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[galadrieljones]

Hi! Daryl's 6 years in the woods - do you think they developed a story for what happened to the wing on his vest or is it just meaning some struggle happened and we will never know exactly what? As in the action isn't as important as the result - Daryl losing part of his identity (wing). Do you think there is any other footage from Find Me they will show us, mainly to clarify her hair colour at the time. And still I wonder why her place looked so messy and such if she left of her own accord.

Hey!! Ah I love all questions and theories about "Find Me." Thank you ^_^

You know I never really developed a solid theory about Daryl's wing. But I have thought about it a lot. I don't know if the writers developed a story for the wing. Somebody else might though. I do definitely see it as a symbol of his degraded sense of self, and where he belongs. I could come at it from a couple different angles.

I do think that the wing is largely symbolic. I remember when I first saw "Find Me," I felt strongly that the eroded wing was related to Daryl's eroded sense of self, and a generally eroded grasp on reality and slow descent into madness. I think that much of "Find Me" is about madness. Daryl's psychology is shockingly fragile. I remember the storm being a major tip-off for me. I think the storm happened, but I don't actually think he lost his map. I think he hallucinated that and he then went on to have a full on psychotic break. The jump cuts in the preceding scene when he's stomping on the boat walker's head are a major tip-off that his perceptions are changing. He is not well in these flashbacks, or memories, or whatever they are. The whole episode in and of itself feels like a metaphor in this way. The woods and the river are just these endless mazes of trauma and loneliness with Leah at the center, like a witch, a black hole, a bad memory, a wound. For a long time I didn't think Leah actually existed. I remember theorizing with @wdway and @twdmusicboxmystery that she was a full on hallucination. Of course, we were wrong, but I think that much of Daryl's time with Leah is either misremembered or forgotten entirely.

I agree with you, too, that the eroding wing is definitely related to some sort of loss of his identity, specifically, I think, after Rick, because Daryl was really Rick's "wingman." Shane even calls him as much in 2.12 "Better Angels."

After Merle dies, Rick basically becomes Daryl's surrogate older brother and his leader, and Daryl follows in his shadow for many years. It's important that the first time Daryl is ready strike out on his own and to be the hero of his own story is in "Alone" when he chooses to stay in the funeral home with Beth, and to possibly settle down there. After losing Beth, Daryl goes right back to Rick and to being his brother, and Rick even calls him as much after the confrontation with the Claimers in "A" and I don't know if anyone can really understand what this must have meant to him at the time. But the schism with Rick seems to start after "Coda" and this is not something that is ever explained or even explored. Daryl full breaks from Rick in "Warning Signs" and openly in "The Obliged," and we can see that Daryl is starting to feel stifled by the role as "wingman," even if it's just instinctively, but when Rick "dies," it's too soon and Daryl hasn't actually had the chance to process what this means yet. He's not ready to be on his own, without Rick, with the anchor to the past. He's like a ship lost at sea. So the erosion of the wing is, I think, also related to this, for sure.

I'm not sure how much more footage there might be of "Find Me." I know it was shot during COVID, so everything was very spare and as-needed. I do know that the writers intended a longer arc for Leah and for the Reapers and while I don't think there is anymore "footage" per se, I do think that there might be more story to be told there. For example, where they came from, why they're after Maggie, who they work for, why Lance knows who Leah is and how to find her, and whether they might have some sort of connection to the CRM. Like I have theorized they may have been contracted by Major General Beale or Jadis, basically as bounty hunters, hunting down "threats" like Georgie and Maggie and other self-sustaining communities (ie: Knoxville, which Maggie will not talk about) and eliminating them. I have even theorized that they may have been the ones who eliminated Grady, as Carver at one point mentions a "hospital in Rockville" that they had previously destroyed. If they're willing to destroy and pillage one hospital, well...

Not enough is known about the Reapers, and Pope's monologue in "Rendition" about "politicians," and how, in their final war, "they were coming for us," is certainly a reference to Operation Cobalt and it reminds me of the Radiowaves episode "Conspiracy Theory" in which a crazed man on the radio mentions a US Military protocol called N.O.A.H., which he speculates is a reference to an escape strategy for the President and other high ranking members of the US Government. Pope's story as a military vet of the Korangal Valley in Afghanistan (aka "the Valley of Death") clearly lays out the story of soldiers who feel abandoned by their government.

With rumors circulating that we might encounter the US President, or that a "renewal" of the flagship show may involve a major skirmish between the CRM, The Commonwealth, and the US military, I am once again reminded of Pope's references to "one last war," and how it involves the US government coming for the people. If the president DOES indeed make an appearance, it really makes me wonder where the heck he has been for the past 10-15 years or however long it's been. If he has been in hiding or maybe even imprisoned by the CRM? If this is true, then it stands to reason that Rick might erroneously free him, starting yet another fire with his goodness that he cannot extinguish alone, possibly even giving way to a replay of the Governor's return.

It might be that we never get more information about the Reapers, but I think their story will end up having major ramifications for what's to come. Gimple is a major proponent of Chekov's Gun, and he will always use everything he can use. Everything in his story has a job to do. Now on the note of Leah's hair color and what happened to her place, these are more reasons I initially theorized she was a pure hallucination. There are other things in "Find Me" that make no sense, like why Leah's story inexplicably mirror's Beth's and why she frequently repeats Carol's dialogue, making her feel like a fantasy. I still think that her red hair is an invention of Daryl's memory, that it basically rewired itself as a way of protecting him from the trauma of losing another pretty blond girl in the woods. I think the fact that Leah's hair is basically the same color as Dog's and the very first shot we get of her in which her face and Dog's face are both obscured and conflated could be evidence for this, ie: His memory is just blurring the two.

On the other hand, it could be that the blond hair is the hallucination. We don't actually know. Not a single character comments on Leah's hair at any point. But Daryl does look entirely shocked to see her when she takes her mask off in "Rendition." Like, stunned. And of course we all were, too, because she looks exactly like Beth. Whatever it is, I think it's in Daryl's head, and it is undoubtedly related to Beth and his linger ing trauma over what happened to Beth, because like, Leah looks like Beth.

And yeah I agree it's also really weird how messy and empty Leah's place is. I even remember other fans, not TD-related, questioning how the hell she managed to find a U-Haul truck to come and move out all her furniture and dishes during the apocalypse lol. I mean, the place was EMPTIED. This is another thing that just literally makes no sense, and it's yet another reason I thought she just... wasn't real! But we know now that she WAS real, so, now I just wonder how much of what we see in "Find Me" is real. If they actually lived in that cabin. Or if something else happened entirely. Daryl gets that nasty cut over his eye, for example. We never learn what happened there but it's a scar that he still has! It must be important. Did he and Leah do something together? Something bad? Idk.

There's also this really weird line by Pope in "Rendition," during the POV scene with Leah. Now this is one of a couple scenes that are from Leah's POV, which I think point to foreshadowing about Beth's life and Beth's "hidden" story that we don't yet have. Anyway, Pope says to Leah something about "losing a day of tracking our enemy because you... you had to go on a fishing expedition with an old boyfriend."

Because like, an old boyfriend? What is he talking about? He's clearly talking about Daryl. But what fishing expedition? Is this a metaphor? Is it just purposely vague? Leah was not recently on a "fishing expedition" with Daryl. At this point, I think I calculated it had been like 1-2 years since Daryl and Leah had last seen each other. Everything about this is confusing, because it makes it sound like Daryl was Leah's boyfriend BEFORE he met her in the woods that day in "Find Me." It was actually with this line that I started to lightly theorize that Leah was actually Beth! And that Beth had already come back, and Daryl had simply repressed it, and he couldn't see her. He was hallucinating somebody else. Honestly, I quietly kept up with this theory until the very moment Daryl shot Leah dead. Because up until then, there isn't really a definitive moment in which it becomes clear that she can't be Beth. Even when Maggie refers to her at one point, she doesn't say Leah's name. She just says her. And there are MULTIPLE moments in "Rendition" when we see Leah's face obscured by burlap, or from a distance, or in half-darkness, and in these shots it could just as easily be Emily Kinney as Lynn Collins.

Obviously I was very wrong lol. But like?? As you say there are so many unanswered questions and so many mysteries surrounding Leah and the Reapers. I do hope we get more information about them at some point, maybe even just in an easter egg or something...?

Anyway as usual I went on for too long lol. I hope you enjoyed my Ted Talk. Thoughts?

[peregrintook]

HELLO EXCUSE ME

i don't check the tag for a few months and suddenly we have confirmation that dawn wasn't the one who shot beth and also emily has been seen filming for a dream sequence excuse me helloooOOo WHAT ELSE DID I MISS

BECAUSE IT'S BEEN A DECADE AND YET IM STILL HERE

[4thenorthstar]

dana bethune

michonne changed her name to "dana bethune" in towl, right? they've never used a name randomly, so i looked the name up and found a man, norman bethune. appearently, he was an important surgeon back in the day.

he also developed a mobile blood-transfusion service in the spanish civil war. blood-transfusion? spain? 👀

there's also a scottish surname, beaton, that sometimes pronounced as bethune. it belongs to a medical family lived in scotland in the past.

it's quite a coincidence that we saw beth last as a nurse, and then michonne chose a surname that has connections to multiple people in the medicine field in real world.

also, in season 5 or 6, tara confuses denise's name with dana.

denise, who has to become the official doctor of alexandria, is the first dana we've ever heard actually. maybe beth also has to undertake the role of a nurse or a doctor after grady, again.

it seems dana is a name in a few different languages, and they're all related to daniel.

michonne chose the name dana willingly, but denise refused it. michonne lived, denise died. daniels live, others die lol

[stillaswind]

We have a premiere date! I can’t wait to see our girl! The article I attached has 4 new photos and lots of interesting information.

https://ew.com/the-walking-dead-dead-city-massive-change-season-3-exclusive-11966287

[galadrieljones]

“Alone”: Marriage Allegory (TD)

This post is jumping off the lovely anon that @twdmusicboxmystery​ answered this morning, which proposes that Beth and Daryl are already “symbolically married,” based on the events of “Alone.” I love this! I have always felt this way. From my perspective, “Alone” is a marriage allegory. It doesn’t appear in any clear order, but all the signs are there (you just have to know how to read them).

I want to note that perhaps a lot of this has already been said over the years, but I feel that TD and our ship are experiencing a bit of reinvigoration lately, and so I wanted to offer this as some illustration of Norman’s recent confession that Daryl had feelings for Beth, and what that means going forward. Anyway, this isn’t my longest theory ever, but it’s long enough to stick under a cut. I hope you like it!!

The Beginning

Keep reading

[stillaswind]

Thank you for linking this old post in your latest one @galadrieljones I never realized that Beth was wearing a cross necklace in Alone and it’s the only time we see it. This item along with the heart necklace, her journal, and her bracelets were not included in the recent AMC TWD auction. And we know that we have two different cowgirl boots for Beth, one with blueish teal accents in Still and one pair with orange and yellow accents in Alone and at the hospital. So where did she get this cross necklace and new boots? Are we going to get a flashback of Beth and Daryl between Still and Alone? We know they found a sweater and long sleeve shirt in that time, but the boots and the cross are so subtle that to me it suggests we might see a flashback of them together finding these items. I don’t know what significance there could be in this missing scene, if anyone has any ideas please share.

[4thenorthstar]

when ginny lost her doll, maggie found it. right?

if beth lost her sweater at some point, and if the stories align, maybe someone (carol) found or saw the so-called sweater but did not say anything? i'd say it's possible.

maggie -> carol

negan -> daryl

ginny -> beth

[4thenorthstar]

when ginny lost her doll, maggie found it. right?

if beth lost her sweater at some point, and if the stories align, maybe someone (carol) found or saw the so-called sweater but did not say anything? i'd say it's possible.

maggie -> carol

negan -> daryl

ginny -> beth

[marybethyl]

St. Ignatius Symbolism: Why Beth’s CODA marks a beginning rather than the end!

I’ve been thinking a lot about the St. Ignatius reference in Slabtown, especially after @twdmusicboxmystery's new video, and the more I look at it, the more connections I see, especially because we take it as a given fact that Beth survived her headshot wound at Grady.

Both St. Ignatius of Loyola and Beth go through a serious injury that completely changes their lives. For Loyola, that wound became the turning point that redirected his entire path and ultimately gave him a new sense of purpose. In the same way, Beth’s “death” can be understood not as a definitive ending, but as a threshold moment, one that interrupts her original trajectory and potentially sets her on a completely different path moving forward.

From that perspective, her “death” at Grady functions less like a conclusion and more like a divergence point. It separates her from the group and from the narrative path of TF, marking a transition into a new phase of existence shaped by survival, adaptation, and possible reinvention. In that sense, the injury itself becomes the catalyst for transformation, aligning closely with the St. Ignatius motif of a wound leading to a redefined identity and purpose.

From there, there is a clear picking point in her development arc. She starts off more emotional and vulnerable, but grows, even more stronger and more aware. After surviving something like that, it’s logical that she would become more structured and part of something bigger, possibly even connected to a military system like the CRM.

It's been a long time (after NR's photos he posted last November with the odd haircut) that I have a headcanon of Beth as a military doctor (I'd like to think that when Daryl gets hurt, they take him to this military hospital, and Beth is the one treating him. He might be sedated or recovering from anesthesia, so he might believe that she’s just a hallucination) and honestly this fits so well in my head... It connects her transformation with both her personality and the hospital setting we saw in Grady...

This also ties into St. Ignatius of Antioch and the idea of Christ as a “physician.” Hospitals are meant to represent healing, but in Slabtown we see the opposite. The system is corrupted, and doctors/cops decide who lives and who dies, effectively “playing God.” As a result, the focus shifts away from care and healing and becomes centered on control, hierarchy, and selective survival.

This is where the St. Ignatius symbolism becomes relevant again. If, in Christian tradition, the “physician” represents healing that is both physical and moral, then Slabtown presents a distorted version of that idea, one where authority replaces compassion, and survival is regulated rather than granted.

Here's where Beth’s role becomes more meaningful. Her “death” is framed in a way that resembles sacrifice, but it lacks the typical elements of closure that would confirm it as a final, resolved endpoint. There is no burial, no sustained emotional aftermath, and no clear narrative closure. This absence leaves room for interpretation and suggests that the moment may function more as a transition than a conclusion.

If we follow that symbolic line, Beth can be seen as moving away from the corrupted model of the hospital and toward the original meaning of the “physician” archetype, someone who restores rather than controls. In that sense, her transformation would represent a shift from being subject to a broken system to potentially becoming part of a more structured and purposeful one, where healing is aligned with discipline, responsibility, and intent.

On the other hand, this could also be interpreted as foreshadowing a new, possibly more subtle form of a corrupted system, one she may have encountered after leaving Grady. A system that, at first glance, presents itself as organized, functional, and oriented toward helping people, but which may conceal underlying control mechanisms, similar in concept to PADRE in Fear the Walking Dead or the CRM.

This idea is further reinforced by details like the fact that in episode 9x05, where Rick experiences hallucinations, Beth’s name is never explicitly mentioned. Instead, we hear EK’s voice but the subtitles refer to it generically as “woman”, which leaves her identity ambiguous. One possible interpretation is that this could hint at her having adopted a new identity, similar to how groups like PADRE or the CRM assign or replace identities as part of their systems, rather than maintaining original ones.

So if we follow that idea, Beth’s story doesn’t end there. She becomes the opposite of what we saw in that hospital, a true “physician,” someone who restores meaning to healing. In that sense, her survival isn’t just physical, it’s symbolic: a wound leads to transformation which leads to a new purpose.

In conclusion, both St. Ignatius figures, Loyola and Antioch, symbolically support this interpretation. Loyola’s experience reflects the idea that a severe wound can act as a turning point, leading to transformation, renewed purpose, and a redefined identity. Antioch’s writings, particularly the metaphor of Christ as a “physician,” reinforce the connection between healing, faith, and the restoration of both body and meaning.

Together, these references frame Beth’s injury not as a definitive endpoint, but as a symbolic rupture that enables transformation. Her “death” can therefore be read through the same lens: a moment of transition that aligns with themes of suffering, redefinition, and purpose-driven identity. Within this framework, the symbolism of St. Ignatius helps unify the idea that a wound, physical or narrative, can mark the beginning of a new trajectory rather than the conclusion of one.

[twdmusicboxmystery]

Love LOVE all of this. Great work. 👏🏻

And it makes so much sense narratively as well. Gimple knew where he wanted Beth to end up, or at least be when we see her again, so he created the opposite (the twisted, non-healing hospital, as you mentioned) with Grady. That way, when we see her again, it’s a 180-degree dynamic shift. And that’s the epitome of a fantastic, transformational character arc.

[4thenorthstar]

i'll just throw sth out there

maybe

beth (and mayyybe the car she was put in) ended up in a body of water, possibly a river

carl found the music box near a river, carol found justina and roberto first near a river

and of course, rick

always a river, always

and "dead in the water" webisode? the blond man was in underwater, just saying

"the flood took the town, the fire took the bank, no one has the money to recover what sank"

did something actually sink or ????

okay, on a second note, john dorie from ftwd also fell down from a bridge, right? dakota pushed him into the water.

huh

[galadrieljones]

Proof of life? Hmm 🤔 💫

What's she been up to?

[dirtyblondedixon]

Who thinks we’ll get Beth back before all TWD series are gone? I had this nice dream of what could happen when I heard that EK was gonna be on Dead City as Beth. It starts with Beth somehow making it to NY and Maggie bumps into her and she’s not herself or how Maggie remembers how her sister use to be sweet and hopeful. Beth’s different more hard and lethal but she still helps Maggie cuz it’s her sister and her nephew and nobody fucks with family. Dead City eventually ends with Beth and Maggie leaving NY to take little Hershel back home after the whooping he so rightly deserves. Then we get a special TWD season where Daryl get back home with Carol and Maggie gets back home too with Beth wherever they are calling home now and Rick’s there already cuz Michonne brought him back home and there is a big family reunion. Because we all need a fucking family reunion. Daryl needs to see Rick alive. Daryl needs to see Beth alive and Everyone gets to be happy except Maggie cuz she sucks as a sister and Mother lol. That’s what I wanted to happen and I wish it still would. In my brain though no matter what happens this is how it ends for me. The big family picnic! My dream is end game!

[galadrieljones]

Team Delusional ask: do you think Beth is aware that it wasn’t Dawn that shot her, or do you think she was led to believe it was Dawn for [someone else’s purposes] when she woke up?*

*depends of course if we think she woke up in Grady or in the white church/somewhere else where she never crossed paths with Grady again, I suppose

Hello, anon! ^_^ I have written a whole post for this lol. Here you go!!

Rick's Memory and Folie à deux

My answer to this might be unorthodox because I am open to the theory that what we see at the end of "Coda" is actually not what happened in reality. Instead it's more of an impression of what happened, based purely on Rick's POV, aka: his memory of what happened. According to this theory, it's possible that the scene that actually played out didn't look anything like the scene we saw. It's probably missing time and details, and a lot of answers.

There are several reasons I think this. The first is based on the fact that Rick has already "internalized" Beth as a parallel representation to both himself and Carl, because of the hat, and this would explain parts of what we see as his memory effectively filling in the blanks. Recall that at some point before the prison falls, Rick gives Beth his hat and calls her the "new sheriff in town."

He does something similar with Carl in season 2 after Carl is shot accidentally by Otis. Carl says that they're the same, because they've both been shot. Rick refers to this as being in a special "club," which means he gets to wear the hat.

Getting shot, getting to wear the hat. It sounds like Beth is also in "the club." I believe that is partially the explanation for the flashback in "A," in which Rick dubs Beth "the new sheriff in town" and tosses the hat onto her head. He's letting her into "the club."

Judith, who inherits the hat from Carl, will go on to join the club later, when she's shot in season 11. Of course, like Carl and like Rick, Judith doesn't die. She's saved by Daryl who rushes her to safety and gives her an emergency blood transfusion.

Brief digression, sort of: It would not make sense thematically for Beth to be the only member of "the club" to not survive a gunshot wound. Rick, Carl, Beth, Judith. In this, I have determined that anybody in "the club" cannot actually die from a gunshot, because Rick didn't die from a gunshot. It would be against the rules of the story. That's why it's actually important and very likely that, whatever occurred in the hospital that day, Beth was shot. We actually see proof of this "protective hat" theory when Carl is shot again in season 6, but this time, he's shot in the head point blank and, not only does he survive, but he miraculously suffers no brain damage at all. He merely loses an eye. The hat is a powerful protective symbol, but it only protects the wearer from gunshots, like Rick. Members of "the club" can die in other ways, ie: Carl died via walker bite. But they cannot die from a gunshot.

Anyway. Back to my point. I think that it's possible Rick "remembers" Beth being shot by a bullet from an unknown source, because that's what happened to him. His brain is repressing the details and then filling in the blanks with stuff he knows. I feel like this is also something that Gimple does on a larger scale in order give us clues about what happened during the missing 17 days, ie: He uses parallel plot lines to help us fill in the blanks. For example, we can use the events of the Greene farm exodus in 2.12 "Beside the Dying Fire" as well as the events of the prison exodus in 4.8 "Too Far Gone" to help us understand how the Atlanta exodus after "Coda" might have gone down. We can also use the Shirewilt exoduse in 5.9, albeit on a much smaller scale. Our greatest example of this, however, as recently analyzed by @twdmusicboxmystery, is Operation Lead the Walkers Away, which is told out of order in the first half of season 6. All of these events when taken together contain clues via a common template that can help us piece together what happened to Team Family and Beth after "Coda."

I would speculate it's totally likely that Rick actually knows who shot Beth, and that some sort of shoot-out or more grisly confrontation may have occurred, but this information has been repressed, or was, for a long time. In this, I kind of think that whatever actually did happen, it was so traumatizing that Rick effectively repressed it. This is why the exchange scene is so fragmented, full of disorienting Dutch angles, missing time and audio cues, and contains physical impossibilities. It's a fragmented trauma memory. Again, it's just a theory. I could be way off.

In any case, note that Rick's memory is also what happened to Carl in season 2. Later, it will be what happens to Judith in season 11. All are shot by bullets that seemingly come out of nowhere. Now, where the bullet that shot Beth came from is truly a great mystery, because it was obviously NOT Dawn, but it was apparently enough to freak Rick out to his very core, and to alter his memories of what happened. At least within the framework of this specific theory.

Another reason I believe we might be operating inside of Rick's fragmented point of view is the concept of folie à deux. Folie à deux, or "madness of two," is referenced specifically in the Tales of the Walking Dead episode "Blair/Gina," in which Gina is seen googling "Folie à deux" on her computer as a possible answer to why she and Blair together keep experiencing the same sequence of events over and over again, Groundhog Day style.

Folie à deux is a real, shared psychiatric condition in which two people are consumed by the same delusional "system." Usually, the more submissive personality is drawn into the delusions of the more dominant personality. A notable recent irl example of this is with the Slender man stabbing in Wisconsin in 2014. The defense legitimately argued that it was a folie à deux, ie: one perpetrator sucked the other into her strong, schizophrenic delusions, convincing her that Slender man was real and had asked them to do his bidding. The phenomenon can also span multiple people, even an entire family. This would be called folie en famille.

The folie à deux theory suggests that the others in Team Family, even those who were there in the hallway at Grady, were convinced that they saw what Rick saw. In the event that the group is tortured with guilt over what happened to Beth, and assuming that there was some amount of confusion overall, it is not out of the question that they might collapse into Rick's delusions rather than face reality. He is their fearless leader, after all.

It is also possible, or even likely, that some members of Team Family will later go on to question what happened. Many TDers think that Carol may still be hiding some sort of intel pertaining what happened at Grady. Tyreese also seems to come to some sort of major realization after he's bitten in "WHaWGO." He asserts that he listens to the news. He knows what happened and what's going on. He says, "Ain't nobody got to die today," implying that he may know the truth. Beth didn't die. However, his realization is cut off by his hallucination of the Governor and then the exodus begins. Note that what the Governor says to Tyreese here—"You have to pay the bill"—opens a whole other can of worms about what I think happened on a narrative level. Another post for another day.

Anyway, it's also possible that Gimple's suggestion for folie à deux has less to do with Team Family and more to do with us, the audience. Another iteration of folie à deux involves the shared delusions of a much larger group of people, called folie à plusieurs or "madness of several." The idea that we've all been seduced and sucked into Rick's delusions about what happened to Beth, keeping us from the truth, is tantalizing to me, as it seems like just the thing that Gimple would simply love to do.

Anyway, none of this really answers your question lol. But on that note, it would completely depend upon who the real shooter is and what happened to Beth after the shooting. If the shooter indeed got away with it and/or they didn't actually intend to shoot Beth, then of course they would want to scapegoat Dawn. But I do NOT think that Dawn shot Beth, and I also don't think that Dawn would have shot Beth, even if she'd had the chance. I also personally do think that Beth was returned to Grady after she was shot, where she was saved by Edwards. Carl and Judith both received emergency medical care after being shot, as did Rick. Rick, Beth's closest proxy, legit woke up in a hospital after surviving his gunshot wound.

Anyway, thank you so much for the ask. And thank you for coming to my Ted Talk!! I enjoyed answering this ❤️

[galadrieljones]

Is Norman Flash-posting?

This morning @atrumreginablue was kind enough to share this image from Norman's current insta story. You should go read the post here for full breakdown.

I made this new post to point out that my initial gut reaction to this was to ask whether it could be the flash, or a reference to the flash.

If you're unfamiliar with the flash, it's a split second "flash" of quasi-blurry footage that appears in the very first frames of TWD credits for seasons 5-8. TD noticed it LONG ago, well before my time. In stills of the footage, you can identify what looks like Beth in her yellow polo and ponytail, running among walkers with a bloodied right arm. In later frames, you can also isolate the image of an arm that looks somewhat like Daryl's. TD has long used these mysterious frames as clues for what happened during the Missing 17 Days.

On that note, perhaps you can see why a live wire tripped in my brain. I have studied the flash a lot, but I haven't thought about it or written about it in a long, long time. So it wasn't fresh in my brain, and yet, it was the first thing I thought of when I saw this post from Norman. Why? There are distinct comparative elements here in the composition of each photo, particularly to the first image above, ie: what I consider to be the "true" flash, as it contains what appears to be Beth, running for her life, in what would be footage we've never seen.

The composition of a photograph or picture is the arrangement of its key visual elements, creating "shapes" and negative space on the page/canvas. It's an important aspect of any form of visual art, design, photography, and cinematography. In the above comparison, I've circled the compositional elements that are flagging for me. It's arms in motion. In Norman's post, the arm on the left looks like it could be Emily's arm, wearing her sweater, in extreme motion. On the right, it looks like a very similar arm to the one in the flash, right down to the folds in the fabric.

Obviously there is a great deal of detail in the second shot, including what appears to be intestines and literal chunks of disgusting flesh. It looks like someone is being eaten. Whether these are the same shots is 100% inconclusive. I'm not claiming they are. But in either case, I think that the parallel compositions are meant to conjure the flash.

Norman is a photographer and has a keen eye for composition. He's done this before, when he posted two photos in the same story that have parallel compositions, one of which is the final shot from "Coda," and the other is a shot he took of a movie on what appears to be a seat monitor inside of an airplane. He posted these in late December 2025:

Even the positioning of the shots on the phone screen seems to be well-thought-out here, as it points to the compositional parallels in the shots. To show you what I mean, I've sketched over the images below, to show the arrangement of basic shapes and elements as they appear in each photograph. I then laid them over the top of one another to show that they are basically the same. The key similarity is the long, diagonal line that splits both images down the middle, in almost the exact same way. Once you locate that, you can see the rest pretty clearly.

Here's a similar rendering with the flash and Norman's latest post.

My eye was simply drawn to these compositional parallels. I also ran the observation by @twdmusicboxmystery and @wdway to get their thoughts and make sure I wasn't crazy. Musicbox replied:

No, I agree. I think the images are too inconclusive to understand what they are, but the style, the fact that it's blurry, definitely brings the Beth flash to mind. So, even if this is completely unrelated to Beth and Norman is just posting a gnarly scenes from DDS4, I still feel like he's trying to invoke the Beth flash. Make us think of it. Maybe a hint that we'll finally get an explanation for it soon.

Again, this is totally inconclusive and just something I noticed through my perspective as a designer. Is Norman trying to remind us of the flash? Maybe not. But if he is... big things are happening!

[bookqueenrules]

As we have seen in the Daryl Dixson spin-off, the license plates have been timeline markers showing where the characters are/are going in the near future. Take a look at the plate in Daryl's flashback.

I have a couple of theories on this. In hindsight, I am sure that it will obvious just as the others have been, but it's fun to try to figure out where they are headed.

This is a tricky one because it is part of a flashback, so it could be more of an indicator of where Daryl is in the flashback more than where he is going.

According to rumors and spoilers, the flashback is going to reveal something that Daryl has misremembered up until now. We could go down a whole rabbit hole about misremembering and how that is coming to the forefront in both Daryl and Maggie's arcs.

Daryl and Maggie are really the characters going through the greatest emotional arcs in the spin-offs. It's very interesting that both of them are addressing not remembering things as they truly were. This is one of the small things that leads us to believe that there was a misremembering of what happened after Daryl walks out with Beth's body in Coda. Greg Nicotera once said that 5x9 picks up 17 days after what happened at Grady in Atlanta. We get brief flashes at the beginning of 5x9 as to what may have happened but it almost has a dream- like quality. Most recently in dead City season 2, Maggie was clearly missing part and misremembering part of the"lightning bug" story according to Hershel.

It's well known in psychology that trauma will cause a person to not remember the events around the trauma accurately.

I think for both Maggie and Daryl this will turn out to be true. So the story Daryl tells Carl in season 3, was not a lie, and it won't be a retconned. It will be a case of Daryl finally working through his trauma in order to face the reality of what really happened. The reality that he's been running from his entire life.

Going back to this plate, it's on a station wagon. This to me indicates that we're supposed to read that this is about family as the station wagon is the quintessential family vehicle.

It's also at a "dutch angle" hanging off the car. That shows that there is something "off" or not "right" about this family/story.

The B is reminiscent of the A/B symbolism explained in The Ones Who Live. As a child, Daryl was most definitely a B. He followed. He was led by Merle before the turn.

I accidentally hit Post instead of saved

to my drafts!

So, I guess I'll just have to finish this post quickly as an edit!

The 11x7 I believe refers to Daryl's relationship with his father. In 11x7 we see Leah calling Pope a father figure. I believe this shows that Daryl's father was a controlling, manipulative man just like Pope who used his "family" to fulfill his own needs. He is willing to kill his family members if they betray him, just like he was going to let Leah burn in the building with Daryl.

In 3x9 The Suicide King, Daryl makes the wrong choice and falls back to his "B" status by following Merle. He will quickly rectify it in the next episode. Another point in the episode is that Rick is deep in his trauma over Lori and makes bad decisions as a result. This may indicate that the trauma we are about to witness through Daryl's eyes, has caused him to run and make bad decisions his entire life. Finally, Glen is VERY angry that they didn't go back and kill the Governor. If they would have killed him then, it would have saved lives. Perhaps that is the connection running from Daryl's father, to Dawn, to Captain Perkins.

A spoiler / rumor states that at the end of Daryl Dixon season 4, Daryl will kill Captain Perkins played by Jimmy Smits. As he pulls the trigger he flashes back to himself as a child holding a gun on his father.

This will cement him as an A. It's rumor ed that after saving the ship and killing the Captain, Daryl drives toward the military hospital and soldiers salute him along the way. What better way to show his A status?

I believe that as a boy Daryl could have killed his father and in some way saved his mother. However, because he was a B(boy), he didn't kill the evil and it took someone he loved.

This will be one of his final test on this hero's journey. He will take what he has learned in this spin-off and make a different choice. This is his final step towards letting go of his childhood trauma so that he can go on to have a healthy family of his own.

I was going to make further comparison to this and the killing the suitors in The Odyssey, but I think I'll save that for another post.

[4thenorthstar]

clementine lives, beth greene and the damn dog

is clementine's story based on beth's story or they're just using the same thing over and over again? don't know but both stories are oddly similar.

clementine lives takes on after the end of telltale.

"clementine is seen discreetly leaving ericson's boarding school. she goes into the fishing cabin and finds a map. after she hears rustling from a walker, she kills it. she begins to pack supplies until she hears creaking at the door. she goes to attack, only to discover it's aj. aj, assuming clementine is only going on a trip, confronts her about leaving without him and demands to go with her, however she declines him and tells him she's not going on a trip. alvin lashes out at her for breaking her promise, clementine tearfully tells him she feels safer with him at ericson's with the coalition around, but it's not home for her and she is unhappy and not even aj can make her happy. aj kills a walker sneaking up on clementine and asks her where she's going. she tells him north and the two share a tearful departure as clementine journeys alone to an unknown destination."

clementine finds a safe place for aj, a little boy but she's unhappy. so she decides to go north. hm. *side eye*

the places she travels along the way:

magdalen islands? canada?? greenland???

other weird coincidences:

amos is also a character in twd, hilltop i think.

this is the funniest one. we don't know what actually happened to beth's arm, but we definitely saw a dog near the funeral home. what are the chances that she was also got bitten by that dog but dawn and the others thought that she was somehow immune to walker bite? 😭 plus same thing happened to clementine in season two of the telltale game: a so-called doctor could not figure out the difference between the two types of bites, so they left clementine behind.

[bookqueenrules]

Did you all see this??? Emily responding to Norman with a ❤️!

Since this from French fan account with a few thousand followers, I wonder if Norman didn't let Emily know to go post a response. You will notice that she posted a day later.

@galadrieljones @marybethyl @wdway

Emily posted the SAME pic as Roman.

Photo credit to @obidala2 and @stillaswind

It's getting crazy folks. Tons of hints are being given! It's an exciting time to be a Beth fan! 😎

[marybethyl]

Two of the photos in this post really stood out to me. In the first one, we see Daryl with Rick, and Daryl isn’t wearing his angel wings vest. When did that happen? I revisited the episode this morning, and there’s no way this is a frame from any of the scenes that aired in Coda.

Also, in the next photo, we see the two cops who were leading Rick and the others into Grady standing on Dawn’s side and holding guns. But the guns were supposed to be hidden—Dawn specifically asked them to keep them concealed. The only time they pull their guns is when Dawn is shot by Daryl.

If this isn’t suspicious, then what is, TD?

[bookqueenrules]

Did you all see this??? Emily responding to Norman with a ❤️!

Since this from French fan account with a few thousand followers, I wonder if Norman didn't let Emily know to go post a response. You will notice that she posted a day later.

@galadrieljones @marybethyl @wdway

Emily posted the SAME pic as Roman.

Photo credit to @obidala2 and @stillaswind

It's getting crazy folks. Tons of hints are being given! It's an exciting time to be a Beth fan! 😎

[bethgreeneprevails]