The four saddest things we’ve learned about the Saviors on “The Walking Dead”
In season seven’s third episode we get to know The Walking Dead’s Saviors, and life for them isn’t great. In fact, The Saviors have it super rough at The Sanctuary. The only person living well is Negan – and that’s probably because everyone is too afraid to cross him.
While Ezekiel’s Kingdom on TWD is an almost weirdly idyllic place, The Sanctuary is, well, not so much that. Daryl’s experience with The Saviors may be bad, but we find out he’s not the only one suffering. Fights break out seemingly regularly, and anytime Negan passes by, everyone has to kneel. All The Saviors are basically just extensions of Negan, and that loss of their individuality seems to go hand in hand with the loss of their humanity.
Here are some of the most depressing things we learned about life at The Sanctuary on last night’s episode:
Prisoners are tortured.
Obviously, Negan and his right hand man, Dwight, are trying to break Daryl. That being said, their treatment of him is still heartbreaking. The Saviors keep Daryl in his cell totally naked. They feed him sandwiches made of dog food, and force him to listen to a horribly cheerful song all the time. When Dwight slips him a picture of Glenn’s body, it’s nearly too much. Daryl (and TWD fans everywhere) basically falls apart – and we know it’s only the beginning.
Everything belongs to Negan.
And we mean everything: Objects, physical spaces, people. Everything belongs to Negan, and even followers like Dwight suffer. The constant kneeling and the actual requirement that they answer the question, “Who are you?” with, “I am Negan,” really hammer that in.
There’s a barrier of walkers surrounding The Sanctuary.
On one hand, a fence-o-walkers seems like a decent way to protect your property. It certainly discourages human intruders. However, this walker barrier is more sinister than it initially appears. The walkers used are just any walkers: they’re people who have crossed Negan. The fence acts more as a way for Negan to mess with peoples’ minds than for protection. It’s a pretty much constant reminder that there’s no way out, for anyone.
People would rather die than be at The Sanctuary.
At one point in the episode, Dwight goes after a runaway. It’s a man who can’t stand to live another moment under Negan. The man asks Dwight to kill him, so he doesn’t have to return. Dwight shoots him, but we later find out that the man becomes just another walker on the fence.
Life for The Walking Dead‘s Saviors is pretty horrible. Negan is the worst bad guy the show has ever seen. We can only hope that means that, when the time comes, plenty of people will work together to bring him down.
