KOOL TV REVIEW: 'THE WALKING DEAD' SEASON TWO FINALE

No escape? Sheriff Rick (Andrew Lincoln) fights the Zombie hordes in the finale of THE WALKING DEAD Season Two. Images: AMC.

NOTE: This feature contains SPOILERS!

After a strong start, followed by a mildly disappointing and seemingly padded out middle (made worse by the series being split over several months), the second season of AMC's THE WALKING DEAD ultimately came to a thrilling and memorable close last week on the UK's FX channel with its finale episode, Beside the Dying Light. Firing on all thrusters, the long-building season of character arcs and storylines set on the far out of the way farm of old country doctor Hershel Greene (Scott Wilson) would come to a satisfying and action packed resolution, as a horde of zombies (brilliantly shown advancing across the States, and following Season One's blink-and-you'll-miss-it helicopter appearance) finally decimated brave Sheriff Rick and the gangs picture-esque countryside home with all the subtly and relish of a football pitch invasion by Millwall fans at Wembley Stadium (if a lot slower!).

They came, they saw, they ate! Yep, its that pesky Zombie time again!

Up in smoke! The Hershel farm dies before its Zombie visitors.

The equivalent of a McDonald's meal-to-go: the unlucky Patricia (Jane McNeill).

The absence of film genius Frank Darabont's touch as the shows' co-creator/co-developer for the series was both very noticeable and greatly missed this year, but continued showrunners Glen Mazzara and Robert Kirkman crafted a season whose scripts became braver and bolder near the finish line, as well as being more ambitious, too, what with the gradual build up of their last three episodes, which had some ultimately stunning moments of genuine suspense, eye-opening revelations (we finally found out what CDC scientist Dr. Jenner (Noah Emmerich) whispered in Rick's ears from the season one finale! And heaven help us, now that Rick has seen the proof!), involving action and some tragic, shout NO! at the screen, deaths (poor old Dale never stood a chance, did he-just too nice and humane for his own good amongst the mob and the lone Zombie that tore his chest out. I also had a feeling the character, always well played by Jeffrey DeMunn, was axed from the show because the writers, bar Darabont, didn't really know what to do with him in television reality form).

And then there was Shane.

No rest for the wicked. Poor old Shane is zombiefied!

Poor, misunderstood Shane. Re-watching the series you realise just what a great job Jon Bernthal did playing this complex, often animalistic, role of an ultimately decent man gone wrong, now bearing a Travis Bickle style TAXI DRIVER, sliding into emotional oblivion, buzz cut homage hairstyle, and ultimately spurred on in to trying to kill Rick-his best friend- by the once adulterous and now pregnant, who's-really- the-father Sheriff's wife, Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies in a more complicated and less likable performance this year, whose role was recently described by series Executive Producer Gale Anne Hurd as an almost Lady Macbeth-like figure-heck, I'd agree with that description!). The final scenes of the penultimate episode, where a devastated and exhausted Rick (always well played by Andrew Lincoln), knowing that there can ultimately be only one leader of the surviving pack, has no choice but to kill Shane, who then turns into a Zombie killed by the new Wesley Crusher of the show, Cal (played by hatted little 'un, Chandler Riggs), were brilliantly written, acted and staged, and, truth be told, I even shed a little tear for our departed friend (couldn't they have done with Shane what they did at the end of SHAUN OF THE DEAD, and what farmer Hershel previously did in this season with his family and farmhands-keeping him in a shed somewhere as a tied-up pet?!)

Back on the road: our survivors re-group to start again...

As if shooting your best friend, and then seeing him dead again as a Zombie, wasn't bad enough, followed by his courage trying to defend his now outcast friends from the terrifying Zombie attack, the audience is cleverly manipulated by the writers- and made emotionally stupefied and stunned in the process- into witnessing brave old Rick, who really has had to make the difficult decisions this year (even killing one of their own-and a child), shunned by the majority of his "family' when he finally reveals the truth about shooting Shane and the zombie plague infection! What a bunch of hypocrites! But the fact that those scenes worked so well shows you just how effectively the behind the scenes creative team and the actors have nailed down the characters and their 'humanity'-flared tensions and a building resentment would surely happen to a group like this after such a dire situation. And, of course, having lost several further lives at the farm, they're still one person short, as poor Andrea, separated and believed dead, has to do a Challenge Anneka-esque run through the woodlands of America to escape the chasing Zombie hordes (our lovely blonde heroine Laurie Holden finally getting some kick-ass moments this year!). At the point of death she's thankfully save by a mysterious cowled swordslady with two armless zombie slaves (the kind of graphic novel moment to be visually savoured in its TV translation!). What that's all about, I really don't know, but I can't wait to see what happens next this Autumn...

Often unlucky, Andrea (Laurie Holden) isn't going down without a fight!

A mysterious new Swordslady, and her decapitated Zombie duo, make their entrance.

With its iconic closing moments, our heroes, desperate to stay one step ahead of being Zombie lunch, aren't too far now from the realm of The Governor (to be played by British actor David Morrissey), and the start of a much anticipated plot-line to its third year that I hope successfully builds further on the reawakened glories of its prior season two finale...


KOOL TV OVERALL SEASON RATING: 3.5 out of 5