Vatos (Episode)

"" is the fourth episode of Season 1 and the fourth produced hour of the TV series. Vatos aired on November 21, 2010 on AMC

Synopsis
Andrea and Amy sit in a canoe on the quarry lake, fishing. They reflect on how their father taught them different fishing knots based on Andrea's need to keep the fish, and Amy's need to throw them back.

Nearby, in a field above the campsite, Jim furiously digs holes in the ground.

On the department store rooftop in Atlanta, an enraged Daryl points his crossbow at T-Dog, but relents when Rick pulls his revolver.

Back at the campsite, Dale approaches Jim, who refuses to respond. Amy and Andrea, meanwhile, present the group with their lines of fish. Dale interrupts the excitement to express concern over Jim.

Daryl and the others follow Merle's trail of blood to a kitchen, where Sterno cans burn next to an iron steak weight crusted with skin — the result, they speculate, of Merle cauterizing his stump.

Rick agrees to help Daryl search the streets for his brother. "Only if we get those guns first," T-Dog says.

At camp, Shane and the others approach Jim, who still won't explain why he's digging. Lori tells Jim he's scaring the children, and Shane orders Jim to take a break.

"If I don't, then what?" Jim asks Shane. "You're gonna beat my face in like Ed Peletier?" Jim swings his shovel at Shane, who tackles him. Subdued, Jim cries over the death of his wife and sons. "The only reason I got away," Jim says, "is 'cause the dead were too busy eating my family."

In Atlanta, Glenn outlines a plan to retrieve Rick's bag: Daryl will watch his back from the store's alley, while Rick and T-Dog cover a second alley two blocks away.

On the street, Glenn runs toward the tank. Back in the alley, a teenager, Miguel, approaches Daryl. Daryl trains his crossbow on Miguel, who begins screaming.

Glenn grabs the bag of guns — and Rick's hat — then runs back toward Daryl. Rick and T-Dog, hearing Miguel's screams, also head for the alley.

Daryl is jumped by two men, Jorge and Felipe, who have also come for the guns. The men turn to Glenn and start beating him. Daryl fires an arrow in Felipe's butt. They throw Glenn in a car and drive off — leaving Miguel and the guns behind.

At camp, Shane has tied Jim to a tree and is offering him water. Jim apologizes for scaring the children. Dale asks why he was digging. "I had a reason, don't remember," Jim says. "Something I dreamt last night."

Miguel leads Rick, Daryl and T-Dog to an abandoned factory, where the leader of the group, Guillermo, emerges. Rick proposes trading Miguel for Glenn.

Guillermo demands the bag of guns, threatening to kill Glenn if they don't hand it over. "I see two options," says Guillermo. "You come back with Miguel and my bag of guns, everybody walks. Or you come back locked and loaded."

Rick and the group retreat to a nearby foreman's office, where Daryl argues that the guns are more valuable than Glenn. "What life I have I owe to him," Rick says, loading a shotgun. Daryl and T-Dog follow suit.

Rick escorts Miguel into the warehouse carrying the guns on his back. Rick cuts Miguel loose and demands Guillermo hand over Glenn. "You said come locked and loaded," Rick says. "We're here."

An old woman wearing a nightgown shuffles into the middle of the standoff, asking Felipe for help with "Mr.Gilbert." She notices Rick's uniform and begs him not to take Felipe away.

Rick tells the old woman that Felipe is helping him find a missing person. "The Asian boy?" she asks, taking Rick's hand.

The woman leads Rick into a nursing home auditorium, where several elderly people (and Glenn) are grouped around an asthmatic man. Felipe helps the man with an inhaler.

"You're the dumbest son of a bitch I ever met," Rick tells Guillermo privately. Guillermo explains he was only trying to protect the food and medicine for the residents. The staff abandoned the patients, Guillermo explains, leaving only himself (the building custodian) and Felipe (a nurse) behind.

Guillermo wonders why the people look to him for leadership. "Because they can," Rick says, handing him a shotgun and a rifle.

Rick, Glenn, T-Dog and Daryl walk back to the cube van, but find it missing. "Merle," Rick says. "He's going to be taking some vengeance back to camp," Daryl predicts.

Andrea roots through Dale's RV looking for wrapping paper. "It's Amy's birthday tomorrow," she tells Dale, showing him the mermaid necklace she took from the department store. "You don't give a gift unwrapped."

Shane frees Jim and invites him to participate in the group's fish-fry.

Ed, his face bruised and swollen, broods in his tent, declining Carol's invite to join the group.

Sitting around a campfire, Morales asks Dale why he still winds his wristwatch every day. "It's important to keep track," Dale explains, paraphrasing a Faulkner parable about a father giving his son a watch — "the mausoleum of all hope and desire."

"You are so weird," laughs Amy, heading to the RV. Ed, meanwhile, hears rustling outside his tent. He unzips the flap to find a walker. The walker topples him, biting his neck as more walkers swarm in.

Amy emerges from the RV. A walker approaches from behind the door and bites her arm. Amy's screams send the camp into a panic. Walkers attack from all directions. Shane orders Lori to get Carl down as he fires his shotgun. Jim and Morales beat down walkers with baseball bats.

Rick and the others, running toward camp, hear gunshots in the distance and quicken their pace. Back at the RV, a walker tears into Amy's neck. Rick, Glenn, Daryl and T-Dog arrive and quickly shoot the remaining walkers.

Andrea runs to Amy. "I don't know what to do," Andrea cries. Amy touches Andrea's face, and then falls still. Andrea, sobbing, screams Amy's name.

"I remember my dream now," Jim says somberly. "Why I dug the holes."

Co-Stars

 * Guillermo - Neil Brown Jr.
 * T-Dog - IronE Singleton
 * Jacqui - Jeryl Prescott
 * Carol - Melissa McBride
 * Ed Peletier - Adam Minarovich
 * Sophia - Madison Lintz
 * Eliza Morales - Maddie Lomax
 * Miguel - Anthony Guajardo
 * Jorge - James Gonzaba
 * Abuela - Gina Morelli

Uncredited

 * Miranda Morales - Viviana Chavez-Vega
 * Louis Morales - Noah Lomax
 * Vatos Gang Member - Roger Herrera
 * Vatos Gang Member - Timothy Douglas Perez - appears in a deleted scene in Vatos (See images: TDP, with Felipe, with Guillermo, with T-Dog)
 * Zombies - Sonya Thompson, Derrick McLeod, Alexyz Danine Kemp, Chris Burns, Erin Leigh Bushko, Charles Casey

Trivia

 * Vatos is a Hispanic youth; guy; dude.
 * Gregory Nicotero, consulting producer and one of the special effects makeup artist, plays the zombie that kills Amy.
 * Ugo.com makes 15 comparisons between the comic and the episode.
 * Bellwood Quarry is the location of the lake that Andrea and Amy fished on. Taken from this thread: "Following the completion of mining, the Bellwood Quarry was acquired by the City of Atlanta for a mixed-use recreational/park facility and water reservoir."