The penultimate episode of Fear the Walking Dead’s first season may’ve explained how so many people died in the apocalypse.
Following some professional torture techniques, Daniel made a soldier reveal Operation Cobalt, a plan by the military to leave the people behind. But that wasn’t the only interesting twist in tonight’s Fear. The cold open depicted Doug in a “cell” (a fence) with a smooth-talker named Strand, who broke the family man down and got him carted out of the cell for further treatment. Nick was also in the cell, but Strand was intrigued by the heroine addict.
Strand the man
Nick appeared to have a slight fever, which indicated he may have been infected. When the soldiers tried to pull him out of the cell for further testing, Strand asked the military to keep him there and paid them off with diamonds.
Nick quickly asked Strand about the save, and in this scene we learned the latter’s a supporter of the average man — the people who are street smart, not book smart. He believes Operation Cobalt will be their opportunity… for… something. If you watch Scandal, you may’ve compared him to Rowan: He’s smart and forward-thinking. The season finale might unveil more about Strand, but we expect the show will make us wait for bigger answers in season 2.
Don’t mess with Daniel
With the military not opening up about their plans, Daniel decided that the only way to learn anything was to capture one of the soldiers. He selected Ophelia’s boyfriend as his victim since he’d be the easiest to lure in. Reynolds was uninterested in sharing any information until Daniel pulled out a razor blade and began cutting his arms up (against Madison’s wishes).
It turned out the plan was a good one: Reynolds revealed that Operation Cobalt is a plan for the soldiers to leave Los Angeles and its residents behind.
This massive plan that’ll change the city forever? It’s going down tomorrow morning.
Is this why much of the population disappeared, as we see in The Walking Dead? The military gave up and ran away? Neither apocalypse drama has explained how the population decreased so rapidly, so this may be our answer (Or at least one of them).
Danger afoot
The soldiers came around to Mayor Travis’s request to see his family in the hospital. They took him out on the open road where they encountered a zombie. Finally! We hadn’t seen one in two weeks. Unfortunately, the soldiers decided to have “fun” with the walker by making a game out of killing it. The lead soldier tried asking Travis to shoot the walker, but naturally he refused.
There’s more to Travis’s thinking here: Not only is he still in denial about the apocalypse, he’s a family man who cares deeply about the human race. Unlike the soldiers who lacked empathy, Travis wanted to believe people could be cured of whatever had cursed them.
After knocking out the walker swiftly the soldiers came across a patch of walkers on their way into the hospital. They left Travis in the car for his own good. “No matter what, stay in the truck” one soldier warned him. You’d assume you’d know how this is going to go, but Travis isn’t much of a fighter — He stayed in the car as he was told.
A soldier eventually made it back to Travis’ truck and turned them back to safety. The plan to find Travis’ family was over — They needed to head back to the safe zone!
Fireworks for Alicia and Chris?
As Chris reeled from his mother leaving the family to take care of others, Alicia and Chris had a night out on the town. They broke into a neighbor’s house and played dress up. But unlike dress up in the real world, this dress up involved trashing the person’s house. Love seems to be in the air for these two. They’re definitely the young rebels of the group.
Dr. Liza
Speaking of Liza, Chris’s mom is a doctor-in-training at the hospital. She watched Griselda pass away of her illness and had to witness Dr. Exner shoot her brains out before she became a walker. The kill was quick and clean thanks to the gun which was normally reserved for livestock.
Next week…
Like the first season of The Walking Dead, the first season of Fear is only 6 episodes. We’re hoping to see a lot of action as the military (presumably) leaves town and Strand puts his plan into action with Nick.
Now that Nick is due to break free, we expect he’ll be united with Madison and Alicia. The big question now is: Will the family stay in town or go?
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