Fear the Walking Dead recap: Virginia gives reality check on Channel 5

Fear the Walking Dead’s Virginia gave a cold sobering sip of reality on tonight’s episode, reminding that positive thoughts aren’t enough.

This recap contains spoilers for Fear the Walking Dead season 5, episode 15.

Tonight’s Fear the Walking Dead episode “Channel 5” examined the concept of positivity and what it can and can’t will into existence. Judging by FTWD’s interpretation, it doesn’t result in much at all. John Dorie led the group to what he perceived was the promised land tonight, another Humbug’s Gulch. But instead of livestock, food and water… There was only the dead wandering inside it, no different from where they came from.

The journey cost them all their supplies, leaving them at the mercy of Virginia’s helping hand. Similar to Rick Grimes’ first realization that there ‘was no door #4’ on TWD he’d lost, no exit. No happy ending, just bitter acceptance that there are no more moves to make. The convoy tried to go against the grain, do things their way without assistance from unsavory, less morally inclined characters. Only to fall flat on their faces. Their higher plane of morality left them wandering many miles only to find their home was a mirage.

At one point this episode, Grace believes Morgan going back to find her fluids may have cost the life of someone else in the process. Inadvertently of course but the same result. Stopping allowed Virginia’s group to catch up with the convoy, who was distracted by a hole in a rusty bridge.

Rejecting Virginia’s polite offer of assistance resulted in her group alerting a walker herd through the noise of gunfire. Thus, the convoy had no choice but to flee, leaving their tanker and supplies behind. Meanwhile, the convoy’s latest recruit, eager to prove their moral point against Virginia, lost his life on the bridge. There’s always a trade-off. One move causes another.

Venturing forward sans supplies meant the group was placing all their chips on a gamble. Should they come up empty, they would have nothing left to even make it back to their starting position. Well, they came up empty, zero, worst scenario possible. Checkmate, a win for Virginia. No longer can they play the angsty, rebellious teenagers going up against the system. The system won, the house won because the house always wins.

John Dorie asked June to get married as soon as possible because he doesn’t want to wait on tonight’s episode. Will the sentiment stay without a steady home or Virginia leading the show? At the same time, Grace asked Morgan to not say what he was about to… Believing it would only make things that much more difficult. The episode concluded with a walkie-talkie request for help from Virginia, making the whole struggle of the journey empty and hollow. A member of the convoy’s life was lost in vain on a gamble.

Check out a Fear the Walking Dead recap for last week’s episode!