Welcome to the Tombs

Welcome to the Tombs is the sixteenth and final episode of Season 3 of AMC's The Walking Dead. It originally aired on March 31, 2013 at 9/8c on AMC.

The episode shattered the zombie drama's own ratings record yet again, scoring 12.4 million total viewers in its initial 9 p.m. broadcast and 8.1 million in the advertiser-coveted adults 18-49 demographic. The numbers represent series bests in total viewers and in the demographic.

Plot Synopsis
The Governor brutally beats Milton for torching the pit of walkers. Milton wonders what Penny would think of her father now. "She'd be afraid of me," The Governor admits. "But if I'd been like this from the start, she'd be alive today." Milton then asks what became of Andrea and if she was still alive. The Governor then brings Milton into his torture chamber, where Andrea is bound to the chair. He declares his plans to kill everyone at the prison. Andrea pleads with the Governor to stop all of this but he ignores her.

The Governor orders Milton to gather his tools and kill Andrea, but Milton instead attacks The Governor. The Governor overpowers Milton and stabs him in the gut. "Now you're gonna die and you're gonna turn, and you're gonna tear the flesh from her bones," he tells Milton before leaving the room, "In this life, you kill or you die... Or you die and you kill".

Meanwhile, Rick and the survivors pack up the prison and load supplies into the cars. Rick tries to talk to Carl, but Carl ignores him. Looking up to the catwalk, Rick sees a hallucination of Lori staring back at him. As Daryl mourns his brother, Carol praises Merle for improving their odds against The Governor. In the cell block, Michonne forgives Rick for considering The Governor's offer and thanks him for allowing her into the group.

Back in Woodbury, The Governor assembles his troops. Soldiers pile into military trucks and a other vehicles. Tyreese informs The Governor that he and Sasha will not join the fight, stating that "this isn't their fight", but offers to stay behind to guard the women and children. After a tense moment, The Governor consents. The Governor and his soldiers arrive at the prison, where they destroy the guard towers, mow down the walkers in the prison yard and storm the cell block. But they find no sign of Rick's group.

Back in the torture chamber, Milton slumps against the wall and tells Andrea that he secretly left a pair of pliers by her feet. He tells her to stab him in the head once she cuts herself free.

Meanwhile, The Governor splits up his troops to investigate the dark prison corridors (known as the "tombs"). Smoke grenades go off and the prison alarm sounds. Walkers attack The Governor's men, forcing them to retreat outside where Glenn and Maggie ambush them with gunfire. The Governor's army quickly flees the prison.

In Woodbury, Tyreese checks in on the women and children. He and Sasha agree they may have to slip out when The Governor returns as they are unsure of The Governor's intentions. Milton asks Andrea why she stayed in Woodbury after learning her friends were alive. "I wanted to save everyone," she says. "Even The Governor, for a while." He urges her to hurry with the pliers. She removes her shoes and tries to grab them with her bare feet.

Back at the prison, Hershel, Beth, and Carl watch the battle from the adjacent forest. A teenage boy from Woodbury escaping on foot runs into them. After being explicitly told to put the gun down, the boy instead insists on handing it to Carl and moves towards him, to which Carl responds by shooting him. Rick and the others decide to chase down The Governor. Carl tells Rick he wants to fight, then brags about killing one of The Governor's soldiers. Hershel clarifies that the "soldier" was just a scared boy on the run. "He drew on us," Carl insists.

Meanwhile, The Governor halts the retreating caravan in the middle of the road. "What the hell are you doing?" he screams. The Woodbury residents refuse to fight, insisting the prison is not worth their lives. Enraged, The Governor finally shows his true self to his once loyal followers. He coldly opens fire without a second thought and slaughters them as they try to run, as Martinez and Shumpert watch in horror. Allen, being the last soldier standing (not including Karen, who is hiding underneath a corpse), points his gun at The Governor in a desperate panic, but is easily taken down with a shot to the head. The Governor, out of ammo, gets in his truck and motions to Martinez and Shumpert. They reluctantly get in.

Back in the torture chamber, Andrea manages to grab the pliers with her toes but then drops them. Milton is now dead, but his fingers start to move.

As they prepare for pursuit, Rick again asks Carl about the shooting. Carl admits the Woodbury boy had surrendered. Still, he says, "I couldn't take the chance," pointing out that Dale died because he couldn't kill the walker stuck in the mud, Lori died because Rick didn't kill Andrew, and Merle died because Rick didn't kill The Governor, even though he was in a room with him alone.

Glenn and Maggie offer to help guard the prison in case The Governor returns. Rick, Michonne, and Daryl leave in pursuit of The Governor. Rick's group finds the aftermath of The Governor's roadside massacre. Karen, the lone survivor having hidden in one of the abandoned trucks approaches them with her hands raised.

Meanwhile, Milton slowly rises as a reanimated walker. He shuffles toward Andrea, who manages to cut through her bonds with the pliers just as Milton reaches her. Their screams echo through the hall.

Tyreese and Sasha are standing guard at Woodbury's gate when Rick's group arrives with Karen. They get into a little gunfight, until Karen explains to Tyreese how The Governor killed everyone and tells him to stand down. Rick mentions that Andrea never made it to the prison, and suggests she could still be in Woodbury. They head to the interrogation room and notice a pool of blood under the door.

Inside, Milton lies dead and Andrea huddles against the wall. Michonne rushes to her aid, with Rick behind her. Andrea tells Rick how she had tried to stop them. "You're burning up." Michonne says to Andrea, who exhales and pulls her coat away from her collarbone to reveal a bite wound from Milton. Michonne cries as Andrea apologizes for her actions and insists on shooting herself. "I know how the safety works," she says as she asks for Rick's gun, musing at the first survival tip he gave to her. Rick lets her know that she is one of them, and Daryl states that he now too feels the same way she did about needing people to survive in the world. Michonne stays with Andrea while the group waits outside. A gunshot sounds.

Afterward, Rick's group returns to the prison with a school bus filled with Woodbury's survivors, as well as Andrea's body in the back of a truck. Tyreese leads the survivors into the prison, where they are welcomed by Hershel and Beth at the entrance. Carl confronts his father about 'what this is'. "They're gonna join us," Rick tells Carl, who walks away angrily at his decision. Rick looks up at the catwalk. Lori is nowhere to be seen, and Rick knows that he has made the right choice.

Co Stars

 * Travis Love as Shumpert
 * Daniel Thomas May as Allen
 * E. Roger Mitchell as Paul
 * Tanner Holland as Jody

Uncredited

 * Dallas Roberts as Milton Mamet
 * Adelaide and Eliza Cornwell as Judith Grimes
 * Randy Woods as Mr. Jacobson
 * Lucie O'Ferrall as Ms. McLeod
 * Keith Andrew Gostel as Eric
 * Owen Ridings as Owen
 * Denny Ainsworth as "Woodbury Resident"
 * Bill Vella as "Woodbury Resident"
 * Lenora as "Woodbury Resident"
 * Nikki O'Neal Cocroft, Nicholas Wayne Whatley, Brendon Cornwell, Gina Marie, Sherrie Leigh Floyd Billings, Gregory Wilborn, Royce Munn, Mitchell Gunter, William Tokarsky, Luther Thompson Jr., Joseph Setticase,  Stephen Edward Austin and Can Trember as Woodbury Soldiers
 * Gregory French, John Jaret, Don Teems, Jeremiah Scott, Kasey Williamson, and James Barker as Walkers

Deaths

 * Jody
 * Paul
 * Eric
 * Noah (Off-Screen)
 * Dr. Stevens (Off-Screen)
 * Rowan (Off-Screen)
 * Eileen (Off-Screen)
 * Mrs. Foster (Off-Screen)
 * Betty Coleman (Off-Screen)
 * Allen
 * Milton Mamet (Alive and Zombified)
 * Andrea
 * 20 unnamed Woodbury Soldiers

Trivia

 * Last appearance of Andrea.
 * Last appearance of Milton.
 * Last appearance of Allen.
 * Last appearance of Paul.
 * Last appearance of Eric.
 * First (and last) appearance of Jody.
 * Last appearance of Lori Grimes. (Hallucination)
 * This is the last episode written by Glen Mazzara.
 * The episode's title could either refer to The Governor's army being ambushed in "The Tombs" or that Rick brings the people of Woodbury to The Prison at the end of the episode.
 * "The Tombs" (as called by T-Dog in "Killer Within") are a portion of the prison that is infested by walkers, as mentioned by Glenn and Carl in "Home."
 * Andrea says, "I know how the safety works," to Rick when asking for his gun to commit suicide with to prevent her reanimation as a reference to "Wildfire."
 * Coincidentally, Amy was bitten by a walker on the neck, similarly to Andrea. However, Andrea prevented her reanimation by shooting her in the head while she reanimated.
 * This season finale marks the first season finale in which Rick's group is able to hold their own in their home and were not driven out by walkers or other survivors.
 * In "TS-19," the group was forced to leave the CDC before it exploded and in "Beside the Dying Fire," walkers overran Hershel's farm.
 * The Bible passage that was highlighted and found by The Governor is John 5:29; "And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation." In this chapter, Jesus heals a sick man and preaches about everlasting life and that "...The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live." (John 5:25).
 * The Walking Dead Facebook page stated there would be 27 deaths in this episode. They ended up being Andrea, Milton Mamet, Jody, Paul, Allen, Noah, Eric, and 20 Woodbury soldiers.
 * This episode begins with a close up of The Governor's eye that then zooms out which is homage to "Seed", where the episode begins with a closeup of a walker's eye before zooming out.
 * Dallas Roberts, who portrays Milton, is not credited in this episode.
 * According to Woodbury extra William Tokarsky, the finale was supposed to be two hours long, and included scenes of him and other Woodbury soldiers being attacked and killed by Rick and Michonne in the tombs.
 * According to Woodbury extra Keith Barnett, there was a scene of him and three other Woodbury soldiers tripping and falling into a barbed wire trap set up in the tombs of the prison, however the scene was deleted.
 * This is currently the only season finale to feature main character deaths.
 * It was given by Laurie Holden that Andrea wasn't originally to die in the episode, saying that Andrea was supposed to end up as the leader of Woodbury's people, filling up the Governor's boots but it was changed 3 weeks before the shooting of the episode began. "...everyone was shocked." Holden says in one of her interview, "But this is the Walking Dead, nothing is certain anymore."
 * The same as her death, the one that was aired was re-written by Scott Gimple, while the original (which was written by Glen Mazzara) shows Andrea got bitten by Milton on the hand while still bounded to the chair, screaming. In the end, Tyreese and Sasha were the ones who found her already bitten, and then two freed Andrea from the chair. Sasha then says that she won't leave her alone, but Andrea insists Sasha giving her gun. Sasha gives what Andrea wants because as given by Sonequa Martin-Green it was her funeral, and Sasha would give her what she wants, so Sasha give her gun, and the two leave Andrea to commit suicide. The gunshot is then heard.
 * Andrea's death received a polarized reaction. For "Welcome to the Tombs", IGN writer, Eric Goldman disliked that the finale rested its dramatic conclusion on Andrea's death. AV Club writer, Zack Handlen said that Andrea would be "missed less" than Milton. Erik Kain of Forbes.com said that "Finally, Andrea is dead. I know this is something I’ve wished for all season, but it almost felt cheap at the end." Conversely, Josh Jackson, writing for Paste called the death "a heartbreaking end for the woman who tried to make peace between the two gangs of survivors."
 * In one of the interviews conducted after the season wrapped up, Laurie Holden confirmed Andrea's death was just for a shock factor made by Mazarra, and dismissed everything about the cast, and crew supported his decision on killing her character, and thus resulting his departure from the series as a showrunner.
 * This episode marks Lauren Cohan's 25th episode on the TV Series.

Goofs/Errors

 * On Andrea's second attempt to pick up the pliers with her toes, she picks them up with the head pointing from the top of her toes. In the next shot, the handles are pointed out.
 * When Andrea shoots herself and just before she drops the gun, a shell can be heard hitting the ground, even though Colt Pythons do not eject shells when fired.