the reason why rick didn’t act when negan said he was going to kill carl is because he knew it would be futile.
rick had already tried begging once before in 7x01 when negan told him to cut carl’s arm off. he was hysterical, he volunteered his own arm, he pleaded, he did everything he could to save his son and it did nothing – only negan had the power to stop what was happening. moreover, negan had wanted to get rick into that emotional state.
he wasn’t going to give that to negan again.
in 7x16, when negan threatens to kill carl and then bash rick’s hands (rick only gives negan permission to do the latter, by the way), rick finds himself in the same position he was in during 7x01. except he’s a different man now: this time he’s not going to bend to negan’s will, and most importantly, this time he knows that whatever he does in that moment cannot save his son.
this means that rick has only two options before him:
he can sob and plead as carl is killed in front of him
he can swear his revenge on negan as carl is killed in front of him
he’s learned from past experience that the first option wouldn’t do anything to stop negan, and that it would only give negan the satisfaction of breaking rick grimes once more. if negan was going to kill carl, rick couldn’t let that become another moment where he bows down to negan; instead, it was a promise that this act would be avenged, no matter what.
rick grimes loves his children more than anything else in the world.
am i annoyed that we didn’t get a scene of rick and carl reuniting? yes. am i annoyed that we haven’t had much father/son interaction this season? yes. but just because we don’t see hugs and bonding onscreen doesn’t mean that there aren’t a million of those moments going on off-screen.
