The Walking Dead 5.8 Review - 5 Talking Points From "Coda"

4. Dawn Vs. O'Donnell

Let's face it: This entire hospital storyline has been a convoluted mess from the very beginning, with the motivations and reasoning all over the place. We're supposed to view them as antagonists, but they're never actually evil unless they're doing something cartoonish like leering at Beth with rapeface or beating on elderly sick people. Dawn's entire existence was all about keeping the balance in her fragile command structure, but the reason why Grady operated the way it did never made any sense. A more logical approach would be to limit the amount of people the hospital takes in to necessary personnel and conserve resources, rather than forcing a trade of goods for services. In order to maintain Dawn's ambiguity we're given yet another sneering, evilish cop who looks at Beth like a barely legal stripper. With Beth tossing O'Donnell down the elevator shaft to Hell seems makes it seem as if she's seen Dawn's side of things. Regardless of that uneasy truce, Beth is still captive and being unable to leave of her own volition negates any progress made, which will come into play in a major way later on. This has been one of the more logic-deficient angles of the show and thankfully it's over with, even if it did cost fans a major character.