Bloodletting
Directed by Ernest Dickerson
The episode opens with a pre-apocalypse flashback from Lori, recalling a conversation with a friend whilst waiting to pick Carl up from school. They discuss Rick and Lori's marital problems, and the friend asks Lori if she still loves Rick; Lori appears briefly unsure before affirming that she thinks she does. At the same time, Shane pulls up in his police cruiser, pulling Lori to one side and telling her that Rick has been shot and is in the hospital. When Lori worries over how she will break the news to Carl, Shane promises to help them both through this, and watches Lori tell her son as he emerges from school.
In the present day, Rick is running across a field carrying Carl, who has just been shot, while Shane follows along behind with the man who accidentally shot him, who introduces himself as Otis and sends them to a nearby farm, telling them to ask for a man named Hershel and promising that they will receive help. As Rick races onto the farm, he is greeted by the elderly Hershel Greene, along with his daughters Maggie and Beth, Otis's wife Patricia and Beth's boyfriend, Jimmy. After rushing Carl inside, Hershel quickly determines that Carl will need operating on as the bullet broke into pieces inside of him; he warns Rick to stay close as he shares Carl's blood type, and Rick breaks down upon realizing that Lori is unaware her son has been shot.
Meanwhile, Lori is nervous after hearing the gunshot ring through the forest as she and several of the others make their way back to the highway. Carol continues to worry over the fate of her daughter Sophia, who went missing in the previous episode, prompting Daryl to promise that they will find her alive. On the highway, Dale begins to worry that T-Dog is developing an infection after cutting his arm open, and they begin to search through the abandoned cars for antibiotics.
Back at the farm, Hershel manages to remove one of the bullet fragments from Carl's injury and gives him a transfusion of Rick's blood, but warns that he will have to go deeper to get the rest and that he is unequipped for such a procedure. Shane and Otis volunteer to travel to a local high school where a FEMA command post was set up in the hopes of finding the specialist equipment needed, while Hershel's eldest daughter Maggie offers to find Lori and bring her back to the farm.
At the RV, T-Dog slips further into delirium as his infection worsens and tries to convince Dale that they should abandon the rest of the group, who he believes to see them as the two weak links. In the forest, Andrea is attacked and pinned to the ground by a walker, but is saved at the last minute by Maggie charging up on horseback and taking out the walker with a baseball bat. Maggie then proceeds to explain what happened with Carl, and takes Lori back to the farm with her after giving directions to the others. Upon arrival at the farm, Lori breaks down at the sight of her son and questions Hershel's medical credentials; he reveals that he is a veterinarian, not a doctor, but assures her that he will have a much better chance of saving Carl if Shane and Otis manage to return with the proper equipment.
Andrea, Daryl, Carol and Glenn reunite with Dale and T-Dog at the highway and inform them of everything that has happened. Carol worries that people will lose interest in the search for Sophia now that Carl has been shot, and Daryl suggests leaving a sign and some supplies for her should she return to the highway, offering to stay behind and wait for her. Dale tells Glenn to take T-Dog to the farm for medical treatment, and upon hearing how bad T-Dog's infection is, Daryl gives him a bottle of antibiotics from his brother's stash of drugs.
At the farm, Hershel warns that if Shane and Otis don't return soon, Rick and Lori will have to decide whether or not to attempt the surgery without anesthetic. Shane and Otis arrive at the high school and are able to locate the equipment needed for the operation, but are subsequently cornered by a horde of walkers and forced to barricade themselves inside the school.
Tropes:
- Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: It's fair to say that Rick and Shane have had their difficulties over the series, but when Rick breaks down after Carl's shooting, Shane does everything he can to help him through it, including at one point
tenderly cleaning the blood from Rick's face. - Batter Up!: Maggie dispatches a walker this way. On horseback, no less.
- Big Damn Heroes: Maggie rides up out of nowhere on a horse and takes a baseball bat to the face of the walker trying to eat Andrea.
- Black Dude Dies First: Lampshaded by T-Dog after he becomes delirious due to his infection. He comments to Dale that the rest of the group see the two of them as the weak links due to this trope and Dale's age.
- Censored Child Death: T-Dog finds a blood-spattered baby seat in one of the abandoned cars on the highway and understandably freaks the hell out.
- Cliffhanger: The episode ends with Shane and Otis trapped in the school surrounded by zombies, unable to get back to the farm with the medical supplies while Carl is rapidly running out of time.
- Closest Thing We Got: Despite being a veterinarian and not a doctor, Hershel operates on Carl as he is the only one with any medical expertise. Really, they were lucky to find someone with even Hershel's credentials, given that they were in the middle of nowhere in the midst of an ongoing Zombie Apocalypse when Carl was shot.
- Continuity Nod:
- T-Dog mentions dropping the key to Merle's handcuffs from the second episode of season one.
- One of the walkers shown when Shane lights the flares is named Calloway, a Canon Immigrant who initially appeared in the Torn Apart webisodes.
- Death of a Child: T-Dog finds a baby's car seat covered in blood and gore, including what looks uncomfortably like bits of flesh.
- The Deep South: Lampshaded by T-Dog, who calls Daryl a redneck and describes Rick and Shane as "good ol' boy cowboy cops.
- Farmer's Daughter: Maggie. Beth also qualifies, but it's not as obvious as with her sister.
- Flashback: The episode opens with one, seen from Lori's perspective as Shane delivers the news of Rick's shooting.
- Genre Savvy: T-Dog is only too aware of the perils of being the only black guy in the survivor party, especially given the show's Deep South setting.
- Guilt Complex: Otis obviously feels horribly guilty about accidentally shooting Carl, and in fact this is what motivates him to accompany Shane to get the medical supplies. Rick is also seen to blame himself for Carl's situation, believing that his decision to search for Sophia is what led to his son getting shot, and in the opening flashback, Shane blames himself for Rick getting shot.
- Heroic BSoD: Rick has a moment of this on arriving at the farm, staring blankly into space while Hershel, Maggie and Patricia rush Carl inside. Shane manages to snap him out of it.
- Horseback Heroism: Maggie.
- The Idealist: Daryl, surprisingly. Out of all the survivors, he seems to be the one most convinced that they will find Sophia alive, and chastises the others for seeming to give up hope.Daryl: It's a waste of time, all this hoping and prayin'. We're gonna locate that little girl, and she's gonna be just fine. (to himself as he stomps away) Am I the only one zen around here? Good lord.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Daryl is still somewhat caustic and irritable, but his redeeming qualities are a lot more evident here than in previous episodes.
- Kick the Dog: Subverted into Pet the Dog by Daryl. Look at the quote above at The Idealist.
- The Klutz: Once again played for drama with T-Dog, who muses bitterly on the potential irony of surviving the zombie apocalypse only to die from a blood infection brought on by his own clumsiness. He also references dropping the key to Merle's handcuffs from the previous season, another instance of this trait having serious ramifications.
- The Load: T-Dog thinks that the others view him and Dale as this, but Dale blows him off and says it's just the fever talking.
- Open Heart Dentistry: Hershel is a veterinarian who has never performed surgery on a human before, but he's still the best chance Carl has given the lack of options available.
- Open Mouth, Insert Foot: Carol has a brief moment of tactlessness due to her extreme worry for Sophia, wherein she tells Andrea that she doesn't want her daughter to "end up like Amy." Given how fresh the loss of her sister still is to Andrea and the fact that it almost drove her to suicide, Carol might as well have slapped her in the face. She does instantly apologize, and Andrea pretends to shrug it off and acts like it's not a big deal, but still. Ouch.
- The Patriarch: Hershel Greene.
- Sadistic Choice: Rick and Lori are told that if the medical equipment doesn't arrive soon, they will have to choose between either giving Hershel the go-ahead to perform the operation without anesthetic despite the fact that Carl probably won't survive the ordeal, or continuing to hold off on the operation even though he will definitely die without it.
- Second Episode Introduction: The second episode of season two introduces the Greene farm and its six inhabitants: Hershel, Maggie, Beth, Otis, Patricia and Jimmy.
- Shoot the Shaggy Dog: Dale and T-Dog spend a not-insignificant amount of time rifling through vehicles to try and find antibiotics, as part of the episode's B-plot. It's eventually revealed that they could have avoided the search completely if Daryl knew, as he has a large stash of antibiotics in Merle's old drug stash.
- STD Immunity: Averted. Daryl states that the reason Merle had antibiotics in his drugs stash is because he "got the clap on occasion."
- Taking Up the Mantle: With Rick and Shane otherwise occupied, leadership of the group seems to fall to Daryl by default, as he is by far the most competent fighter. He's actually surprisingly good at it.
- Took a Level in Kindness: Daryl still isn't exactly friendly, but he's definitely a good deal less volatile that in the previous season and seems to have integrated more fully into the group. He is the most adamant in reassuring Carol that Sophia will be found, he comes up with the idea of leaving supplies for the missing child and volunteers to remain at the highway should she return, and he gives T-Dog the antibiotics he needs once he realizes how serious the infection is.
