The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Season 3, Episode 6 Review

Warning: This review contains spoilers for The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season 3, episode 6.

In its penultimate episode, I was hoping The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season 3 might finally have some get-up-and-go to start setting up its endgame. But alas, that’s not the case. As Daryl joins yet another community for yet another rescue mission, this latest episode just goes through the motions once more, and it’s starting to feel painfully repetitive. The setup in the opening scenes was intriguing — Paz joins Daryl on the road to Barcelona for an unlikely partnership, a la For a Few Dollars More — but it promptly settles into another rehash of the same old formula.

Much like the zombie-ravaged London we saw in Daryl Dixon‘s season premiere, there are some interesting visuals when Daryl and Paz get to post-apocalyptic Barcelona. The city is massive, and it’s filled to the brim with the undead. There are some gorgeous wide shots of the ruins, as well as some specific locations up close — like the dilapidated Cathedral Basilica — but the story is sorely lacking.

The Writers Have Lots Of Ideas For Communities, But Only One Idea For A Story

This season is starting to feel a bit like Groundhog Day. Episode 6 gives us yet another story where Daryl wanders into a community of survivors and tries to earn their trust. It’s getting comically repetitive at this pointeven if the writers have dozens of ideas for different communities and only one idea for a story. The overuse of this trope is a bigger problem with The Walking Dead franchise as a whole, but it’s been particularly noticeable in Daryl Dixon season 3.

First, there was Solaz, then came the boat people, then came the rabbit colony. Now, we’re in Barcelona with a resistance group who are too afraid to take action until Daryl comes along and inspires them. Daryl’s trip to Barcelona has some serviceable action sequences. There’s a lot more zombie action than in most of the previous episodes in this season, and there’s a great rescue sequence when Daryl, Paz, and the revolution attack the king’s convoy and attempt to free his prisoners. butt it’s impossible to escape the feeling that we’re just retreading familiar territory.

There are some neat editing flourishes this week. I was especially taken with the beautiful Spanish-language telling of the tale of Saint George and the Dragon, played over Daryl’s latest heroic endeavour. As we hear this story, and watch Daryl slaughter a horde of the undead, the show draws an interesting parallel between our crossbow-wielding zombie slayer and the holy dragon slayer of medieval legend.

Carol spends this episode back in Solaz, essentially as a spectator to Antonio’s drama. It was a wise move to bring Melissa McBride into this spinoff — she made the show 10 times better when she joined the cast in season 2 — but it feels like a waste of time to bring her in at all if they’re not going to use her. McBride is a brilliant actor, but Carol has spent the bulk of this season as the audience surrogate watching the drama unfold in Solaz. It’s a massive waste of her talents and her electric on-screen chemistry with Norman Reedus.

Reedus is still a joy to watch as Daryl — I could watch this character pick out wallpaper and still be riveted — but I just wish the writers would take more risks with the storytelling instead of relying on the same tropes and conventions. I’ve been absolutely loving the spaghetti western vibes this season — the dusty locales, the bullet-belted costumes, the blood-soaked shootouts, the gorgeous Leone-esque wides — but at its core, it’s still the same old tired, clichéd Walking Dead storytelling but with a Corbucci facelift.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season 3 only has one episode left to turn things around. I’d like to hope that the finale can pull everything together and deliver a satisfying ending, but I won’t count on it.

Release Date

2023 – 2026-00-00

Showrunner

David Zabel

Directors

Daniel Percival, Greg Nicotero

Writers

David Zabel, Angela Kang

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  Norman Reedus

  Daryl Dixon

• 

  Clemence Poesy

  Isabelle Carriere

Pros & Cons

• This episode has some decent action scenes

• Daryl’s travels to and from communities are getting painfully repetitive
• Carol is being massively underutilized