Hello fellow survivors! It’s time for your weekly review of the survival techniques of our favorite zombie-themed drama on AMC, The Walking Dead! Let’s dig right in…

Scenario 1: Mourning for the tragic murder loss of Otis, the survivors attempt to find meaning in the death of their sweaty, overalls-wearing friend.

What the survivors did: Spend the better part of a day gathering up stones from the property and piling up a life-sized statue of Otis. What, Otis didn’t look like a pile of gravel? Says who?!

What the survivors should have done: You know, when this scene first started, I thought, “finally! They’re digging in and making necessary repairs and fortifications, making the best use of their time.” This quickly turned to cries of “oh what the holy fuck?!” when I realized I was watching a funeral. This is the zombie apocolypse! Death is cheap in this world, it’s life that is expensive and should be celebrated. So, okay. Georgia has a population of almost 10 million people. If we take average US obesity rates, and male/female ratios, and age demographic data, and likely mortality rate of the apocalypse (90%) into account, if the survivors wanted to build a memorial to every fat middle-aged, redneck bubba that has died at the hands of zombies, they’d be making 234,500 piles of rock. While I’m scribbling on the back of this goddamned envelope of mine, the Otis pile contained about 54 cubic feet of rock. 234k of them could make a rock wall 12 feet high and six feet thick, over 133 miles long. I think we all agree that would make a MUCH better anti-zombie fence. So that’s what Simple Jack Shane should have done when someone handed him that rock and asked his dumb ass to make a speech; smashed it into Hershel’s head and led the rest into building the Great Wall of Shane.

Scenario 2: Concerned for the safety of his family and distrustful of the outsiders and their zealous, zombie killing ways, Herschel asks them all to disarm for the duration of their stay.

What the survivors did: Hand over their guns, except for their second-least-effective member, Dale, and on a gun range that they will establish far from the house.

What the survivors should have done: Rick: “Alright, we’ll give up our guns, but you have to give up your teeth.” Herschel, confused: “Our teeth? Why, whatever could you mean, Rick?” Rick: *pistol whips every last tooth out of Herschel’s mouth* Herschel: “Gah! Glory to God! Blargh!” End Scene. You know, I take everything back about what I said about our survivors needing to swallow a bag of cement and get hard. Even the softest of the lot, Carol, is an oak compared to this soft-hearted, soft-headed bunch led by Herschel. A bag of cement won’t cut it. These poor bastards need to get an injection of adamantium, Weapon X style. A bunch of apparently decent people with guns, led by a man carved from pure awesome going by the name of Darryl Fucking Dixon, and your first thought is to disarm them? With approximately 9 million zombie men, women, and children wandering the hills of Georgia? Yeah, you should loose teeth for that.

Scenario 3: A zombie is discovered swimming on the bottom of one of the farm’s five wells, the one they use “for the cows”.

What the surviors did: Quickly concluding that they couldn’t let the zombie contaminate the well, because, hell, it’s been there for weeks already, and that shooting it in the head so it could bleed into the water would just be a laughably stupid idea… they decide to fish it out with a rope. After attempting to lure the zombie into a noose using Spam, they jump to the conclusion that what they really need is live bait, so they decide to lower Glenn in, apparently for the lulz. The ridiculous redneck rigged bullshit pulley system they employ fails about 15 seconds into the plan, hilariously dropping Glen to within inches of the bloated zombie’s clutches. He manages to some how lasso it while girlishly screaming for help, and the survivors haul up Glenn, quickly followed by the zombie. When the geek reaches the top, and hits a snag, the best plan they can think of is “pull harder”, which rips the zombie in half, spilling the entire contents of it’s blood and lower body into the well. Congratulations, you fucking morons.

What the survivors should have done: If the adults in the group, namely, Darryl and Rick, had discovered them doing this shit they would have fed Glenn to the zombie just on general principle and then spanked the rest of the kids and put them to bed without supper. But, let’s consider, for a moment, a brief list of plans that would have been less stupid than what they ended up trying:

Tried to lure the zombie with a live chicken.

Shoot the zombie in the head. Seal up the well.

Shot the zombie, then carefully raise it up, dead. Dump several gallons of bleach into the well to purify. Test it out on a cow and monitor for results. Under no circumstances ever let a human drink from this well. Ever.

Pour cement down the well.

Because shit, you have FOUR OTHERS.

Make the noose much larger, approximately the diameter of the well, and hold it open with some sticks tied in a cross formation. Lower it over the zombie, then pull it tight.

Fuck, just try roping it for longer than five minutes before giving up. I’ve literally spent longer trying to fish a timing chain out of the bottom half of my motorcycle engine with a coat hanger, and there wasn’t a goddamn zombie menacing me at the bottom.

Maybe go talk to Herschel and Rick, and actually devise a plan to deal with a non-urgent, yet potentially deadly problem that takes longer than FIVE FUCKING MINUTES TO COME UP WITH, JACKASSES?!

Use Carol for bait.

Use Dale for bait.

Hell, use Shane for bait. He’d appreciate the irony, no doubt, and has no problem engaging in close range fisticuffs with zombies.

Wait for Darryl to return, have him shoot a cross bow bolt with rope attached to spear the zombie, then pull it up.

“But A.Ron!” I hear you say. “Some of these ideas are terrible too.” Yes! But they’re terrible in a way that would have had a better result, and not endanger one of the more useful and likeable group members, Glenn. Remember, the actual result was the zombie was torn in half, and ALL OF ITS BLOOD and HALF OF ITS DISEASE RIDDEN BODY ended up in the well. Basically, the only plan you could devise that was WORSE than what the survivors actually did was to somehow get the zombie up, dead or alive, and mechanically grind and separate the zombie flesh and use this slurry to chum up the well. When you have to get industrial food preparation equipment involved to intentionally try to fail harder, you know you’re dealing with a fucking stupid plan. Keep in mind the result that happened wasn’t even the worst case scenario! Oh no, no, NO! Glenn could have been killed by the swimmer, and we’d have ended up dumping TWO bodies worth of contaminated fluid into the well.

Scenario 4: Glenn and Maggie ride into town to refresh their medical supplies.

What the survivors did: Retrieve pregnancy test, condoms, engage in the worst seduction I’ve ever seen on TV or cinema that didn’t involve rape, and then fuck like bunnies.

What the survivors should have done: Same thing. Exactly the same. I can find no fault with this plan. Although, judging my Maggie’s reaction on the ride back from the pharmacy, Glenn could do with a detailed critique of his technique. If you know what I mean.

I’d like to say our psychotic band of bastards made progress, but the “zombie in the well” incident alone merits giving our group at Camp Dinner Bell an F-minus for survival this week. Now it’s your turn! What did I miss? Write in and let me know. Make it funny, or serious, or stark raving mad, we’ll read the best, most informed or entertaining ones on air. Or, discuss on our Facebook page or Tweet your suggestions!