User:Bmax999

What is there that I need to explain?





"But I understand. I'm sorry for how I acted earlier, Dad, but I can't stand feeling helpless around here. Sitting around on watch was something important that I could do. Helping your "investigation" at the motor inn was something important I could do. Helping getting the train ready was something important I could do. But sitting on my ass in an empty mansion wondering when you'll return with a boat wasn't going to help anybody."

- Tyler to Lee.

Tyler's Character
Tyler is a very thoughtful and compassionate boy when he maintains control over his emotions. As a child, he led a very antisocial life with other children his own age, but apparently had no problem in forming relationships with people not his age. As evidenced by his quick thinking personality, Tyler is extremely resourceful and intuitive in the face of danger.

Tyler is by no means a perfect person, however. Although he is generally compassionate, he loses himself to anger at random times. One of his most notable indications of him losing control of his emotions is when he is biting his upper lip, in which case, Lee advised other group members to stay away from Tyler. This suggests that Tyler may be prone to violence. Despite his fits of anger, Lee usually manages to calm Tyler down.

Tyler is extremely close with the people he does call friends. Tyler quickly grew attached to the group at the motor inn, even to the point where he would sacrifice his own safety in saving Carley from being shot by Lilly and to save Duck from a grenade.

Tyler also has an obsessive need to prove himself before others. He feels that he must be useful at all times, and is angered whenever he is told that he must stay behind while other people do work.

Killed Victims

 * An Unnamed Atlanta Cop.
 * Gary (Caused)
 * Sgt. Stephen Ray Tyler (Zombified)
 * Numerous counts of zombies.

"Was It Worth It? Season One"
The link is right here.

"A New Day"
The episode progresses normally, where Lee admitted his true relationship with Clementine, partially lied to Hershel, helped Duck, sided with Kenny at the drugstore, did not give Irene the gun, and saved Carley at the drugstore. There are a few minor changes to reference Tyler, explicitly between the conversations with the police officer, Hershel, Clementine, Kenny and Carley. Lee also does not refer to the zombies at any point in the episode as walkers; therefore changing the texts that do refer to them as that when talking to Shawn Greene and Doug. Lee also challenges Lilly's assertions about her father being a good man at both the drugstore and motor inn, despite there being no option do that at the latter place. Lee's ex-wife is named in this chapter, as is the senator she slept with. Clementine's finger was never cut. Lee gave a candy bar to her, Duck, Carley and Lilly, though he did not find any batteries for Carley's radio, nor did he approach her about it. The episode contains a short transitional scene between the departure from Clementine's Neighborhood to the Greene Family Farm, and includes a bonus scene after Kenny helped Lee get up in the drugstore. Lee also pointed out the fact that Kenny never said his wife's name, Katjaa, when introducing her to Lee and Clementine. Irene also gives Lee, Glenn and Carley her name. Lee directly changes his conversation arguments when convincing Doug that the trapped walker had the keys. Lee does not tell Katjaa that his parents owned the drugstore. Lee takes the photo of his parents from the drugstore and another one of his son.

Tyler has a brief appearance in Lee's nightmare in Hershel's barn, where he witnesses Lee kill the state senator and call the police himself.

"Starved For Help"
The episode is played with the choices of leaving David Parker behind, giving the axe to Mark, feeding him, Larry, Duck and Clementine after Carley, Kenny and Katjaa abstained, initially choosing not to go to the farm, having Danny shoot Jolene, helping kill Larry, not killing the St. John brothers, and raiding the station wagon. Lee did try to free David Parker by cutting off the limb, but was stopped before he could complete the process. Lee sided with Kenny in the argument between Lilly and Kenny. Clementine did not eat Mark's legs. A few conversations had added words to either reference Tyler or redirect points, explicitly with Mark, Andrew St. John, Carley, Kenny, Clementine and Brenda St. John. Andrew ended up fixing the swing for the kids. Lee helped Kenny open the barn doors and directly asked Andy on it. Lee reasoned with his group over what they were eating and tried to plead with Brenda. Lee took the hay hook from the slaughter room and used it against Danny St. John. In the fight, Lee punched Andy repeatedly until he stopped midway without the intervention of Carley. Lee chose to be direct in saying that the St. John brothers were dead when talking to Clementine.

Upon arriving at the station wagon, Lee orders whoever was out there that he would shoot if they did not come out. He was met with a voice that he later found to be Tyler, holding a grenade as a weapon. After reuniting, Kenny revealed that the station wagon was full of food and supplies. Tyler suggested taking the car, but Kenny said that there would not be enough room for everybody. Lee ultimately decided to take the supplies and have Clementine wear the hoodie. While Tyler was greeting the rest of the group, Lee told Clementine to tell him should Tyler ever bite his upper lip, alluding to Tyler's anger issues.

Two weeks after the end of the dairy nightmare, Clementine shakes Lee awake in the middle of the night because Tyler was biting his lip. Lee found his son sitting outside in front of the barrels Clementine used to play soccer. Lee asks him what was wrong, and Tyler says that he had not been kind to his mother's last words to him before the outbreak, revealing that she had cancer. Lee consoles his son and then asks why he and Clementine were outside. Tyler jokes about showing her knife fighting techniques, to which he brags about his skills in fighting with a knife. Lee infers that Tyler must have used his knife on a living person, and Tyler confirms it shortly before storming off.

Deciding that he was awake enough, he tells Carley he could take her shift as lookout of the night, urging her to get some sleep of her own. Lee shares with her what he had just heard about Tyler killing someone. She advises him to find out who it was he killed, then leaves for her room.

"Long Road Ahead"
The episode is mostly played with normal progression, Lee's choices involving not shooting the screaming woman, leaving Lilly behind, being honest with Chuck, talking some sense into Kenny, having Kenny shoot Duck, sharing a drink with Chuck, and pulling Omid into the car. Lee told Clementine, Kenny and Katjaa about his past. He began talking to Ben about it, then brushed off the conversation before he revealed anything. Lee grabs the animal crackers, water bottle and map of the train routes from the train area and gives the food to Duck. Lee taught Clementine that fear would be the thing that kills them if they did die. His first words to Christa were "Define trouble." He convinced Omid to jump off of the bridge to the train without pushing him. Lee was honest with Clementine regarding why Duck was being taken into the woods. This episode had several major changes performed to the plot of the story. First, Kenny and Lee's supply run into Macon was described as the first of its kind, so some of the dialogue was changed. There was no air force pilot zombie in the drugstore, though there was still a crashed helicopter through the roof. Lee managed to grab all visible supplies within the time before the walkers broke through. Lee sided with Kenny in each discussion about leaving the motel.

Following everyone leaving Lilly's room, Carley does strike up a conversation with Lee, though it is cut short after Tyler booms out and runs towards Duck by the wall. It is revealed that Duck had pulled the pin on the grenade Tyler had brought in. Tyler and Lee both save him by getting the grenade over the wall and shielding the boy with their bodies. Tyler and Lee both retain no injuries from the accidental explosion, but Duck is rendered unconscious from the blast. Lilly rushes outside at the sound of the explosion and notices a large gap in the wall. Out of fear and anger, she raises her rifle on Tyler before he manages to take it from her and do the same. Lee stops Tyler from pulling the trigger, and he gives the gun back to Lilly. Embarrassed, she goes back to her room. Lee follows her, and some small changes in dialogue occur to accommodate the custom sequence.

Tyler takes over for Duck in the "investigation" of the missing supplies, and proves to be extremely helpful in arriving at conclusions. Tyler tells Lee about a second grenade he carried. He locates the chalk hidden away in the garbage dumpsters. Duck regains consciousness during the investigation, but is kept under close observation by his parents on the couch.

When the bandits took Lee's group hostage, Tyler was amongst the hostages. After Lilly killed the bandit leader, Tyler stabbed Gary through his foot, pinning the bandit in place, but forcing Tyler to abandon his knife once the bandits attacked. Tyler ran with Ben and Carley into the RV.

Tyler defended Ben and Carley multiple times during the argument in the RV. Lilly does not give him a vote when trying to get the group to turn against Carley. When she attempted to kill Carley, Tyler jumped in front of the bullet to save her. This horrified Lilly at who she had shot, and Lee wastes no time in beating her to the ground. Lee kneels down to check on Tyler and found him still alive. He carried him into the RV, leaving Lilly behind. Katjaa helped to clean the wound and bandage it before returning to the front. Lee goes up to the front of the vehicle and discovers Duck's bite. He tells Clementine about his parents to help her get her mind off of Duck.

Lee then enters a short dream before the one where a zombified Clementine attacked him. The RV inexplicably stops and the door opens. A woman steps in and kisses both Clementine and Tyler. She is revealed to be Ashley, and she berates Lee for letting Tyler get shot. She then mockingly kisses him to spite his "new girlfriend" before leaving and allowing both Tyler and Clementine to attack Lee.

Everyone exits the RV, including Tyler, once the car comes to a stop. Lee starts the train, then calls for Tyler's assistance in separating the train from the derailed cars. Their efforts are unsuccessful, so Lee searches the train for anything he can use to remove the coupler pin from the conjoining pilot. He returns to Tyler with both a spanner and spike remover, neither working to remove the pin. Tyler uses both tools to form and pulley-type object to remove the pin. After straining with everything they had, the pin is finally removed and the boxcars were unhitched. After more than a little nudging, Tyler reveals who he had killed and what he had done since the start of the outbreak. Tyler informs Lee that he had been with another boy his age that had saved him. A cop killed that boy, causing Tyler to kill him in return. Lee is shocked by Tyler's retelling, mainly because he did not understand how his dream of Ashley had been correct; Ashley had claimed that Tyler had killed a cop in Lee's dream, and was proven correct in reality.

Tyler accompanies Lee and Kenny in going to find Duck and Katjaa. While walking, the three notice a large plane in the sky. Kenny is indifferent, not caring because he believed his son had just died. Tyler identifies it as an Air Force plane because of its massive size.

Tyler is saddened upon finding Katjaa's corpse, as is Lee. Tyler stays silent as Kenny kills his son, then leaves just after Kenny.

He later tells Ben, Clementine and Chuck about what had happened, leaving Lee to tell Carley. She breaks down into sobs at both Katjaa's and Duck's deaths, and Lee consoles her. After the train starts again, Lee and Carley partake in their first kiss together.

After speaking to Chuck, Lee returns to the boxcar to teach Clementine how to shoot. He, Tyler and Carley all give her tips on how to perfect her aim, and they all compliment her shooting after each shot. Once finished, Lee asks Carley to cut Clementine's hair so he could give Chuck the whiskey in the boxcar.

Tyler stays silent during Kenny and Chuck's argument. He follows Clementine up the ladder, albeit slowly because of his gunshot wound. Lee gives a sunflower to Carley, earning him another kiss. He then takes Clementine to the train station, telling Tyler not to follow.

Tyler joins Lee and Omid on the bridge when cutting the tanker down. He initially suggested that Lee dangle him, but Lee did not agree on account of Tyler's injury. Tyler was the last person to jump off of the bridge. After making sure the train was a safe distance away, he tossed the grenade at the fuel tanker, exploding it and killing several dozen of the herd and dropping the bridge. He narrowly jumped to the train in time, being propelled most of the distance by the explosion.

"Around Every Corner"
Most of this episode is the same as the game's version, with Lee making the choices of killing the boy in the attic, being rational and honest with Vernon, letting Clementine go to Crawford with the group, letting Ben die in Crawford, and revealing his bite to the group. At the end of the episode, Kenny, Christa, Omid and Carley left with Lee for Vernon's lair. Lee told Christa that they had to keep moving when she asked for a break. Lee calmed the argument between Kenny and Christa in the backyard. Lee told the group the truth about seeing someone outside the fence, then sided with Kenny regarding leaving for the docks immediately. Lee bested Molly in their fight. Lee came up with the plan to sneak into Crawford. Lee confronted Molly on her lie and consoled her afterwards. He told Ben to not tell Kenny the truth twice, and told Kenny to calm down when trying to get to Ben. Lee told Vernon off when he made his offer to take Clementine with him. Lee asked the person on the radio what he wanted at the end of the episode.

Several major changes were made in the course of this episode; sometimes dialogue shifts, sometimes whole new sequences. More walkers were killed in the streets outside of the church than there actually were in the episode. Tyler was the one who saved Kenny at the start when he was tripped by a walker pinned beneath a burnt out car, and Carley shot several walkers that had attacked Clementine. Carley and Tyler focused on getting the shed open, though they were unsuccessful. Carley assisted Lee in searching the lower floor of the mansion, and later stood with him before he buried Fivel outside. Tyler and Lee got into a quarrel regarding whether or not Tyler would go with them to the docks, where Tyler eventually left the mansion on his own for the docks and was followed by Lee and Kenny. On the way, Kenny grew despondent when he saw Tyler had kept Katjaa's rag and not told him before taking it himself. Tyler also got involved after Lee defeated Molly and after she in turn defeated Kenny.

Tyler found himself a pistol with a broken notch when getting back to the mansion with Kenny and Molly. When Lee returned to the mansion, Tyler felt insulted that he got back and first asked about Clementine. Tyler later got into another argument with Molly about her role in Chuck's death. Lee told him he had to stay behind during the excursion to Crawford, and he accepted that, but challenged Lee when he learned that Clementine would be going.

Carley stayed in the classroom to help Ben open the armory door. After Lee retrieved the battery and climbed up to the semi-truck, a shard of glass cut and lodged itself in his left arm, which Brie later treated in the classroom. Carley left to get Vernon and Christa at the nurse's station, and Lee joined her after she had killed four of the walkers outside the door. Carley left with him to find Logan outside, and argued with him over him about secrets they had kept from each other. The two of them both dealt with the walker in the shed, and jumped over the fence to get to Logan. The two of them later climbed the fence to get back to the school, and returned to the nurse's office after opening Logan's locker. Carley left with Vernon and Christa back to the classroom.

In the bell tower walker attack, Carley and Lee worked together to kill the walkers from the bottom up. Lee tried to shoot Crawford Oberson, but Carley did so instead. Carley remained silent when Lee was deciding Ben's fate.

At the mansion, Tyler was found kneeling over a mangled walker corpse. Lee found that it had been a soldier named "Tyler" in life, and Kenny understood Tyler's behavior. The two calmed Tyler and checked on Clementine.

(Neither myself nor Solarsearcher can make claims on the works of John Steinbeck.) A custom sequence takes place during Lee's nap in front of a crying Clementine, detailing an experience where he and his wife, Ashley, were getting an ultrasound checkup on their baby. The two joke to each other about why Lee was reading "Once There Was A War", and each not-so-subtly offer their opinion on the baby's gender. A hospital staff doctor questioned them both, where, during one of Ashley's responses, it is implied that she was a hyper-sexual woman.

Carley left with the group for Vernon's lair, but Tyler was ordered to stay behind.

Conspiracy Theories
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Jane's "Final Solution"
Okay, first, I'll make something clear to indicate my particular bias. One hundred percent, I am with Kenny to the end. I couldn't bring myself to hit "Shoot Kenny" until several weeks after the episode was released. Even then, I didn't accept the endings with Jane, because both of them seemed so hopeless. One involves inviting some potentially (and most likely) dangerous people in, the other is choosing the selfish option to be a dick to other people. Kenny's endings both symbolize a new beginning either with family or in a safe place (yes, I did just bring up Luke's statement on what the most important thing in the world). The ending alone is, I suppose, the same as the ending to Season 1 (Video Game) ending, so take that however you want it.

Now, onto the point. Jane's plan at the end of No Going Back was utterly shortsighted and extremely stupid. I'll just ramble off as many points as I can in no particular order, so bear with me. Ah-Ah-Ahem.

Jane left Clementine behind in a blizzard when the slowest walkers we have seen thus far were chasing her. Granted, she couldn't exactly fight back with A.J. in her arms, but going uphill? That seemed like she was going out of her way to abandon Clementine and get to the meet up point separately from either her or Kenny. How Clementine didn't notice that really conflicts with her observant nature.

This next point is entirely circumstantial, but is a point of view that I mean to share. At several points throughout the episodes she has been featured in, she encourages Clementine to abandon her friends. In "No Going Back", she suggests (Determinant) that other people's lives are not as important as her own. If Clementine covered Luke and then begins to crack the ice, Jane will practically outright say "Leave him to die." Again, just circumstantial, but I believe Mike approached Jane about leaving the group. Don't you think it a little strange that one of the people who consistently voted in favor of Arvo wouldn't get invited? That she didn't rush outside at the sound of a gunshot? In fact, I believe that Mike asked her about it, and she turned it down but promised to keep quiet about the plan. With Luke's death, Bonnie's death/departure, Mike's departure and Arvo's departure, the group had been whittled down slowly. Jane could've thought "Hmm... I want that Jaime girl to myself. The less people around, the more she'll have to listen to me! Maybe she'll even friend me on Facebook! *Gasp* Mike? You're leaving? Great!"

My next point is not circumstantial and is taken directly from observed events. Jane didn't really care about anyone but herself, and wanted to make herself feel better by helping someone she felt she could treat like her sister (in Jane's special way of pretending at amusement parks). Oh sure, Luke's death hurt her. Luke, the guy that took a one night stand with her the day after Troy... I'm not even gonna finish that sentence.

What's that? You think Jane taught Clementine invaluable lessons on how to survive? If you think that, then you're correct! Yep, I'll freely admit it. Knowing which particular guard you can whore yourself to is a very important skill to have. Even more important than teaching her how to take out the knee of a walker. But wait! She didn't teach it to Clementine. Clementine does it to one or two walkers in "A House Divided", and another in "In Harm's Way". So, Jane, thanks for showing us how to do something we already knew how to do. In an even more dangerous way as well, as kicking a walker's knee from the front is a good way to have it fall on top of you, whereas Clementine knew that the best way to do it is from the side. And you "taught" us to leave Sarah behind too. That's right; condemn a girl who reminded you of a past you'd rather forget because she can't help it (though some of you didn't complain when Sarah died). And now we know how to loot corpses. Is that something you did before the outbreak?

Now for the big one: hiding A.J. and provoking Kenny. First off, she obviously didn't think her plan through, and that isn't something you can blame on the cold for slowing down your thoughts. No, you left a defenseless baby in a burnt out old car during a blizzard with no heat and only a blanket over his body. It's a good thing that baby cried out after Kenny's killing of Jane, otherwise, the baby would never have been found and would have died in the car. It also might have led to Kenny's needless death too, as in, hypothetically, he would refuse to stand up after killing Jane for anything. So, Jane, you really should have realized that failure was not an option, and it is eventually what happened. You want to kill Kenny? Well, Kenny kills you instead unless Clementine does something about it.

Now, you wanted to kill Kenny in a way that would make him seem like the bad guy. That would normally be okay when the person genuinely was bad, but when you provoke him in the first place, you are officially an idiot. Get the hell out of dodge while you can. When Clementine says "No", she doesn't mean "Maybe". When you ask "You want to abandon your friends again and live with me in a possibly hostile environment where the people who may or may not still be there have a definite reason to make us beg for our deaths before killing us?", and I answer "No", I don't mean "ask me some other time", I mean "Ask me that again and you'll really make me mad."

"She's a disturbed person, Clem..." I love it how both Kenny and Jane will try and shift the blame to someone else after one of them dies, and that Kenny's argument- despite two years of irrationality in the face of loss and pain- Kenny's argument is the only one that makes sense. Jane did want a fight. Jane was a disturbed person. She is fucking crazy. And what was Jane's defense when Clementine tried to protect her? "Um... I thought you said ask me some other time when I asked you to leave Kenny. You want to leave Kenny now?" I was so disappointed when there was no option to shoot Jane, which is exactly what I wanted to do when the fight between her and Kenny started to break out.

I'll say it again, I'm with Kenny to the end, but even if it was Vernon that came back with a new girlfriend in "A House Divided" instead of Kenny, I'd still side with him over Jane. Vernon may have been a hypocrite, but he was no murderer. Yet.

All credit for argument thesis goes to myself and Solarsearcher, a user log in on a fanfiction forum that I work very closely with on a combined product known as "Was It Worth It?"

Save-Lots Bandits
This is an argument with absolutely no point to it, but I'll make it anyway.

At the end of "Starved For Help", if you chose to raid the station wagon, then you have the option to tell Clementine that you are not like the bandits for never hurting anybody to get the hoodie. There were, obviously, much better solutions to surviving when there's dozens of you rather than extortion for drugs and women, but then again, these sociopaths were "meth-riddled forest people."

As we learn from Jolene's video recording, the bandits knew and worked with the cannibalistic St. John Dairy farmers. Now, to start, we learned that not only did the bandits kill several farmhands on the farm, they were harassing their work efforts. Eventually, the St. John's made a deal with them: the bandits find people who were desperate, they tell the farmers where they are, the St. John's cook and kill them, and they give some of the meat to the bandits. Maybe, instead of killing the people they found, maybe the bandits could have decided to help around at the farm and cultivate the food they needed to keep them all fed. With their numbers, they would have a lot of protection should the electric fence ever fall. Maybe they could have had their own community and last longer than they did.

Following the deaths of the main cannibals, the bandits became more aggressive now that the group at the motor inn were getting stronger and more armed. Now, they had a right to be afraid of them, but deciding to attack them instead of taking the farm back and maybe saving Maybelle and some of the meat in the barn? It could have lasted them a while, but they didn't have to attack when one shipment was taken.

Why did they even wear masks anyway? Amateurs. You don't need a mask to scare people when you're holding the guns.

All credit for argument thesis goes to myself.

Ben and the Hatchet
Can we really blame Ben for pulling the hatchet out of the door? It's not like he deliberately wanted the walkers to get in because he thought they were still people. I have no love for the stupid boy- I'm calling him stupid because of his other mistakes- but I don't think people should be blaming him for this.

Let's start with the arguments you'll be making. "It's a glass door, moron. How in the holy Hell did you not see the flesh eating monsters on the other side of it?" Listen, the walkers did not immediately burst in once Ben removed the hatchet. They did not burst in until several moments after the bell rang, and they weren't in full force. Is it not reasonable to assume that the walkers had gone downstairs at the time Ben had gone into the hallway? They didn't all get in immediately, which means that most or all of them were gone. It took at least three walkers to actually break through, so obviously there had to be less than that many when Ben took it.

"Ben, shouldn't you have assumed that the hatchet was there for a reason?" First off, when Kenny sent Ben outside to look for something to open the armory door, he probably should have warned him about the dozens of walkers that- of which he last knew- were barely being kept outside of the hallway. Definitely. Should he have assumed it was there for a reason? Yes, but since there weren't any walkers that he could see, and since he couldn't have anticipated the bell bringing them back, it might have looked like that it wasn't needed there anymore.

"Ben's a useless idiot anyways. He got Brie killed, so he needs to be blamed regardless." Yes, it was partially his fault for Katjaa's and Duck's deaths; there were several options for him to prevent what had caused Duck to be bitten (I will not talk about them yet, Solarsearcher will do that in his fanfiction at some point. I've given my share of ideas to him already). Brie's death, although tragic and quite needless, came about because of Ben's removal of the hatchet letting the walkers in, yes. But, he did not want her dead, nor did he know that any walkers were nearby because Kenny hadn't warned him.

And the big one. "Who cares? I hate Ben. I dropped him from the bell tower because I knew what an idiot he was. Even he knew it at the end. Why should I cut him any slack?" The truth is, these arguments don't have to affect your opinion of him, whether it's low like mine or high like someone else's. But anyway, ask yourself: after reading this, do you still blame Ben for what happened to those who were lost in the school? Sure, blame him for other things, but is it really worth it to hold this particular incident against him?

All credit for argument thesis goes to myself.

What Really Happened Between Carver and Rebecca
Many people have made theories about this, and I have one of my own. We all know that Carver had hoped that he had fathered a child with Rebecca, and a thought like that doesn't come about unless there is a legitimate reason to think the baby is yours. Or you can be a confused psychopath. Or both. Mwahahahahahahaha.

Rebecca once said "Alvin and I tried for so long." Right there is the clue that would mean that the intercourse between Rebecca and Bill was indeed consensual, though it is not entirely certain still.

Carver did not, to my knowledge, actually love Rebecca. I suspect he just viewed her as a strong woman- as he comments to Clementine in his office- that he would be able to raise a child with and teach him/her to be strong just like his/her parents were. I could be wrong, though; Carver might have legitimately had feelings for her. Dark feelings, of course, but they still might have existed. It is implied that Carver might have groped her the day he discovered Luke hiding in his community (if you are uncertain how, it is because Rebecca had the radio Carver held up in the yard, and there's no way she would have just given it to him). He also fondly stroked her face at the ski lodge, either in front of an angered Alvin or the man's corpse.

Now, I'm pretty sure that every player has, at least once, watched Carver die. I did too, if only to see if Telltale has finally taken advantage of what an M-rated game can allow. I enjoyed watching his death, plain and simple. I haven't left with Sarita too many times when playing this episode, so I'm not sure if this happens either way, but Carver's last words were telling Rebecca that she loved every second of it. This does suggest that Rebecca had not wanted to have sex with Carver in the first place, though it confirms nothing regarding whether or not it was rape or just unplanned, heat-of-the-moment action.

Clementine can tell Rebecca at the observation deck that the baby does not look like Carver, to which she will harshly brush aside the comment. Rebecca was obviously eager to forget the man, and for numerous reasons, rape possibly being one of them. I myself do not support the notion of rape, regardless of Solarsearcher's conflicting views. I'm just kidding. God. Put down the phone. No need to call the police.

Does it really matter who Alvin Jr.'s father is? People will just remember him Rebecca's son. The baby looks like Alvin to some extent, or rather a smaller combination of Alvin and Doug. *shiver* The baby's eyes, in the last episode of Season Two, are neutrally brown, as were both Carver's and Rebecca's. Alvin's were a low green, though he may have been heterogenic and had a baby with his mother's eyes.

But, I digress. What really happened between Carver and Rebecca? I believe it may have been a case where the evil man seduced the younger woman into believing in him, then pulling her into bed after she threw out no objections.

All credit for this argument goes to myself and Solarsearcher.

Was Arvo Lying
Now, a long time ago, I did post something to Natasha's page saying that according to unused audio clips, she did indeed have a pain problem like Arvo had said. Since it was unused, and I do not particularly know if Telltale scrapped any plans to have her cry out in such fashion, I'm going to make this argument anyway.

I read that Arvo's sister suffered from a disease known as sickle cell anemia. The disease is a hereditary disorder that can frequently cause pain due to misshapen blood cells that can clot arteries and veins. People with this disorder normally should not have to take painkillers for this, but when you cannot find a good doctor, under such situations would be the near extinction of all humanity due to a zombie outbreak, sufferers of this disease would need something to deal with the pain. It is unknown if Arvo suffered from this as well, as there is no reference to this anywhere in either the game or the unused audio clips.

Natasha was not around long enough to determine the validity of Arvo's claims, and she did not demonstrate any symptoms in her short time around. You'd think that Telltale would either absolutely confirm or deny it so we could learn to hate or sympathize with Arvo to make him a larger impact on the player. Well, they didn't, so I'll do it for them.

Did she truly suffer from any pain-related disease in the final cut? I don't think so. Arvo went to great lengths to hide a large stash of medicine at least two days' walk away from his group's hideout. I believe that Arvo was their supply runner, as he was alone when Clementine first encountered him. That way, he'd have an excuse to disappear for at least a day at a time and take some addictive drugs from the bag hidden far away. Alternatively, if this was not the case, he and his whole group might have been scouting and he splintered off at one point. Plus, even if Arvo was let go with his bag, that bag is not seen back at the unfinished house in the next episode. It can be safely assumed that Arvo found some other place to hide it.

All credit for these arguments go to myself.

Was Larry Dead
What happened in that meat locker on the St. John's Dairy Farm was an absolute tragedy. Yes, regardless of whether or not you hated Larry like I did, what happened in there was a tragedy. Why? Because when your group's unelected leader loses her best reason to survive, you're bound to see her go crazy and get reckless with the lives of every one else. Granted, her intentions at the motor inn when she was convinced there was a traitor were good, but she did get reckless and end up killing Carley/Doug after not listening to anyone at all but the voices inside of her head.

I'm getting ahead of myself here; this isn't about Lilly, it's about Larry. Was he really dead when Kenny dropped a salt lick on his head? I doubt we'll ever really find out, but I'll just give my opinion.

Larry had a heart condition, as anyone who's played the game knows. Lilly mentioned in "A New Day" that sometimes Larry would have a few bad attacks that he couldn't get over and would need to go to the hospital for. It's kind of hard not to have these sorts of attacks when you have a temper, but that isn't really relevant right now.

My point is that he's definitely had heart attacks before, but I don't know if they've ever been that bad. We don't have enough context to know what Larry was up to in 1970. Larry is in his sixties, and I think that Telltale had released their first game with the pretense that the setting of the game was in 2003. Larry, being in his late sixties, would have been old enough to have been drafted by the military into armed service in the war with Vietnam in 1968. Did he actually serve in the war? In armed conflict? I don't know. He had a medical condition that might have excluded him, but he served in the military anyway; we know that much. We don't know if he ever fought in the war or if he just enlisted after the war's end.

Let me explain why this is important. What happened in the meat locker was Larry's worst heart attack he had ever experienced. If he did serve active duty in the war with Vietnam, he most likely would have the desire to want any particular enemy dead, considering his considerable temper. His bloodthirsty rage at the St. John's for making him eat human meat prompted his heart attack. If he did serve in the war, something similar to this may have happened, where he would suddenly clutch his chest and fall down during a firefight or be taken to the nearest infirmary for breaking down while yelling at enemy prisoners.

Being tricked into eating Mark's legs made him angrier than ever before. With his heart beating at five thousand beats per second (I know, not actually possible), it wasn't any surprise when he suddenly stopped breathing and fell over. Now, to any gamer who has tried to revive him and pressed Larry's chest more than twice, you can see his lip twitch, though no noise is heard- neither breath drawn nor groan released- over Kenny's yelling. Larry is generally pale in skin anyway, so we didn't see any blood rush to his cheeks until after his head got crushed and it all splattered out.

Larry did not gradually come down from his increased heart rate and collapse from shock, he instantly fell to the floor once his heart rate reached too high, and only went down to zero. This does kind of imply that he was dead and could not be resuscitated. Therefore, his lip twitching was a result of his impending reanimation.

However, there is the point to be made that even though his heart rate didn't decrease before it stopped, it might not be because he was dead. There are recorded medical cases where a victim's heart rate would not plummet to zero because he had recently thrown up. If Larry had thrown up like his daughter and Clementine (Determinant) before Lee had woken up, it would make sense that his heart rate wouldn't drop anyway. Lilly, confusingly, never said if her dad's heart was beating or not.

People are still discussing this today, and I still can't give a definitive answer on this because I don't have enough context of his pre-apocalyptic life nor what he did before Lee woke up, but I'll give my conclusion anyway. Was Larry dead? Yes. I believe he was dead.

All credit to this argument goes to myself, Arthener and Solarsearcher.

July 20 th 2003
This argument has no point to it and is not even really an argument. More of just a rambling.

I did some math, crunched the numbers, recalculated the spectrum of the passage of time from the first to second season (which was unnecessary in this evaluation) and I have determined that Telltale Games's version of The Walking Dead had the outbreak start on July 20 th 2003. Well, based on the information I have discovered, I have pondered here and fro on why. Why Telltale had made the outbreak start on that day.

So I did some research on what that day has meant over the course of history, and found a couple of sad things that occurred in the past. In reality, on this day, a series of chemical bombs killed sixteen people in France. Also, in years past on some other July 20 th, the Yankees beat the Tigers 12 to 6 in 17 innings. July 20 th is the day Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin stepped foot on the moon. About a millenia and a half ago, one of the most despicable Christian Popes of all time rose to power on that day.

What do you think? The link to that page, in case you might want to look for other causes, is right here.

All credit to this "argument" goes to my very lonely self. (I didn't know before I made this argument that this is the case across all medias.)

Howe's Hardware Herd
There are a couple of different arguments to be made here and they don't have any correlation to each other.

First, a lot of people have called bullshit on the fact that Carlos (and determinately Nick) was the only member of the group to get hit by the bullets fired by Tavia, Fucking Video Game Tyler that I did not create, Tisha and the other shooters. I'd like to point out that the music Clementine played at the end of "In Harm's Way" was not playing in "Amid The Ruins", so can we not assume that the guards were shooting at the speakers instead? Granted, not a very good idea, since you should be more concerned about the walkers in the parking lot than walkers in the forest, but their intelligent leader was nowhere to be found, so they started doing stupid shit.

How about the fact that very few of the walkers noticed when Sarita got bit? I'll admit, everyone should have died for running at one point or another, since that kind of negated all the differences between zombies in The Walking Dead and Dead Rising. But, as most of us have witnessed, walkers are more drawn to flashes of light than people. In which case, the bullets being fired from the roof would draw more than screams or running people. But the smell of Sarita's human blood; that right there should have gotten her killed instead of the screaming, like what we credit her death to. Otherwise, it just wouldn't make sense as to why Mike, Kenny, Sarah and Luke made it out alive.

Then there's the fact that the walkers somehow overran the defenses of the building and killed everyone. Circumstantial, yes, but notice how there were very few corpses, so why the hell did everyone leave? In-fighting, of course. With Carver dead, the guards wrestled for control and destroyed each other, everyone trying to escape. And for the fact that Carver's corpse is still there is very confusing. Granted, the only walkers capable of getting inside would be the ones who were freakishly tall in life, but why did none of those get inside and eat Carver? Why were their corpses not found in or outside of the camp? I don't know. Telltale made a mistake.

All credit for these arguments go to myself.

How In The Goddamn Hell Did Clementine Get Lee Into The Jewelry Store
This was a question posed to Solarsearcher on his Fanfiction forum... and a question nobody has a logical explanation for, including myself. So I'm going to list a bunch of unlikely conclusions to this in no particular order. Please, keep in mind that I myself do not believe any of these possible explanations.

Wherever they were in Savannah, they had recently made a lot of noise that could have been heard by a living person. And not just any living person, but maybe Molly. Maybe Molly dropped from some rooftop and... fuck it, this conclusion is already smoking pot. Moving on.

So, you guys remember how Clementine was able to hold the doors shut in "A House Divided" if she went with Nick in the previous episode? Well, that's not very easy. True, this was two years later after being forced to survive on the run for all that time where she would have undoubtedly gotten stronger. She performed a pull-up while extremely hungry and cold in "All That Remains", something she could never have actually trained for, considering she was in first grade. Unless her dick daddy decided to force her to do so when she was four years old, she clearly has some level of innate... WHAT THE FUCK AM I WRITING? Moving on.

Maybe Lee is a sleepwalker? What do you think? Maybe he stood right back up in a daze and Clementine led him to the nearest building she could find? I mean, that doesn't account for how she could have not seen if he was dead or not, but the kid has no experience with this stuff anyway, so who gives enough of a turd? Super Clementine saves the day. Again. Moving on.

Glenn once said that the kid was strong. Or maybe he didn't. I am spewing a lot of bullshit into this theory. I mean, if he did, that meant he liked her... '''Moving on. Moving on. MOVING ON.'''

Okay, I have thoroughly driven myself insane here. Don't forget to like and subscribe... wait, that's for YouTube. Oh, yes. Please understand that there's nothing you could have done; this was my own choice...

All credit for this arguments go to myself and Solarsearcher.

How Exactly Did Kenny Survive Savannah
Okay, this is probably a conspiracy theory I should not be making, since Solarsearcher and I plan on actually giving a story on what happened to Kenny in which he will truly address how he survived. I'll try not to spoil which theory we're leaning towards and will include in our Season Two.

Now I know that there are already several theories about what happened in the alleyway Ben fell into. To name a few, there's one that says he broke a window and jumped into it; there's one that says he jumped into the dumpster next to Ben's corpse and hid there until the walkers left; there's one that says he jumped into a sewer grate like Lee did in the previous episode. Frankly, I don't believe that the last one would be possible, since there were no sewer grates in the area that I could see, but maybe Ben landed on top of one and hid it, I don't know.

When it comes to this one (I can speak about this one because we let Ben die in the previous episode), I have to say that we're in favor of the "jumping into a dumpster" theory. The windows in the alley were all boarded up and at least four feet up. Kenny would've had to have jumped up and tried to use a hammer (which, by the way, he doesn't have) to bust open the center of the wood with limited leverage because there was no ground beneath him before jumping up again to get inside. The dumpster is a lot easier, since he could wait for a couple hours until the walkers left or he could pick them off one at a time from inside the dumpster with whatever he could use in there.

As for the scene where he saved Christa, there are way too many theories that we have found for us to rattle off one by one, so we're just going to say the one we're in favor of. It was total darkness down there and Kenny only had somewhere in the range of seven bullets. Who's to say he didn't step on a slope that he couldn't see because of the lack of light, fallen down into a hole that led into the basement of the building neighboring or a rain ditch on the other side, and just ran off? I can't go into too much more detail because I can't spoil exactly what we're going to do with it, but think of this as our answer.

All credit for these arguments goes to Solarsearcher and myself. Theories that we rattled off are ones we heard from Fear the beard and Panasomnia.}}

Season 2 Ratings
These scales are given on an average of three numbers, with the exception of "Around Every Corner", which was weighted on average and then deducted points outside of the scores made by the three of us by the number of bugs we had to deal with in the writing of this chapter for "Was It Worth It?" The score without the deductions would have been a B (86).

Episode Rants
Each of these ratings were discussed between Solarsearcher, Arthener and I. Feel free to pose any questions about it on my talk page.

"A New Day"
Telltale Games took the gaming community by storm with this first installment in what would be a five part series of grueling and emotional work. For their efforts here, we decided to give this first episode a solid B- (81).

Stuff We Enjoyed
The first crucial plot point that we took an interest in was Clementine's first appearance in the game. In her first appearance, Clementine showed up with a hammer to save our hero and make us care. Then came her reaction to the blood seeping out of the zombie's fatal head wound.

The next enjoyable sequence was when the whole group argued over Duck's bite, where it was our first instance of safety vs. morality. Regardless of what choice you make, the ending is just believably shallow.

Stuff We Hated
Well, you probably guessed this was coming. An error that really cost the episode points was the inability to actually make a difference with Shawn. What would have made the outcome better would be the option to save Shawn from being killed, but still ending up with him being bitten. Duck would still survive no matter what, but if Shawn could live beyond the player's seeing of him (Hershel would still throw Lee and Kenny out for outstaying their welcome), maybe it would not make the whole experience on the farm seem pointless save for the first information on Lee's family.

Another major error that the plot here contains is the one "flight path" that the story arc contains, even though the story is supposed to be tailored to the player's decisions. What this means is that the player is forced to save Irene in the motel even if the player does not want to.

"Starved For Help"
The release for this episode was a disappointment for a lot of players, as much of the details seen in the trailer were not used in the episode. Despite this, our rating is a B+ (87).

Stuff We Enjoyed
The quick action pace of the beginning with the option to cut a man's leg off to save him was an ingenious plot point, even if either effort is ultimately fruitless with a two deaths no matter what.

Some players felt that the final battle sequence was a bit wasteful, as Telltale could have used the "final battle during a storm" gig later. However, in this season, this was definitely the best place for it. With everyone watching Lee's struggle against Andy, the storm fight was definitely not used too quickly.

Stuff We Hated
The revelation that the St. John Family were actually a bunch of cannibals was not surprising at all. The "people become cannibals" gig, unlike the final battle during a storm gig, was indeed used too quickly. It might have been better storytelling if the St. John's were merely members of the bandits and that the dinner was a trap from the start. Then, instead of them all getting captured, they could all try to escape after Lee/Lilly blinds Andrew and Danny with a pitcher of water or some other liquid, where Larry is shot and killed by Andy if Lee had blinded the St. John's or Danny if Lilly blinded the St. John's. Katjaa gets taken down by a shot to her stomach, though Kenny does not see it and leaves with Duck. Lee/Lilly would attempt to take a gun from either Danny or Andy, depending on who blinded them, where they would fail and Mark would save them but get shot in the chest in the process, similar to how he shot Travis if the player did not cut off David's leg. Everyone still alive would escape after that and flee back outside. From there, they could go to the barn and ambush Danny from inside, then work from that regularly until Lee returns to the house to save Katjaa. Since Duck would have already escaped, Kenny would simply sneak around back and force his way inside while Lee keeps Brenda distracted. Using the gun he pilfered from Danny, Kenny would shoot Brenda in the back of her head, scaring Katjaa. Kenny notices her bleeding from her gut and asks what he can do, but Katjaa is still in shock at seeing Brenda killed right beside her. Lee can choose to help calm her down or go hunt for Andy. If the former is chosen, Lee successfully soothes her enough so that she can help Kenny help herself. If the latter is chosen, then Lee takes the gun from Brenda and goes back outside to see Andy holding the group hostage. If Lee chose to help Katjaa before looking for Andy, then Andy has beaten Lilly in front of Clementine and Duck. If Danny had been the one to shoot Larry and Lee had spared him, then Lilly had killed him while Lee was gone. Otherwise, Andy (and Danny, if he had survived; he would be leaning on Andy for support) is simply demanding to know where Lee and Kenny are. Lee can choose to give himself up to calm them down or try and shoot them. If the latter is chosen, Lee shoots Danny (if alive), and his blood lands on Clementine and Duck. If Danny had previously died, then Lee simply shoots Andy in the shoulder and his blood lands on the kids. He and Lee engage in a standoff with guns pointed at each other, waiting to see who would make the first move. Andy is then either shot by Carley in the ear or blinded by Doug. Lee will either then attack Andy or try to shoot him. If he tries to shoot Andy, his gun jams and Lilly attacks Andy from behind. If Lee attacks Andy, he tackles him as the kids run away and begins to beat him down, where Lee can stop willingly or continue beating Andy until he kills him. If Larry's killer was spared by Lee in either circumstance, then Lilly becomes mad at Lee. She tries to kill Andy herself if Lee spared him, only to be stopped by Lee. If Lilly had been the one to attack Andy when Lee's gun jams, then Lee has the option to pull her off of Andy or allow her to kill him. Pulling her off if Andy was Larry's killer makes her mad at Lee. Alternatively, if Lee had given himself up to Andy, then Carley would either shoot Danny and kill him (if he was alive) or shoot Andy in the ear as Lee pulls his gun out. The same conditions as before apply here. However, if Doug had survived "A New Day", then it would be Lee who shoots them after they are distracted by the generator being powered down, and the same conditions as before apply. After the whole sequence with the standoff and beatdown of Andy is over, then Lee would either see Kenny and Katjaa exit the house or hear a gunshot from the house, depending on whether or not Lee stayed to help Katjaa. If the gunshot is heard, then Kenny exits the house alone with tears on his face, saying that Katjaa had turned and he had been forced to kill her. Otherwise, Kenny would carry Katjaa out of the house and Lee leads them out of the farm with Danny and Brenda both dead no matter what, Andy determinant. This should belong on my own version of a video game page, but as any of you who have read everything else on the page know, I already have one called "Was It Worth It?"

"Long Road Ahead"
This episode had a very enjoyable plot, although it is not without its faults. For that reason, we have elected to give this episode a score of B+ (89).

Stuff We Enjoyed
The whole argument on the side of the road deal (yes, even including Ben's inconsistencies in his dialogue) was pretty enjoyable. The whole urgency of the situation was extremely real no matter what options the player chooses. And when Lilly killed whoever it was she shot in the head, the shock was real the first time we played it.

Stuff We Hated
The inability to effectively reason with those meth-heads in the forest... okay, maybe not the best example, but Lee never once made the option or was given the option to actually try to reason with the bandits instead of blindly following Lilly's orders and distracting them.

Also, the deaths of both Katjaa and Duck were not what they should have been. Katjaa never gave any indication that she was failing mentally, save for the one moment where her voice cracked when trying to convince Kenny that Duck had to be put out of his misery. If I were Telltale, I would have had Katjaa shoot Duck, then herself (if she was let go alone), or just have her fail to shoot Duck entirely while Kenny was there. Kenny would just wait for Lee and as Lee actually got there, Katjaa would hand Lee her gun and say she was going back to the train. She is seen on the way back being devoured by a walker.

"Around Every Corner"
In all honesty, the main reason that we scored this episode as low as we did was because of all the goofs and errors that normally would not detract from the plot, but did create a lot of holes in the story. That, and numerous glitches that Telltale chose to ignore. As such, this episode gets a rating of B- (80), and that's us being nice.

Stuff We Enjoyed
We enjoyed the notion of meeting a bunch of cancer survivors in the sewers, even if we hate all of the characters themselves.

...

Yeah, that's about it. We're thankful there was a video game to be played, but there really isn't anything else unique or specifically enjoyable about the episode.

Stuff We Hated
I'm sorry, were we supposed to feel sympathy for the boy in the attic? If we were, we're not sorry after all. The whole segment at the mansion was way too slow paced off of an intense if pointless action scene and a frantic if lazy search for a dog collar, and it held nothing new to the player: an undead boy, missing parents, dead pet.

Molly herself is just not a likeable character to the player. She's crass, rude, imprudent, deadpan, pessimistic, arrogant, shallow... sounds a lot like me, actually. Except I don't think I'd sleep with a doctor for medicine. I might be wrong, though, who knows?

Clementine runs away at the end of the episode. Was that meant to be surprising? Why was the hat left behind? I thought this was supposed to be a game based around choices. Why is there no option to actually give the girl what she wants and look for her parents? What, was there too little time to craft such a large branch? Guys, what could've happened was a forceful abduction from the streets of Savannah by the kidnapper if this option was chosen. Sure, it might have led to complications with the whole Vernon thing, but still, it would have given us the choice that this game is supposed to be tailored by.

And of course, all the major goofs and errors that we saw in this episode: Lee somehow re-entering the school the second time through a barbed-wire fence (oh, yeah, I had a heck of a time sorting through that one in "Was It Worth It?"), Brie not appearing during the break-in, Kenny with the rifle (another great time with that one), the bell-tower screw-ups; the list goes on and on.

"No Time Left"
In our opinion, this is the best episode of the whole series. Despite its bad ending in Clementine randomly seeing two shadows out in the distance that were clearly Omid and Christa, we have given this episode a rating of 94 (A).

Stuff We Enjoyed
One of the greatest aspects of this episode was the fight with the stranger towards the end. Telltale nailed this fight perfectly; no music, no background noise, just two grunting men straining to kill each other. No, this is not sarcasm; that was truly a stroke of brilliance. Unlike his showdown with Andy in a storm or his gunfight with the bandits in their escape from Macon, this scene needed absolute silence. In case you do not know why, it's because both the player and Lee understand the same thing in regards to the story; regardless of who wins the fight, Lee is dead. This scene was great and succeeded in all of the ways a few other slated deaths did not (Sarah, Sarita, Luke, etc.), but we'll get to those.

Stuff We Hated
If you care to know, our main (and practically only) problem with the plot in this episode is the lousy writing that went into separating Kenny from the group if Ben was saved in the previous episode. Whereas his heroic act of saving a woman he had feuded with for days now was noble and was poetic, him deciding to stay behind to give the kid who had killed his family a few more moments of life was just irregular and stupid. Keep in mind, despite my own beliefs about Ben, this decision was made by one Ben hater and two people who liked him. Kenny "sacrificed" himself for what? A few more breaths drawn in for Ben? And he decided that he wasn't going to die with Ben in the first place, so why couldn't he have just fought against the walkers for however long he felt necessary without locking the gate so he could leave when he felt himself no longer obligated? He could have shot Ben once he was done, no problem.

Something else that bugged us was the way that the group was just strolling across the rooftops of Savannah, as if they had not a care in the world. I mean, there is a dialogue option that Lee can say to reveal his anxiety, but this still felt wrong, especially considering how they all understood that Clementine could very well slip through their fingers or be killed by whoever was on the other end of the radio. Maybe Lee wasn't fit to run in his condition, but a little sense of urgency would have been nice.

"400 Days"
400 Days is the lowest rated episode on this spectrum, which is really disappointing, considering that with several different branching storylines, this should have been Telltale's easiest project. We have rated it a C+ (78).

Stuff We Liked
Despite Solarsearcher's tremendous hate of the protagonist in this story, Vince's story was enjoyable to all of us, as it had the most diverse ending of any of the characters in "400 Days". Here, you have the first time you can value player's emotions and priorities regardless of the situation. You can see if the player is smart and quick-thinking or dull and confusedly slow-witted.

Stuff We Hated
Tavia. I think the epilogue and our reason to hate the character listed a little further up the page under "My Least Favorite Video Game Characters" section speaks for itself.

Bonnie's story in its entirety is awful. Here, Telltale thrusts at us three named characters, two of which supposedly end up dying in awful ways, but why should we care? We don't know who these people are nor have we been given any time to bond with them before we immediately end up in an argument. Why should I feel sorry for Dee or Leland (though in all honesty, I am actually a fan of Leland because of what I learned about him in the Epilogue if he survives Bonnie's story)? Why should I care about the emotional trauma Bonnie suffers at having killed one of the people who saved her?

Russell's story gave us an interaction with the mythical creature known only as Nate, but not much else. It really does not give the player any real choices, as regardless of what you choose, all characters seen in this episode have slated statuses, with a minor exception of Walt's wife, Jean, who can be seen as undead in Shel's story.

Speaking of which, Shel's story might actually be the worst in our collective opinion. We have no decisions of any real importance (and no, Boyd's survival has no impact on the plot), a good-for-nothing demon by the name of Becca, a bitch of circumstance Joyce, a charisma vacuum named Roman Reigns, a Kristen Stewart wannabe named Shel who just has nothing to offer... and Stephanie, the one character of the story with a soul.

Wyatt gave us nothing memorable, in all honesty. With no confirmation of any character's status other than the protagonist himself, Telltale tried to give us a bunch of fleshed out characters to be used as killers in future episodes, but there was no mystery of any sort. Everybody finds themselves in a ditch in the fog and nobody but the guy who gets hit by the car has anything going for him; he dies and possibly ends up as one of Shel's watchdogs.

"All That Remains"
Much of this episode was very contrived, and if this were an actual television show that Telltale try to deliver with their episodic games, then this would have been a mild season premiere with very little excitement. Much of its very stale plot points are the reason why this episode gets a B- (83).

Stuff We Liked
Gameplay-wise, this season had much better visual effects, action sequences, and dialogue-captioning utility than the previous season, all introduced in this episode. However, this did not affect the score in a drastic fashion.

Plot-wise, we liked the dog and the dog-bite scenario. Getting bitten by a dog and others believing it to be a walker bite is something that is honestly overused in fanfictions across the site of our forum (or, rather, the stupid "the walker actually had dentures before it died, so it can't kill you" scenario), but it just works here.

Christa getting cut off was sad, but a decision made by the developers to make the player feel alone and vulnerable. It worked on us.

And discovering the bodies at the river added a bit of suspense, which was sorely lacking throughout the entirety of the next episode.

Stuff We Hated
I mentioned before that we enjoyed the "is it a dog or walker bite" scenario, but we did not enjoy the lack of decisions to be made regarding the situation. Regardless of whether or not you try to feed the dog, it still attacks you. Maybe we could've had an option to give the dog the can, even if we were hungry. Regardless of who you appeal to in the argument over the source of the bite, you still end up locked in the shed. Maybe we could've had an option to successfully appeal to someone and at the very least get let inside the cabin. Regardless of whether or not you make BFFs with Sarah, she will still give you the peroxide (by the way, this decision has no significant impact anywhere else in the season). Maybe choosing not to befriend her on principle would have prevented her from giving Clementine the disinfectant (by the way, choosing to not use the peroxide has no significant impact anywhere else in the season).

Also, I speak for myself, Solarsearcher, Arthener, and just about everyone who has ever played this game when I say "Fuck you, Telltale" for that dreadful "suturing your own arm" segment. It drags on for too long, gets incredibly annoying with the whimpers and shouts, and is boring as fuck during your second and third time playing the game. It was supposed to demonstrate Clementine's strength in being able to take care of herself, but it doesn't work because the concept of slow gameplay at a crucial moment makes absolutely no sense. It's an objective that takes near two minutes of constant moans and stupid facial expressions.

As I said before, there was a dearth of choices in this episode. Choosing to not help Christa leads to the same outcome as choosing to distract the bandits attacking her. Killing the dog directly or leaving it to die is really a choice that tells you what kind of person you are, but the result is both sad and the same in each scenario.

"A House Divided"
There were numerous errors in terms of narrative-based storyline that Telltale plugged in here without realizing how many holes they were leaving behind. Nevertheless, this episode gets a fair grade of B (85).

Stuff We Liked
(Now, let me preface this one by saying that, obviously, Kenny is a very divisive character amongst the game's fan base. Some, like the three of us, adore Kenny and all of his cute little psychotic actions. Others loathe the man and curse the man for having such a useless son. And then there's people who take an objective look at what Kenny brings to the table. I'm gonna try and do that.)

Kenny's return. Granted, it was fairly obvious to anyone over the age of twelve that Kenny would be the one to make his return based off of the episode's trailer, so it dampen the surprise of his return. Undeniably, however, his reintroduction was an incredibly powerful scene, and even amongst Kenny haters, you'd be hard-pressed to find someone who didn't pick the "HUG KENNY" option the first time around. You couldn't help but remember the good times of the first season when you saw his horribly scarred... ahem, bearded... face. Also, Kenny brought some much needed character development to the table with his return, as prior to this, just about every character encountered thus far in Season Two had been entirely one-sided. The only characters with true personalities we had found at this point were Pete, Nick, and Alvin. Pete was dead at this point, Alvin barely had any interaction with Clementine depending upon the player's choices, and Nick was clearly going to get himself killed in the episode (I know, only determinately; I mean that it was apparent to me that Nick was going to die after he shot Matthew, so it didn't make any dialogue with him feel special, even if I was wrong about him definitely dying in this episode), and no, Rebecca's sudden shift in demeanor does not count as character development. Kenny was a main character that had some much needed depth.

Aside from Kenny's return, there was also some incredible power to a few other scenes too. Luke falling through the bridge actually made it seem like he was in danger of death. Walter confronting Clementine about Matthew's death made the conflict seem all the more real. The option to run and protect Alvin from Carver reportedly brought a tear to Solarsearcher's eye the first time he played that option (that crybaby).

By the way, Carver. Good thing for this series. Michael Madsen brings some drama with his incredible performance as Carver.

Stuff We Hated
I mentioned before that we did have a few problems with plot holes. Some of them include the circumstances of Kenny's survival being unexplained (certainly would have helped narrow it down for Was It Worth It?), Clementine returns to the cabin and Carver happens to show up a minute later, and a bunch of other stupid fallacies that some characters commit like Sarah finding a gun under the house when Clementine didn't earlier, the doors of the cabin being unlocked in the first place.

Also, in terms of choice-based gameplay, Telltale utterly failed with this episode. Taking the blame for Sarah's photo is absolutely meaningless and has no impacts later on. Choosing whether or not to let Carver is meaningless as he comes in either way. Asking Nick to tell Walter the truth is meaningless, as he will only tell the truth if you tell Walter that he is a good guy in the next choice. Choosing to find Kenny or to surrender has no consequence in later episodes, with only a few changes in dialogue and camera angles during this scene. Did you get that? Only one out of five choices in this episode actually makes an impact on future episodes, and you know what, I could argue that telling Walter that Nick is a good guy is also pointless as Nick serves absolutely no purpose in the next two episodes.

"In Harm's Way"
This was a great episode that was, in our opinion, the highlight of the season. A driven story forces our hand and receives a B (86) from us.

Stuff We Liked
People criticize the lack of real story that went into the opening parts of the episode, and we are no different. However, despite the pretty boring first four scenes, the rest of the episode picks up in short order. The plan to escape felt tense throughout its entire execution. Right up to the point when Luke got captured, we all felt some sort of anxiety. Games that inspire the sorts of emotions that the developers want us to feel are successes. When Carver beat down Kenny with only one fist, it made me scream "motherfucker!" at my screen. When he woke up, it was a genuine feel good moment, and continues to be a feel good moment through each playing of the game since the first.

Then came the choice that saw the type of person the player is; do you watch Carver die or beg for Kenny to let him live before leaving? I enjoyed the death scene, as it felt pretty satisfying.

Stuff We Hated
Don't let the numerous criticisms of this episode fool you; we still had a lot of fun with this episode. Regardless, there were some low points, like the aforementioned first four scenes. The bathroom break scene was stupid, in all honesty, as it really didn't mean anything, even if Carver smacks Clementine because, we get it, Carver's a bastard, and we didn't need to see child abuse to understand it. The argument in the back of the truck felt pointless, since we all saw the trailer that clearly indicated that Kenny wasn't going to break us out just yet. Reggie's introduction... I wish I could erase it from my memory. The forced child abuse between Carlos and Sarah was also pointless, as it did not inspire sympathy from us for Sarah.

Furthermore, like the previous episode, this episode really failed in making the game "tailored by how you play", though, to be fair, that message was not there at the start of this episode. Maybe they recognized themselves that this episode had no choices and chose to cut it out entirely. Choosing to help Sarah or to do your own work has no impacts on future episodes, and both end with Reggie getting killed (which might actually justify it being out of the player's hands). Choosing to tell Bonnie about Luke has no consequences in future episodes, and choosing not to tell her actually leads to an entirely senseless decision by Bonnie to tell Clementine to just scram. Trying to take blame for the radio means absolutely nothing, as Kenny will take the blame either way, get beat to shit either way, and will not talk to you about it in the next episode. Trying to help Kenny, trying to restrain Sarita, or doing nothing all comes with the same result; Kenny loses his eye, and nobody dies. Staying to watch Carver die has no impact other than minor dialogue changes, and this choice is only there for you to find out what kind of person you are. What would have been good here was an option to convince Kenny to make it quick instead of bashing his skull in, so he would respect you and the others wouldn't be scared of him as such if you were to convince him. Finally, whether you cut off Sarita's arm or kill the walker that has her arm, it makes no difference. She dies in the next episode with barely any lines, Kenny blames Clementine no matter what, and it does not carry over into the fifth episode in terms of whether or not you made the right choice.

"Amid The Ruins"
Okay, this episode was pretty disappointing. I've heard that the writer of this episode wasn't even a Telltale employee, so I'm not sure what Kevin Bruner was thinking by letting some outsider come in with no prior knowledge of their future plans and letting him have creative freedom with this episode. Due to this lack of foresight and some overall lack of real quality, this episode gets a B- (81), and even that feels too generous for the letdown we all experienced in playing this episode (Arthener gave it a 96 for some reason, while I gave it a 74 and Solarsearcher gave it a 73).

Stuff We Liked
There were a few notable positives that came out of this episode, though not nearly as many negatives. Many of the positives were picked out by Arthener, who scored this episode higher than "No Time Left", one of the most bizarre reactions to this episode I have ever seen.

Anyway, one of the positives we got was an ending to the Howe's Hardware story. We were content to leave it behind after Carver died, so it was kind of a relief when the antagonists in this episode didn't turn out to be Tavia seeking revenge.

Also, we got to see a few Kenny badass moments when he went out to fight the walkers (even though he only killed one in that scene). It was, we all agreed, an epic frame. To summarize our thoughts, we came up with this to describe the scene. "Thirty hungry walkers... one angry Kenny... the walkers are in trouble."

Also, we were glad to say goodbye to the worthless Sarah in this episode, as this episode actually gave us more of a reason to hate her for actually wanting to get herself killed.

There. Those were the only positives I consented to put up here. I don't know what the fuck Arthener was thinking when he gave this episode a 96. The three above were the only major positives I agreed with him on (Arthener thought that the museum scene should have been a positive, to which I promptly replied with a request for him to kill himself). He said that I should include Kenny's reaction to Sarita's death a positive, as he felt real fear when Kenny snapped at Clementine the first time. Seriously. I'm not making that up.

Stuff We Hated
Solarsearcher and I hated a lot about this episode. First of all, this episode changed the rules of the walkers. People could stand still and scream at each other in this episode, run through herds, and crouch down without getting eaten by the thousands of walkers around them. I don't care how many guts you have smeared across your face; Jane's advice to simply walk in the previous episode went unheeded and everyone still survived somehow. That is the only major negative that Arthener would agree with us on.

The reunion at Parker's Run felt forced and devoid of any emotion. Everyone was talking to us like we were dumb little animals. The player gets no say in any decisions the group makes, such as forcing you to go talk to a clearly angry Kenny who blames you for Sarita's death/bite for some reason, forcing you to go with Jane to search for Luke, and forcing you to lick their shoes. It was straight up condescending for Mike to list out all of the group's current problems, as Telltale actually thought we did not understand the situation.

Nick's death, if he was saved earlier, is one of the worst death frames ever. He died after getting stuck in a damn fence. He wasn't devoured by a walker while he was stuck (breaking the rules of the walkers even further considering that his blood should have drawn it to him). Nope, he just died of an infection two hours or so after getting bitten on the leg. That's it.

Jeez, do any of your choices matter in this game? For the second episode in a row, the opening message about the game is tailored by the player's choices is omitted, and for the third episode in a row, your choices do not matter. If you try to convince Sarah to live, regardless of whether or not you get through to her and convince her to live, she still freezes and you have to slap her, something I wish we were able to do a long time ago. Even if you save her, she still ends up dying in this episode in a death that serves no real purpose. Choosing to let Arvo leave with his bag still causes him to come after you at the end of the episode to rob you. Worse, even if you do rob Arvo and give the medicine to Rebecca in this episode or Luke in the next episode, it does not matter, as it does nothing for either of them. Crawling through the ticket booth- that's actually a choice they chose to highlight? The result is the same either way. Does Telltale really expect a bruise to count as an impact of your choices as proof that your choices matter? Hold the baby- that was a choice? Then there's the decision of whether or not to leave the observation deck in the morning or take a few days rest. Why is there no option send a few people to the nearby town to scavenge for supplies while Rebecca and the others stay behind until they return with the necessary food? Instead, we get a choice that has no consequences, as Rebecca will die either way and the Russian group will ambush you either way. And Rebecca's death, unavoidable though it was, was still pretty stupid, as her death was attributed to blood loss either way. Choosing to shoot the zombified Rebecca before she could attack Bonnie or choosing to call for help so as not to inflame the standoff ends in the same result; Rebecca dead of a gunshot, the baby still alive, and the Russians opening fire. I thought this was an interactive movie, where you could determine the outcome of any scenario. WHAT WAS ARTHENER THINKING GIVING THIS EPISODE A 96? And no, I don't hate him enough to divulge his address, in case you want to kill him yourself. He's my friend. I would never let some stranger end his life. No! He deserves my respect in killing him myself.

"No Going Back"
Arthener gave this one a score that I suppose is a bit more reasonable than the previous episode (he gave it a 82 while Solarsearcher gave it a score of 89). My score of 84 averaged this episode out at a solid B (85).

Stuff We Liked
I didn't hate this episode, unlike the last one, so there were a bunch of things I enjoyed that I don't feel compelled to type. One of them was the sweet return of Lee in a dream sequence. Solarsearcher marked the fuck out when he heard Lee's voice (I was there for his first playthrough and I made sure not to spoil that one). He squealed with joy and oh my, he's standing right behind me.

The climax of the episode was decidedly fantastic yet also decidedly stupid (I'll get to that part later). When I played through, I had already spoiled for myself the ending. The episode came out on the PC a day before it came out on the consoles, so I decided to see what the hell I was in for after the catastrophe of the last episode. Mainly, I only wanted to see who died in the firefight with the Russians, but way back then, there was only the major choices on the page rather than a detailed summary that I would end up writing (YOU'RE WELCOME).

Anyway, I digress. Despite already knowing that Jane had hidden the baby rather than actually failing to save it, I actually got into the story, even if that knowledge prevented me from helping Jane during the fight. I actually got teary-eyed when faced with the mere option to shoot Kenny, even when I had no intention of doing it in the first place. I got teary-eyed when I found the baby alive, even when I knew that he was in fact alive to begin with. Despite all of the spoilers, I still got embroiled in it. All three of us cried for real when we got to Wellington, me twice because I cried during mine and Solarsearcher's playthrough. It physically hurt me and distracted me throughout the entirety of my next week.

And when I went back weeks later and finally got myself to shoot Kenny, I cried again at having shot the one guy left in the game that I truly cared about. I went with Jane because I picked the wrong dialogue option the first time I went with her, so you know I wasn't looking forward to that. I did not enjoy the company of Jane and could not care about the family outside, so I just let them in for the fun of it. Turns out, it wasn't that fun, but it did reinforce by hatred of Jane, so that worked creatively.

Also, honorable mention of a good scene in this episode, Clementine's silly face to A.J. in this episode. Solarsearcher insisted I include it after he caught me going off about him.

Stuff We Hated
The circumstances of everyone's survival at the start of the episode were absolute bullshit. I know it, you know it, and Telltale knows it. Apparently, they understood they were backed into a corner by having limited options in who to kill without making the episode predictable with both Bonnie and Mike getting killed and Luke and Kenny surviving. Problem was, they couldn't kill either of those two either, otherwise the group would be entirely without conflict for the rest of the episode. Obviously, Clementine couldn't die, but getting shot wouldn't have hurt, right? Telltale just decided to rush through the scene as fast as possible so they could forget the whole firefight.

And then, there was the real sense of boredom that came with certain parts of the episode. I don't know about you, but the whole power station scene felt like forced comic relief. It dragged on too long, and Luke gave away his own death when he announced it was his birthday. Honestly, if anyone thought that he would survive after that, you clearly haven't been paying attention to the game. Or any game that involves death. You announce something good about yourself in a drama-blood game; you end up dead.

While I said before that Lee's return in a dream sequence was a nice moment, it has a major problem; it served no purpose. We had a conversation with a Lee that had to answer a question of whether or not we should have kept Lilly. This had no real relevance to the plot, especially after Arvo just shot Clementine. If Clementine had asked about Lee killing the senator and whether or not you should forgive those who wrong you, then it might have meant something. And while Lee's quote about protecting people you care about even if you have to hurt someone else was supposed to give the player some insight on what to do when given the choice to shoot Kenny to save Jane later on, it didn't make sense in that conflict. That wasn't a moment about the morality of your choice in where you needed to kill someone to save another person you cared about; it was picking which person out of the two meant more to you and siding with them in the fight.

Also, the climax was a tad stupid as well. It's good that Telltale went away from the expected "Luke vs. Kenny" ending and chose something entirely different, but it was a complete turnaround from their previous respect for each other. Now, sure, you could argue that Kenny lost his respect for Jane after her plan to get through the herd failed and got Sarita killed (not her fault, regardless), but this conflict only started in this episode. When we got to the fight between them, it was comparatively small when you had the choice of which life to end, as you probably had a vested interest beforehand.

Finally, once again, this episode struggled in making our choices matter. While it wasn't a horrendous failure like the previous three episodes, it still did not really make all of my choices matter. The first significant choice of the episode is whether or not to go for the baby during the firefight. If I go for A.J., he survives, I get out unscathed, and Luke ends up getting shot in the leg. If I don't go for A.J., he survives, I get out unscathed, and Luke ends up getting shot in the leg. Later, when I have to choose whether or not to help Luke or cover him, he dies either way. Bonnie has a determinant death, but considering how miniscule her remaining role is in the episode, it doesn't feel special at all. Do I give Mike the gun or threaten him? It doesn't matter, because I give him the gun either way and end up shot either way. Then comes the choice of Kenny vs. Jane, which is really the first consequential choice in four episodes. However, this was, as GCN pointed out, is the easiest choice of the season, despite this being the most crucial moment of the story. Finally, the ending of who you are with in the end. Recently, Kirkman confirmed that Clementine would return for Season Three, so this still has potential to be the first choice that really tailors to how I play, instead of what I expected a while ago that Telltale would just go with "it's been a while since that day of Clementine's choice, but now she's alone with A.J. after Wellington/Howe's Hardware fell". So, as for right now, we'll just wait and see, and honestly, after E3 2016, it does not look good.

Wait for it, and I'll prove you wrong.