“Tales of the Walking Dead” Review – Alpha Origin Episode Shows Full Potential of New Spinoff Series

With the latest episode of “Tales of the Walking Dead,” the fresh spin-off has veered as close as it has to the original world and characters of the flagship series. Simply titled “Dee,” the episode follows none other than Season 10 villain Alpha, once again brought to terrifying life by Samantha Morton. While Season 10 brought us a glimpse at who Alpha was before she became leader of the Whisperer clan, this installment of “Tales” shows us an earlier event from Alpha’s past.

Taking a concept that very well could’ve served as the basis for a separate episode featuring new characters, “Dee” mashes an original zombie survival tale with an already well-known character from “The Walking Dead” universe. This enables the episode to not only provide a compelling deep dive into a fan-favorite, but also depict a refreshing zombie apocalypse experience that we haven’t yet seen in the main series before. There’s a few questionable and slightly confusing narrative turns within the episode, but luckily they don’t detract much from what is really a vehicle to showcase Samantha Morton’s exceptional performance. 

We find Dee living with her daughter Lydia (Scarlett Blum), who remains a surviving character as a teenager in the current seasons, on a large boat that is floating through an eerie swamp. The lives of the passengers are overtly lavish and filled with faux motivational workout classes all spearheaded by optimistic boat leader Brooke (Lauren Glazier). The refreshing world within the ship contrasts greatly with the atmospheric, almost gothic horror atmosphere of the surrounding swamps. Walkers shamble between trees in the distance and low fog clings to the murky water. The passengers have come together to form a bubble of sorts, living on the ship as if the outside world remains as it was. 

Losing the trust of her daughter and acceptance of those around her, Morton’s Dee becomes increasingly agitated with how things are running on the ship. Long story short, chaos does ensue simply between the human characters (as the flagship show has warned us of so well), leaving Dee to flex her bloodthirsty survival skills in what serves as an eerie precursor of what is to come down the line. The wild, sea-born tale is occasionally interjected by an ominous apocalypse-worn Alpha (seen with her iconic bald head) standing within a severed head-covered cave. Throughout the episode audiences aren’t keyed into who exactly she is retelling this story too, but in the final moments their questions are answered with typical “Walking Dead” macabre flare. 

Morton’s depiction of Dee is one of the main reasons why this episode works so well. It’s a performance that has since continued to stand out even when considering the earlier seasons of the flagship series. Her stone-cold demeanor, daggered eyes, and precise dialect infuse a chilling ambience to all of Dee’s scenes. What makes the episode so enjoyable for longtime fans of the show, is that each scene feels ten times more intense simply considering the ticking time bomb of Dee’s transformation into Alpha. Audiences know exactly what Dee is capable of, making all of her intense choices even more of an exciting experience for avid fans. 

“Dee” also happens to have the best walker gag of the spin-off series thus far in which Dee learns the cover-yourself-in-zombie guts trick. Scrambling to hide after being knocked off balance during a walker attack, Dee buries herself underneath a particularly skeletal walker’s corpse. Within seconds the torso of the decaying creature snaps open, swallowing Dees face into its mutilated ribcage. Drenched in the rotten blood of the undead, Dee coaxes young Lydia to crawl into the zombie torso with her in an absolutely twisted scene of mother-daughter survival.

Much like the “Here’s Negan” bonus episode, “The Walking Dead” franchise shows great strength and effectiveness when it focuses on its most compelling characters in contained, character-exploration pieces. Much of the original’s current shortcomings come from the overabundance of storylines and characters. Perhaps “Tales of the Walking Dead” as a whole would’ve worked better as an episodic revisit of past-characters at different points in their apocalypse journey. 

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