It’s not particularly controversial to suggest that The Walking Dead is somewhat past its prime, but there are still many who enjoy the beleaguered tales of post-apocalyptic survival no matter now drawn out they are. However, the latest episode had a hard time pleasing even them, evidenced by it having become the lowest-rated outing of the entire series.
Out of the 152 installments ranked on IMDb, ”Diverged,” season 10’s 21st and the fifth of the half-dozen bonus tales acting as an extended coda, is languishing in last place with 4.5/10, a considerable drop from the next one up, the 5.2 of the previous episode “Splinter,” demonstrating just how much it failed to resonate with viewers.
Ever since season 4 when the writers finally figured out what to do with Carol, she’s consistently been one of the series’ highlights, with her uncompromising nature and stoic badassery making for compelling viewing in both character development and action scenes. She’s always been someone with a plan no matter the situation, too, so it’s beyond frustrating to watch her utterly at a loss as to how to prove useful, spending her time wandering around trying to gather ingredients to make a pot of soup as though she’s just stumbled into some minor RPG fetch quest, then trying to catch a rat invading the kitchen. It’s like something you’d see on a third-rate Robot Chicken sketch rather than an official episode in some way intended to advance things towards this week’s season finale.
What was once essential and appointment viewing for many, The Walking Dead has become something often only stuck with out of a sense of begrudged obligation. And if there are many more episodes like this one, it’ll be a long haul to see it through to the end after having made it this far.
