“Carol says she saw you — that you wouldn’t kill those people?” Rick
says. “Did you let any of them go?” Carol asks, as we quickly see she
and Michonne are part of this conversation too. Morgan tries to explain his
philosophy, about how people can change and “all life is precious.”

“That idea changed me, it brought me back and it keeps
me living,” he tells them. “Things aren’t as simple as four words. I
don’t think they ever were,” Michonne responds. “Making it now, do
you really think you can do that without getting blood on your hands?” Rick
asks. “I don’t know,” Morgan replies.

On a porch a short while later, Michonne and Rick discuss
the herd, which is continuing to put pressure on the walls and tower at
Alexandria, which is starting to crack. Rick suggests his gang can get to work
on the problem, but Michonne thinks all of them – including the Alexandrians
need to be involved.

Somewhere outside of Alexandria, Enid is taking a breather
in what was once a diner. She opens the door to see if the coast is clear
before her next move, but there are walkers outside. A hand covers her mouth
and yanks her back inside – it’s Glenn. “What the hell are you
doing?” she demands to know, once the door is shut. “I’m taking you
home,” he tells her. Maggie wouldn’t want him to leave Enid behind, Glenn
tells her. Enid, though, isn’t going anywhere and she pulls a gun on Glenn. He
manages to disarm her quickly, and explains they have to get back fast – half
the herd broke off and are headed toward their home.

Glenn’s a little out of date on his information for obvious
reasons. As we know and the Alexandrians know, the herd is already there
and continuing to cause major damage on the walls and the crumbling tower. Rick
isn’t about to let the walls fall, so he’s got his hammer and nails out, as he
tries to reinforce it with some cut wood. Tobin sees him working away and jumps
in to lend a hand.

As Enid and Glenn get closer to Alexandria, she kills a
walker, and then spots some balloons that were put out earlier as a marker for
those moving the herd. She grabs them and tells Glenn she can use them to
distract walkers. It’s a good idea and so Glenn lets her know there’s a helium
tank, more balloons and string nearby.

Back at Alexandria, as they work on the wall, Tobin tells
Rick that he terrified them when he first came to Alexandria with that beard
and “the way you looked around like you were seeing things we weren’t,
hiding around the corners.” “Turns out you were. Things moved slow
here, and then things just started moving fast, too fast. But don’t give up on
us,” Tobin says. 

On the road, as Enid blows up more balloons, Glenn asks her about who she stayed with back at Alexandria. Olivia, she
tells him, but that place is not her home. “I get that you’re scared,” he
tells her. “You don’t want to lose anything again, so you give up and say
that’s just what happens. … You honor the dead by going on, even when you’re
scared. You live because they don’t get to,” he tells her. When he brings
up her parents though, Enid grows quiet, and tells him they don’t have to talk.

Speaking of Olivia, she’s in the pantry at Alexandria, reading a hefty book when she hears a strange noise.
Walking around the corner, she sees some cans have fallen over – only, we find out it wasn’t an accident. It was Ron! While Olivia cleans up the mess, Ron tip-toes
into the armory and grabs bullets for his gun.

A short while later, Glenn and Enid finally make it to Alexandria’s walls. After seeing the terrifying herd outside the gates, Enid tries to
bolt, but Glenn stops her. “The world is trying to die. We’re supposed to
just let it,” she says. “No, you’re wrong. We’re not supposed to let
the world die and I’m sure as hell not going to let you die. … The walls are
still up, the houses are still up. We’ll find out the rest, OK?” he tells
her. Glenn’s words get through and Enid decides to stick around – for now. 

Back inside Alexandria, Rick and Tobin are walking along the fence when they spot Spencer doing something dangerous. Deanna’s son is trying to crawl across a rope that could take him outside the
walls. Rick runs over and shouts at Spencer to crawl back to safety, while
Tara, from a nearby post, tries to shout instructions to help him too. But
Spencer’s weight is too much for the rope, and he falls to the ground outside
of Alexandria. Immediately, Tara jumps on a ledge outside the wall to get
better aim as she fires at the walkers who move toward Spencer. Rick grabs the rope
and tries to pull him up. Tobin jumps in and grabs the rope too. Tara manages
to take out enough walkers to save Spencer from being bit as
Rick, Tobin and Morgan (who jumps in too) pull him to safety.

“Tara, you almost died once for these people. What the
hell were you doing?” Rick screams at Tara, who replies by giving him the
finger. Rick then turns his anger to Spencer, who reveals he was trying to get
to a car to distract the herd away from Alexandria. “You wanna help, don’t
make us come running to save you,” Rick says, telling Spencer to come to
him next time he has an idea like that.

With Spencer now safe, Morgan heads back to the medical
ward, where he speaks to Denise, asking questions about how to tell if a wound
is infected. He hints he’s got a situation to take care of, but doesn’t want to get her
involved. Denise decides to come with him anyway. Carol spots the two of them
walking somewhere and immediately is suspicious. She follows them for a bit,
but then heads to Jessie’s to ask her to take care of baby Judith. While she
waits for Jessie, a scared Sam (who is still upstairs in his mom’s house) asks
Carol about the monsters. “If you kill people, do you turn into one of the
monsters?” he asks her. “The only thing that keeps you from becoming
a monster is killing,” Carol replies (as she probably has a flashback to
her conversation with Morgan from earlier) . Jessie comes back in, Carol hands her Judith and walks to where she last saw Morgan. He meets her at the door to the place he
is keeping the wolf. “Who the hell do you have in that cell?” she
asks him. 

Out on the quiet streets of Alexandria, Carl is walking
along, hat on. He’s being followed by Ron, who reaches into the back of his
belt and begins to pull out the gun. 

Before we find out what happens next, we catch up with Rick,
who apologizes to Tara. “I’m sorry about before… I just meant, what you
did for him — you didn’t have to. You could have died,” he says.
“We’re stuck with each other, right?” Tara tells him. Deanna thanks
Rick for helping to save her son, but the moment is interrupted by something in
the sky. Everyone – including Maggie — looks up and sees green
balloons. Maggie runs down the road to Rick. “That’s Glenn! That’s
Glenn,” she says. Rick nods. And then, the tower that has been crumbling
all day under the weight of the herd, falls, knocking over a portion of
Alexandria’s wall. 

“The Walking Dead” midseason finale airs next
Sunday night at 9 PM ET/PT on AMC.

— Jolie Lash