‘The Walking Dead’ Recap: Episode 414 — ‘The Grove’

Lizzie’s true nature came out, Carol had to get very brave, there were character deaths, charred walkers and a whole lot of pecans in “The Walking Dead” on Sunday night.

Here’s our blow-by-blow recap of “The Walking Dead” Season 4, Episode 414, “The Grove”

A Kitchen: A bronze kettle is boiling on the stove as old time music plays. Outside the window, two unidentified figures run around the trees.

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The Woods, Nighttime: Hundreds of crickets chirp as Carol and Lizzie talk. “Do you think there’ll be kids at Terminus?” Lizzie ask Carol. Yes, she tells the youngster, if their parents kept them safe. Proving how strong she’s become, Lizzie reveals she saved Tyreese during the prison siege. Later, Carol’s past comes up again as Lizzie asks her if she had kids. “A kid,” Carol explains, thinking of Sophia. “She was sweet. She didn’t have a mean bone in her body.” And that, the two of them realize, is why Sophia isn’t still around.

The Woods, The Next Morning: Walking down the tracks, Tyreese tells Carol that Lizzie is tough. “She’s confused about them – the walkers,” Carol tells Tyreese. “She doesn’t see what they are.” Carol is also worried about Mika who (like her daughter) doesn’t have “a mean bone in her body.”

As they continue on, talk changes to something else. Carol smells something – it’s a fire in the distance. Far enough away not to present danger, Carol and Mika go off to find water. Instead, they find a house, surrounded by a pecan grove.

Lizzie and Tyreese find a walker and the pre-teen screams at Tyreese when he makes a move to kill it after it falls and gets lodged in the tracks. “Sometimes we have to kill them. And I know that. But sometimes, we don’t,” she says.

Near The Stream: Running away from walkers isn’t good enough, Carol tells Mika. She has to learn to fight. Mika is OK with killing walkers, but not people. “I could never do that,” she says, adding, “someone killed Karen and David. They were wrong.” Carol (who actually killed the sick Karen and David) doesn’t buy Mika’s logic. “You have to change now. Things just don’t work out,” she tells the young girl.

Outside The House: Standing near the pecan grove, Carol and Tyreese decide on their plan for clearing the house. They’re barely inside when Lizzie and Mika are attacked by a walker. Lizzie seems paralyzed by fear, but after Carol and Tyreese run out (and Mika shoots it dead), Lizzie starts crying over the walker death. Mika tells her to calm down and to, “look at the flowers like you’re supposed to.”

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At The Dinner Table Inside The House, Nighttime: Lizzie and Carol crack pecans at the kitchen table as Mika runs in with a doll she’s found. It all takes Tyreese by surprise. “I’m not used to this, being in a living room — in a house,” he says. “We should live here,” Mika suggests.

The Kitchen, The Next Day: Carol pours water into the bronze kettle and puts it on the working stove. Looking outside the window she sees a sight that forces her to spring into action – Lizzie is playing chase with a walker (the scene from the show opening). Intervening and saving the child by taking out the walker makes Lizzie mad. “She was my friend and you killed her,” Lizzie screams at Carol while having a breakdown.

A Water Well: Maybe they don’t need to go to Terminus, Tyreese tells Carol. “I know Lizzie and Mika, I know Judith and I know you. I trust you and I don’t know if I can get that anywhere else,” he says.

The Train Tracks: Mika follows her sister to the tracks where she sees Lizzie is feeding the walker, who is lodged into the wood, a mouse. “I can hear them,” Lizzie tells her sister. “They just want me to change, make me be like them. Maybe I should change. I can make you all understand,” Lizzie says. But before she allows herself to be bit by the walker, a small herd of charred walkers emerges from the woods (from the direction of the fire — the house Beth and Daryl burned down, perhaps?). The girls run back and the foursome take care of business – Lizzie too. “You did it,” a relieved Carol tells Lizzie after watching her fire at walkers.

The Dinner Table At The House: To confirm that Lizzie is back on the right path, Carol asks the pre-teen if she understands what walkers are. “I know what I have to do now,” Lizzie replies.

The Groves Outside The House: Standing in the groves, Tyreese has a heart to heart with Carol. He dreams about Karen every night, and it haunts him, he tells her. Carol remains silent, but at times can’t look at Tyreese. “We are who we are. And we do what we do because they’re still here in our heads … The whole world is haunted now and there’s no getting out of that. Not until we’re dead,” he tells her. “Maybe they’re just teaching us. Helping remind us that we can live with what we have to do,” she replies.

Moved, he tells Carol not to be ashamed of who she is. “You did right by those girls. You did right by everyone,” he says embracing her.

The Woods: Carol and Tyreese bond while deer hunting, but as they walk back to the house, they see Lizzie holding a knife, her hand drenched in Mika’s blood. “Don’t worry, she’ll come back. I didn’t hurt her brain,” Lizzie says of her little sister, who she just killed. “I need you to see. You’ll finally get it,” Lizzie says, aiming the gun at Carol and Tyreese when they make a move to come over and grab baby Judith. Lizzie admits she nearly turned Judith too! “We can wait,” Carol says, using all the kindness she can to get Lizzie to put down the gun, which Lizzie does. It’s Carol’s promise not to kill, but to tie Mika up (with her shoelaces) that gets Lizzie to put down the gun and head inside with Tyreese. After they walk away, Carol breaks down, composes herself and pulls out her knife to stop Mika from turning.

The Kitchen Inside The House: Having left Lizzie in her room with nothing she could hurt herself or anyone else with, Tyreese tells Carol the news – he found out Lizzie was the one feeding the walkers at the prison. “I was thinking maybe she killed Karen and David, but I don’t know how she could drag them away,” he says. “She would have let them turn,” Carol replies.

The situation is dire and they know it. “She can’t be around other people,” Carol says, putting her face into her hands.

The Grove Outside The House: Heading out into the grove, Carol suggests Lizzie pick flowers for Mika. “What is it?” Lizzie cries, aware that something is up. “Are you mad at me? Is that what you wanted to talk to me about?” Carol tells Lizzie she loves her and sends her over to “look at the flowers.” Repeating her instructions, Carol slowly draws the gun out of her belt, raises it and fires, as Tyreese watches from the window. Later, Carol and Tyreese bury the two young girls.

The Dinner Table At The House, Nighttime: Carol and Tyreese are seated on opposite sides of the table, a puzzle between them, when Carol slides the gun across the table. “I killed Karen and David. I had to stop the illness from breaking out. I had to stop other people from dying. It wasn’t Lizzie. It wasn’t a stranger, Tyreese. It was me,” she tells him. It shakes him, he cries, and then, he asks Carol some questions. “Did she know what was happening? Was she scared?” Karen didn’t and wasn’t and Tyreese makes up his mind. “I forgive you. I’m never gonna forget. It happened. You did it. You feel it. I know you do. It’s a part of you now. Me too. But I forgive you,” he tells Carol. “Thank you,” she replies.

But this place won’t be their home. “We don’t need to stay here,” he tells Carol. “We can’t stay.”

The next morning, with baby Judith, they all leave together.

“The Walking Dead” airs Sundays at 9 PM ET/PT on AMC.

— Jolie Lash