‘The Walking Dead’ Recap: Season 7, Ep 3, ‘The Cell’ And What Was That ‘Easy Street’ Song?

Caution: As always, this The Walking Dead recap contains spoilers for Episode 3, “The Cell.” If you haven’t watched it yet, proceed at your own risk.

First, that song that they kept playing to drive Daryl crazy. It’s called “Easy Street” by The Collapsable Hearts Club. If you want to hear the entire thing, it’s already been put up on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoQ4GidQP-k

If you don’t know, the song that eventually broke Daryl down and made him cry was the classic Roy Orbison tune “Crying.”

As promised, this week’s episode showed what life was like in the compound through three sets of eyes: Daryl’s, Dwight’s, and Negan’s. (We may have gotten almost everything else wrong, but we were right about that.)

The episode opens with Dwight making a sandwich set to The Jam’s “A Town Called Malice.” A fried egg, pickle, tomato, lettuce, and mustard sandwich to be precise. We watch as he jumps in line ahead of other people and takes a loaf of homemade bread without paying. He sees someone get a beating and goes to their room and gets the pickles and yellow mustard. Dwight takes tomatoes and eggs from people who are tending the crops and animals. And yet, we are also shown that Dwight isn’t really in control as he drops to one knee quickly when Negan walks by. But that tight-lipped, side-eyed glance lets us know that Dwight isn’t exactly happy about the situation.

From Daryl’s perspective, it’s complete hell. He’s in prison, fed dog food sandwiches, and made to listen to music that is designed to drive a person mad. When we first see Daryl, he’s naked inside a small room that almost looks like an old janitor’s closet. Dwight shows up every now and again and feeds Daryl a dog food sandwich accompanied with that maddening song. This isn’t just torture, it’s psyops meant to break Daryl down. Eventually, Daryl gets a dirty sweat suit from Dwight and is taken to see a doctor.

The doctor says that Daryl’s gunshot wound will get better if only he lets it. It’s pretty clear what the doc means — Daryl needs to fall in line with Negan and company. We also see Sherry, who recognizes Daryl and has some advice before Dwight cuts her off. Dwight takes Daryl out to see the wall where two sweatsuit clad flunkies are wrestling with zombies. Dwight lays out the choices Daryl has.

“That’s you, a**hole. Unless you’re smart. Your choice. You can be like them, or me…or them.”

After a brief talk where Daryl emphasizes that he’s never going to kneel, we see Negan and Dwight talk. Negan graciously offers Dwight some girl time because Dwight has been hustling and working hard for Negan. Dwight refuses, prompting Negan to make some belittling remarks about Dwight’s ability to perform because of the bite that Eugene gave him. Before Negan can pursue it much farther, a Code Orange pops up, meaning someone has stolen something and ran.

Dwight volunteers to go out, even though it’s grunt work in Negan’s eyes and Dwight is better than that. Dwight tells Negan that he likes to do it, but you get the feeling that Dwight will take any opportunity to get out of the Savior’s compound he can.

While Dwight is off pursuing the stolen goods, Fat Joey is left in charge of feeding Daryl. It seems that Fat Joey is a little more careless than Dwight, because after a feeding, Daryl discovers his door is unlocked. With almost zero hesitation, our man Daryl is on the lam.

As he’s making his way out, trying his best to avoid patrols of guards, he runs into Sherry who warns him, “Go back while you can. You know I did. Whatever he’s done to you, there’s more. There’s always more. You won’t get away. And when you’re back, it’ll be worse.”

Daryl gives her his trademark steely-eyed glance and slips away. He makes it outside to where the bikes are kept and is immediately surrounded by Negan and 10 other guards. It was a test to see if Daryl was going to try to escape, and Daryl failed spectacularly. Negan asks his men in turn, “Who are you?” to which they respond, “Negan.” Yes, Negan is everywhere.

Negan leaves Daryl to the tender mercies of his guards who beat him senseless.

Cut to Dwight on the road in pursuit of the thief. After a narrow escape at an underpass with an Easter egg nod to the comics, he catches up with the former Savior, who apparently has history with Dwight, calling him D. As Dwight brings the other back to the compound to a fate that’s probably going to be gruesome, his prisoner keeps begging him to let him go and eventually falls to his knees, begging Dwight to kill him. Dwight refuses, and it isn’t until he tells his prisoner that he will kill everyone that the man has talked to and unearth his wife’s dead body for the crows to eat that the man acquiesces and continues stumbling back to the Savior’s compound. In a final act of mercy, Dwight takes aim and kills the man.

Later, we see Dwight and Sherry in a dimly lit stairwell sharing an intimate moment over a cigarette. Dwight tells Sherry that he did the right thing because it’s a hell of a lot better than being dead, right? Sherry’s listless agreement is argument enough.

Dwight goes back to Daryl’s cell and tells Daryl how stupid he’s being. He points out that the two of them aren’t so different. Daryl got Glenn killed, and Dwight got Tina killed, both by defying Negan. After leaving Daryl with a Polaroid of a Lucille kill (similar to the ones we saw last season at the outpost), Daryl breaks down crying.

Negan gives Daryl one last chance, taking him into a relatively posh room (heck, with Daryl’s current accommodations, this room is like the Four Seasons). Negan tells Daryl about Dwight and what happened since we last saw them, filling in the blanks, Negan-style. After Tina died, Dwight and Sherry went back to the Saviors, and to forestall Lucille having her way with Dwight, Sherry agreed to marry Negan. Negan magnanimously agreed, but left Dwight with that scar from a hot iron. Negan then asks Daryl, “Who are you?”

After a tense standoff, Daryl answers simply, “Daryl.”

Dwight raises his hand to smack Daryl around, but Negan stops him saying, “It’s cool, D. He made his choice. Ain’t my problem if he made a dumba** choice.”

Daryl gets tossed back into his cell, and Dwight tells him that he’s either going to end up in that room or hanging on the fence. Daryl speaks, connecting with Dwight on a deeper level.

“I get why you did it. Why you took it. You were thinking about someone else. That’s why I can’t.”

Dwight leaves and wanders out to the fence, drinking and sees his former friend that he shot on the fence as a zombie. The marked sense of despair that crosses Dwight’s face lets us know that he finally realizes that there’s no real difference what choice you make, you just end up dancing to Negan’s tune one way or the other.

[Featured Image by AMC]