"Till Death" is the fifth episode of the seventh season of AMC's Fear the Walking Dead. It is the ninetieth episode of the series overall. It premiered on November 14, 2021, the same night as "Blood and Lies", the seventh episode of the second season of The Walking Dead: World Beyond. It was written by Ashley Cardiff & Justin Boyd and directed by Lennie James.
Plot[]
With a code to guide them, Dwight and Sherry become ethical outlaws known as the Dark Horses. When Strand recruits them for a search and rescue mission, it forces them to question their code and their future.
Synopsis[]
A man in a gas mask, Eli, pushes a cart through an abandoned town. Another man flags him down and selects some fruit from the cart. Two masked riders, the Dark Horses, show up on horseback and hold the men at gunpoint, demanding to know why they're stealing food from others. A fight ensues. A rider kills one of the men, but Eli escapes. The riders remove their masks: It's Dwight and Sherry.
Dwight and Sherry bring supplies back to the cellar where they've been living with the Larsons—Kevin, Kim, and their daughter, Briga. Kevin and Kim tell Dwight and Sherry that they need to move on and join up with a community, but Dwight and Sherry beg them to wait until they find Padre. Someone radios with a request for help from the Dark Horses.
Dwight and Sherry arrive at the caller's meeting spot and get ambushed by Howard and his rangers.
Strand hits golf balls off the roof of his tower. Howard brings Dwight and Sherry to him and removes their hoods. Strand bursts into laughter when he realizes the identity of the Dark Horses. He tells them he has a proposal.
Strand takes Dwight and Sherry on a tour of the tower and says that June, Wendell, and John Dorie Sr. are living there, but that he won't allow Morgan and Grace into the community. He offers them residence at the tower if they can find one of his former residents, Mickey, who went searching for her husband and is obsessed with a place she heard about on a radio transmission. They refuse his offer.
Howard brings Dwight and Sherry back to the outside world. After he leaves, Sherry proposes they find Mickey and search for Padre all together.
Mickey holes up in a bar and duct tapes phone books for armor. She hears people outside and tells them she's not going back to Strand. Dwight enters the bar and insists they just want to talk. Mickey twists his arm. Sherry shows up with a gun and explains they're just here to help Mickey find her husband.
Mickey tells Dwight and Sherry that she escaped Strand's tower by taping phone books to her body and pushing through the herd around the tower. She says the only reason Strand wants her back is so that no one else finds out how she escaped. Dwight suddenly recognizes Mickey as a professional wrestler who used to tour with her husband Cliff. Mickey explains that she and Cliff opened a training gym after their career ended and agreed to meet at the gym if they ever got split up after the fall. Dwight and Sherry offer to help her find Cliff and locate Padre together.
Dwight, Sherry, and Mickey arrive at the cellar and find Kim and Kevin shot in the head. Briga is a walker.
Sherry and Dwight bury the Larsons, and deduce that Eli murdered them. Dwight wonders if they should take Strand's offer.
Dwight tells Mickey that the tower might be the safest place for them, but Mickey refuses to go back. Sherry decides to accompany Mickey to the gym and tells Dwight she'll meet him at the bar after they find Cliff.
Sherry and Mickey begin their journey to the gym. Mickey says she understands Dwight's rationale for wanting to live at the tower. Sherry explains they already made a bargain once with a man like Strand, and it nearly destroyed them.
They arrive at the gym and find it surrounded by walkers. Sherry gets an idea.
Dwight finds his horse in the woods. Eli sneaks up on him and holds him at gunpoint. Dwight makes a sound, cuing his horse to kick Eli to the ground. Eli drops some polaroid photos of dead walkers. Dwight remembers seeing polaroids of dead walkers at Strand's tower and realizes that Strand hired Eli to kill the Larsons. Dwight leaves Eli to die as walkers devour him.
Sherry slathers Mickey in walker guts. Mickey walks unnoticed through the herd and reaches the front door of the gym, but it's locked. She trips, drawing the walkers' attention. Sherry shoots the front door, shattering the glass. They both run inside.
Sherry and Mickey block the front door with gym gear, but walkers keep amassing on the other side.
Sherry climbs into the boxing ring to gain some height. Mickey sees a walker and realizes it's Cliff. She walks toward him in tears, but Sherry stabs him in the head. Mickey climbs into the ring. The ring collapses, allowing walkers to climb up. Sherry grabs her walkie to call Strand for help, but Dwight shows up and tells them that Strand killed the Larsons. They slaughter all the walkers together.
Dwight gives Mickey a letter he found while cleaning Cliff's body. In the letter, Cliff urges Mickey not to give up. Dwight privately admits to Sherry that the reason he wanted to live at the tower was because he wants to start a family. They decide they don't need to wait for perfect circumstances to have a child. A voice comes over the radio, looking for the Dark Horses.
Dwight, Sherry, and Mickey gallop through the wasteland to answer the call. They arrive at the meeting point and find a masked man. More masked figures come out of hiding as the man invites them to help him find Padre.
Other Cast[]
Co-Stars[]
- Aaron Spivey-Sorrells as Kevin Larson
- Julia Barnett as Kim Larson
- Ella McCain as Briga Larson
- Blake Blair as Stalker
- Lexter Santana as Partner
Uncredited[]
- Wade Hampton as Cliff
- Marco Ramirez as Bell
- Nina Rossetti as Tower Resident
- Randy Frazier as Tower Resident
- Rebecca Blackmore as Tower Resident
- Nicholas Andrew Rice as Tower Resident
Deaths[]
- Milus (Confirmed Fate)
- Eli's Partner
- Kevin Larson
- Kim Larson
- Briga Larson (Alive and Zombified)
- Eli
- Cliff (Alive, Confirmed Fate; Zombified)
- Cliff's Father (Confirmed Fate, Pre-Apocalypse)
- All members of Milus' group (Confirmed Fate)
- 1 unnamed paramedic (Zombified)
Trivia[]
- Only appearance of Eli.
- Only appearance of Mickey.
- Only appearance of Cliff. (Zombified)
- Last appearance of Kim Larson.
- Last appearance of Kevin Larson.
- Last appearance of Briga Larson.
- The title of the episode, "Till Death", refers to Mickey and Cliff's signature pro-wrestling move "Till Death Do Us Part" which is also briefly performed on a zombie by Dwight and Mickey.
- This episode was made available for streaming to subscribers of AMC Premiere on November 7, 2021.
- The seventh episode of Season 2 of The Walking Dead: World Beyond is played directly after this episode.
- According to Strand, the Tower is the only inhabitable place with any sort of a future for 50 miles. It can also potentially hold up to a thousand people.
- Its current population is over 200.
- Sherry briefly mentions the Sanctuary, comparing the Tower to it. She also refers to Negan.
- Sherry helps Mickey use the walker guts trick, which was last seen in "El Matadero".
Episode Highlights[]
- Dwight and Sherry are shown to be living with the Larson family after the nuke fallout and are taking jobs to help people using the group name The Dark Horses.
- Dwight and Sherry meet Mickey, who is revealed to be one half of a famous professional wrestling tag team that Dwight was a fan of.
- After Dwight and Sherry help Mickey clear her gym of walkers, Mickey puts down her zombified husband and joins The Dark Horses.
- Dwight, Sherry and Mickey return to the Larson family home only to find that Eli murdered Kevin and Kim and left Briga to turn. Dwight puts down Briga and kills Eli in revenge, after finding out Strand ordered him to do it.