Why Rick Grimes will shave off his beard (we hope)

CRAZY BEARD MAN

Crazy beard man.

As well as not wanting to look like the crazy man who he let out of the old railway carriage (who promptly got eaten), there's one reason why Rick Grimes will shave his beard - bearded men don't do well on The Walking Dead.

Don't believe me? Just ask these guys.

JIM

Jim was left to die against a tree at his own request after being bitten. Maybe he should have shaved. 

DALE 

Daryl had to end poor Dale. 

Dale was walking along the quiet fields of Hershel’s farm, when he was bitten by a roaming zombie and had to be put out of misery by Daryl Dixon. Ironically, Carl Grimes had been taunting the walker earlier.

Trusting Shane can seriously ruin your chances of staying alive.

OTIS 

Otis was collecting medical supplies for Carl, when he and Shane were confronted by a gang of walkers. Shane thinks how do I get out of this and decides to use Otis as a diversion. He shoots him in the leg, leaving him to be devoured by walkers.

Baddie Tomas gave him a few whacks to the head.

 

BIG TINY



At the prison, Big Tiny was scratched by a walker while clearing out the cell block and fellow convict Tomas who repeatedly smashed his head in with a crowbar.

Hershell will be missed.

HERSHELL

When the Governor cut off Hershel's head with a sword, we wept.

JOE FROM THE CLAIMERS

Pulling a gun on Rick was a bad idea, as was not getting a shave.

 Joe from The Claimers got what he deserved.
Rick ripped his throat out, we cheered. 

How to save the Walking Dead

The Walking Dead needs to ramp it up in season 4 to keep us watching. And here's 6 ways they can do it -

 

 

1. Flesh out the characters - 27 characters died in the season finale, but apart from Andrea and maybe Milton, did we actually care? Nope. Why? Because we didn't know these people, so how could we care about them? And, in the case of Andrea a lot of us had little sympathy because we found the way the writers developed her character unrealistic and even irritating.

2. We need more Daryl - Let's be honest here, Norman Reedus is the star of the show. He wasn't meant to be, but he is. Yet the Governor effectively kills his brother Merle and he doesn't hunt him down and turn up at the prison with the Governor's head on a stick? Rubbish. They need to stay true to the character.

3. Stop ruining female characters by turning them into unrealistic victims like Carol (battered wife, dead daughter), loose women like Lori and gullible idiots like Andrea (the old Andrea would have killed the Governor, not fawned over him like a love struck teenager). Only Michonne has kicked ass without any of the melodrama.

4. Do something interesting with the Governor or kill him off. For me, every time the action went to Woodbury the show dragged to a crawl. After the initial shock over him keeping his walker daughter and the heads, the Governor character disappointed.

 

5. We need more shocks. It was a shock when Merle died and when the Governor gunned down his own people, but apart from that there weren't enough shocks. Predictably, everybody at the prison survived.

 

If you can bare to watch it, here's the bit where Daryl finds Merle the zombie.
 

 

 

 

6. Up the walker threat. The reason folk love the show is because it's about zombies. But too much of the time in season 3 they were a sideshow. They need to pose more of a threat, to evolve, get stronger. TWD is primarily a zombie show, the writers shouldn't forget that.