A major recurring theme in the source material introduced in this episode is our hero, Rick Grimes, constant need to put himself in danger. Upon a tearful reunion with his son and an emotional photo album review / “coming together” with his wife Laurie, Rick immediately sprints back to certain death in Atlanta to do… stuff.

Not to insinuate Rick doesn’t have valid reasons to risk himself (I wrote last week that his very philosophy dictates the need to save every human life or die trying, Merle Dixon included) but one has to admit the machine gun style justifications for a return to Zombie ATL left a lingering impression that Rick is compelled to action beyond reason or compassion.

Rick returned not for Merle, or the ammo (can you pack 700 rounds in a sack that size?) or the promise of radio contact between the kindly father and son who saved his life. Rick acts like a man with a death wish. Not because he wants to die, because he lives in a world where if he hasn’t died yet, he doesn’t believe he can.

Who could blame him? He didn’t die after his medical attention abandoned him in a coma. He was presumably, the only man alive in the hospital he woke up in. He was lucky enough to find two survivors who educated him on his vastly remade world. He found more survivors that saved his bacon when he walked into a fool-proof death trap. On top of all that he found the only people on Earth he was looking for.

He’s playing with house money at this point and doubt is nonexistent because if he actually had a resting moment to contemplate how improbable his journey had been, even tough-as-nails Grimes might be prone to scrounge the last pint of ice cream in North America and crawl into bed so he could weep in the fetal position.

In the underrated Battlestar Galactica movie-event Razor. We follow a young soldier forced to fundamentally change who she is to survive. Replace compassion with aggression. She has to become a razor and she does. The tragedy is when the conflict is over and she realizes that the person she became is only useful in combat. Too jaded to enjoy the innocence of peace. She can no longer enjoy what she sacrificed to protect.

Rick has become a razor. His realization of this will be the defining conflict between himself and those he holds the closest.