Spoilers below for anyone who hasn't yet watched tonight's episode of The Walking Dead.
With six seasons' worth of alterations from its source material - some top notch, and others less so - The Walking Dead likes to knock comic fans' expectations for a loop, and Season 7 has been a constant stream of plot remixing. I never would have expected live-action Dwight to be as different from Robert Kirkman's original story as Carol has been, but the only commonalities are Savior-ship and having a burned-up face. Tonight's "Hostiles and Calamities" changed things up even more, with Sherry taking on a mysteriously more important new role in Dwight's life, among other things. (And she wasn't even there.)
First things first - or fist things fist, as it were - Dwight continued to take injuries with insults, as he started off tonight as a temporary scapegoat for Daryl's escape. We already know how badly Negan wants Daryl dead now, and Dwight avoided the same fate by falling back in line with Negan's rule, and lying about who actually did let Daryl go. Dwight had motivations; even though he doesn't know who's responsible at this point, he certainly isn't willing to take the blame, and he's not going to let Sherry be the fall woman. Dwight was an underdog in this "whodunit" scenario, given his past Savior-sympathizing actions and his Negan identification, but I admittedly still kind of wish he was the one that did it. Ah, well.
Not only did Dwight get Dr. Carson motha-fuckin' murdered like a champ, using the talkative physician's words against him, 9but he also found out that it was actually Sherry that slipped Daryl the key to his (possibly temporary) freedom. Not that he gets to hear her audibly confess it; he finds her heartfelt note at their meeting place, and it's possible Daryl's high-tailing isn't his biggest concern. Sherry has now left the Sanctuary for good, as she'd originally intended whenever viewers first met her, and she didn't trust Dwight enough to wait for him. Since, you know, he might want to take her back to that hellhole. It's one thing to hear Negan tell him he's shit, but having Sherry take him down a peg is something else entirely.
In the comics, Dwight and Sherry's relationship served two basic reasons. The first involved an illicit affair between the two after she'd become one of Negan's wives, which set his facial scarring in motion. (Already not how the show did it.) The second happens after their eventual full-parting, and while it's too much info to tackle the details here, suffice to say Sherry is not on Rick's side when she becomes a major player again on the page. Her TV retreat is a more credible pre-cursor to her decisions here, though, so that's good.
By the end, we aren't quite sure what Dwight is going to do in the future, with his comic fate still only a half-possibility. He might be so saddened by Sherry's absence, her note, and his own bruises that he decides to strike against Negan, instead of just running. But he did use that note to send an innocent man into the furnace, or at least what we assume is an innocent man. Nobody is innocent in the post-apocalypse, however, and Comic Dwight never had a Daryl Dixon to idolize, which could play a big part into things. His appreciation for Daryl's ways was the very reason Sherry let him go, so...it better play into it. The way he looks at Eugene in the end, after the mulleted possible-protagonist self-identifies as Negan, is something to think about.
With more comic alterations on the way, The Walking Dead hits AMC every Sunday night at 9:00 p.m. ET. To see what has yet to debut on your TVs yet in these early months, check out our midseason premiere schedule.
