The Walking Dead Season 7: 3 Ups & 6 Downs From 'Swear'

5. Another Single Location Instalment

The woods, the Kingdom, the Sanctuary, Alexandria, Hilltop... now Oceanside. Six weeks, six episodes, six different locations. There's nothing wrong with that in theory: a show can span multiple characters and settings, drop in and out of storylines, keep all of the plates spinning and wheels moving. The Walking Dead, though, isn't doing that. It's moving through them one episode at a time, like ticking boxes on the list of locales it has to visit. Alexandria, check. Oceanside, check.

It means that stories that could take up 1/3 or even 1/4 of an episode have to dominate the whole thing. At the same time, it means other storylines are completely left behind. It makes the episodes increasingly boring, and the plot static, and that's again what we've got here in Swear.

The show has plenty of stories to tell, and there's a good chance they'd work well (or at least better than they are right now) by intercutting them throughout the episode. Show some of Carol, some of Daryl, some of Rick, some of Tara here - progress each one a bit with every visit, and you could have episodes that don't feel like total filler.