I know that Andrew Lincoln is gone from the show. However, the show just had a totally different "feel" without his awesome presence. Rosita and Father Gabe I found to be cringe worthy. They have not had flirtation and now they are a couple?
I know what you mean.
Whatever the decision for the time jump, there's now another whole load of back story the audience doesn't know anything about. Rosita and Gabriel is probably the most unlikely pairing ever, so what gives (also, how did Gabriel get out of Jadis/Anne's truck)? We're being led to assume that the little 'un with Michonne is her and Rick's kid...but that's a rug that's likely to be pulled down the road, too. And what was with the little girl calling Aaron 'Daddy'? Wasn't he supposed to be gay? Does that mean she's adopted (assume so, but again...would that kind of set-up even exist with no protective services hoops to jump through? Would it need to)? When did the council form? When, why, and how badly did the alliance of communities fall apart? Given that it has fallen apart, how and why does Hilltop still get Alexandria's rejects? Come to that, how did the newcomers manage to survive for what is now 7-8 years post-ZA, given that they were apparently still bumbling about the wilderness? Smacks of a larger, heretofore unknown community (and I mean...really?), which means they're either spies or genuine survivors from its fall. But, given their reaction to Alexandria and its vestiges of organisation, maybe not, yet there is no way such a rag-tag bunch could have gone on for seven years that way.
I'm not a massive fan of internal reboots, but that's clearly what they've done. It would have been better, IMO, to cap TWD off this season with Rick disappearing, then launching what was clearly a continuation show and letting it stand or fall on its own merits, or lack of them. As it stands, it feels like a bit of a cheat. Maybe not much of a one, mind, but still a cheat.
Also, having watched it back, I clearly misheard what was said at the end. That was partly because I had my gf waffling away saying how ridiculous it all was (her standard position; she's never liked TWD and thinks it's become ludicrous now), and partly because, as the ep wound down, I was already mentally switching off. And you don't expect clear speech from a zombie horde in any case.
I'm not a massive fan of internal reboots, but that's clearly what they've done. It would have been better, IMO, to cap TWD off this season with Rick disappearing, then launching what was clearly a continuation show and letting it stand or fall on its own merits, or lack of them. As it stands, it feels like a bit of a cheat. Maybe not much of a one, mind, but still a cheat.
Also, having watched it back, I clearly misheard what was said at the end. That was partly because I had my gf waffling away saying how ridiculous it all was (her standard position; she's never liked TWD and thinks it's become ludicrous now), and partly because, as the ep wound down, I was already mentally switching off. And you don't expect clear speech from a zombie horde in any case.