The Walking Dead Season 8 Finale: Every Dumb Moment, Ranked Bad To Worst

2. Rick Slitting Negan's Throat For No Reason

After the Saviours had been beaten, Negan flees with Rick in chase, and for no real reason except because the writing team remembered they needed yet another climactic battle between the pair, they get into a fistfight and Rick takes a pretty hard blow from Lucille.

Out of nowhere - and despite literally trying to shoot him seconds earlier - Rick starts to explain how they can still work together. Telling him it's what Carl would have wanted, Negan apparently reconsiders his plan, only for his foe to reveal it as mere coercion, slashing his throat with a bit of glass.

In one final twist though, Rick then decides that Negan needs saving after all, and does listen to Carl's advice, ordering him to be patched up before he bleeds out.

Though this is a major scene from the comics, it falls totally flat here. For one, Negan's moment of clarity isn't the huge revelation it's presented as, as he's already shown affection for Carl and a willingness to stop fighting (albeit on his terms), while Rick's rash throat slice doesn't mesh at all with the new-found merciful streak he supposedly has.

In the comics Rick's deceit and Negan's second thoughts were all surprising, but here, devoid of their original context, they come across as pure WTF moments, and serve no purpose other than to tie the finale into the source material.