Review

Carl surprises Lori with his views on life following the apocalypse, she is in for an even bigger shock when Carl requests permission to join Shane's gun training group. Surprisingly Carl and Andrea show they are pretty much crack shots. Lori is still troubled with her pregnancy and asks Glenn to get something from the Pharmacy in town for her. Maggie heads on out with Glenn and is later attacked by a walker at the Pharmacy, Glenn comes to her rescue.

Speaking of Glenn he confides in Dale that there are walkers in the barn and Lori is pregnant. Dale confronts Hershel and learns that Hershel believes the dead are still people and can be cured. Meanwhile Shane and Andrea visit a local housing development looking for the still missing Sophia and discover a horde of zombies. Lori finally confesses to Rick that she is pregnant and had an affair with Shane while believing Rick to be dead.

While last episode was all about Daryl Secrets turns its focus onto Carl and Glenn, two characters that are generally well represented in each episode without being the focal characters. We learn Carl has hardened up through the trials and tribulations the group has suffered. The kid is for sure more accepting of the situation they find themselves in, everything is prey waiting to happen, than his mother Lori is comfortable with, and Carl has a fixed notion on why he needs to learn how to shoot. In terms of survival Carl is rapidly turning into one little dude you would want to have around, as opposed to Lori or a couple of the other loose cannons in the near vicinity. Likewise Glenn has grown as an individual through the past couple of seasons, comes the time comes the man yo, and as Maggie notes he has become the go to guy for the group when something outside of the box needs to happen. Glenn remains stunningly unaware that he has a huge role in the group's survival chances.

Very solid episode that sets up the second half of the season nicely

We now know there are walkers in the barn, and Glenn has told Dale the good news there, can't be that much longer before the whole group learns just what is in their midst. Dale confronts Hershel and we finally learn why Hershel has been uneasy about Rick's group staying on the farm. Surprisingly Hershel still believes that the zombies are people who can somehow be miraculously cured, which makes you wonder how he has survived this long. It also pointed to a slight plot hole for mine, didn't Rick get roped in to a zombie capture with Hershel's possie and as such what exactly did he think ultimately happened to the captured zombies? This particular quandary doesn't come up in the comics, and underlines one of the problems of having multiple writers - if you don't have your story lines well plotted then things sort of fall between the cracks of plot development. Anyways we are likely to have one hell of a clash when Rick's group is let into the secret of the barn that dripped decay and it will be interesting to see how Rick reacts to the news of a clear and present danger right next to where they sleep.

What I did want to comment on with episode six was the camera angles in use and the general style Director David Boyd brings to Secrets. We're talking sweeping long angles that promote the feeling of how rural the setting is, plenty of shots of well worn wood, (the barn, fences, etc), and a real feeling of camping out going down. Boyd nailed the whole country feeling the episode has going down and there are a butt load of fly shots coming at you. I'm just going to state that this might well be the best directed episode thus far in a year and a half of The Walking Dead.

Perhaps the only issue I have with the episode is it continues the season's tendency to run in the one place with no feeling of the overall plot moving ahead. While season one certainly had a strong central concept of where things were headed season two is treading water and sort of feels like a fill in season to a certain extent. On the bright side of the screwdriver character development is rocking along and the relationships between the characters continues to evolve with Shane and Dale now circling each other, Lori and Rick are coming to terms with what has happened, and of course Glenn and Maggie getting more into each other.

As usual we get our far share of zombie action with an individual zombie attack and a whole bunch in another scene. Naturally there's plenty of claret being spilled and in at least one scene the gore isn't being held back. I'm half way through season two and just aren't seeing the lack of zombies some Critics were claiming; perhaps they aren't used to zombie outings? Unfortunately there's no developments on the zombie mythology, which has been sadly lacking thus far this season to be honest.

I really dug Secrets, mainly due to Director Boyd delivering more atmosphere than you could poke an RV at. The story lines advanced, without anything getting bogged down, and there's enough meat on the bone to ensure the next episode should be explosive. We now know Hershel's motivation and this is going to be diametrically opposed to Rick's security requirements. Full recommendation kids, one of the best episodes I've seen in either of the first two seasons.