Warning! SPOILERS ahead for The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season 2 finale.The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon – The Book of Carol has been a mostly solid follow-up to the first season, albeit with a story that’s more contrived and at times messy. Season 2 does a lot in six episodes, leading to the overall flow feeling a bit rushed. The big moments, like the reunion of Carol (Melissa McBride) and Daryl (Norman Reedus), do land with the emotional weight that such scenes deserve. This is thanks in large part to the performances of McBride and Reedus, who, along with a strong supporting cast, elevate their scenes even when the story stumbles.

The biggest stumble for Daryl Dixon season 2 has been the villains. At first, there is only one bad group, Pouvoir, led by Madam Genet (Anne Charrier). Then there are two when Losang and L’Union show their true colors. In the span of two episodes, though, both Genet and Losang (Joel de la Fuente) are killed, and what remains of their followers unite under Losang’s second-in-command, Jacinta (Nassima Benchicou). It’s all needlessly complicated. As a result, these villains haven’t been as compelling as they might have been. Thankfully, the whole Pouvoir/L’Union situation is wrapped up in the season 2 finale.

Titled “Au Revoir les Enfants”, which translates to “Goodbye Children”, Daryl Dixon’s season 2 finale is split into two parts. The first completes what has been Daryl’s main mission – protect Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi), which is accomplished by getting him out of France and as far away from Pouvoir/L’Union as possible. The second half of the episode finds Carol and Daryl figuring out their way home and finally putting to rest the ghosts that haunt them, setting the stage for where the series will go in season 3.

Mission Accomplished

Laurent Finally Leaves France As Daryl Dixon Clears The Way For Season 3

The first half of the season 2 finale focuses almost exclusively on getting Laurent out of France. It doesn’t take too much convincing, but Daryl is able to get Ash (Manish Dayal) to agree to fly Laurent to America, playing again to his sympathies as a father, but being more truthful about it than Carol. For her part, the plan is initially for Carol to fly back with them, as Daryl unsurprisingly chooses to be the one left behind, since the plane can only take three passengers.

Spelling out a big part of Daryl’s arc – he originally wanted to get home, but what he needed was the relationship he’s built with Laurent.

This leads to a lovely scene between Daryl and Laurent where they sing The Rolling Stones’ “You Can’t Always Get What You Want”, highlighting how close they’ve grown and spelling out a big part of Daryl’s arc. He originally wanted to get home, but what he needed was his relationship with Laurent. Accepting responsibility for Laurent, especially in the wake of Isabelle’s (Clémence Poésy) death, forced Daryl to become a father figure in a way he never imagined, even more so than caring for Judith. It’s a good look on him, and a facet of Daryl Reedus clearly enjoys playing.

We can only hope Laurent will arrive safely to the Commonwealth because at the last minute, in another completely unsurprising move, Carol gets off the plane to help Daryl hold back the Pouvoir/L’Union forces trying to stop their takeoff. It’s now left to Ash to not only get Laurent to America, but also to a settlement he’s never been to where none of the people there will have any idea who they are. It’s unclear exactly what Walking Dead show will ever address this, but presumably, there will be some resolution once Carol and Daryl get back stateside.

As for Carol also staying behind, this feels like Daryl Dixon finally becoming the show it was initially announced to be – an adventure for both Daryl and Carol, similar to how the other Walking Dead spinoffs have centered the pairs of Maggie and Negan and Rick and Michonne. This decision, along with what’s left of Pouvoir/L’Union seemingly dealt with during the takeoff scene, has cleared the decks and will allow the show to have a fresh start come season 3.

Daryl Dixon Says Goodbye To (Most Of) Its Excellent Supporting Cast

With Isabelle & Laurent Gone, The Rest Of The Parisian Cast Are Given Exits

In its continued effort to wipe slates clean, Daryl Dixon also dispatches with most of its Parisian supporting cast in its season 2 finale. Isabelle, sadly, was killed off in episode 4, and now with Laurent on his way to America, Daryl’s connection to France is lessened. There are still a few characters who rounded out the supporting cast of the show, but all are written off in ways that suggest they won’t return, at least not anytime soon.

The most obvious characters who won’t be returning are Lukerya Ilyashenko’s Anna and Benchicou’s Jacinta, as both bite the dust in the finale. Anna’s death is a shame because her season 2 return made for a fun addition, and I wouldn’t have been opposed to her popping up again in season 3. Jacinta’s death, however, is perfectly fine, since the less of L’Union that remains the better. However, her suicide does raise questions about what happened to Tatiana Gousseff’s Sabine, Genet’s second-in-command. She isn’t shown being killed, so presumably she could reassemble whatever remains of Pouvoir/L’Union. (Perish the thought.)

The biggest regret among the departing cast is Fallou (Eriq Ebouaney). While never a major player, his presence in the story has always been a comfort, and Ebouaney is immensely charming in the role. It’s initially presented as though Fallou will join Daryl and Carol on their next adventure, but plans are quickly changed when he decides to stay in France with Akila (Soraya Hachoumi), a character who only appears in this finale, but comes across as if she’s been around all season. Hopefully, this decision means he’ll stay alive and that perhaps he will appear again in the future.

There is one supporting cast member who does stick around: Romain Levi’s Codron. In last week’s episode, he was forgiven by Laurent and seemed to make peace with Daryl. He also joins Carol and Daryl as they start their journey home, but whether he’ll remain an ally of theirs is thrown into question.

Daryl, Carol, & Codron Face Ghosts From Their Past

All Three Grapple With Their Lingering Trauma, Some More Successfully Than Others

With their time in France over, season 2 ends with Carol and Daryl leaving for England. To do this, they head into the Chunnel, an underwater tunnel that connects England and France, with a pair of Scots as their guides. The journey is complicated by the abundance of guano (bat poop) found in the tunnel, which in large quantities can lead to hallucinations and psychosis.

After stumbling upon a group of British soldiers who were clearly affected by the guano, leading them to attack and kill each other, Daryl and Co. find themselves suffering from the same symptoms. This leads to Daryl, Carol, and Codron hallucinating the dead people who still haunt them, forcing them to grapple with what they mean. For Codron, this means seeing his brother, who he believed had been killed by Daryl, but learned in the previous episode was killed by the woman who tricked Daryl in the show’s first episode.

This knowledge has clearly been weighing on Codron because his brother’s murder was the whole reason he began hunting Daryl in the first place. Upon hallucinating his brother as a zombie, Codron can’t handle it and again blames Daryl. The two fight, but eventually Codron runs off, leaving his whereabouts unknown.

This turn is a strange one because it appeared everything was cool between Daryl and Codron, but then I guess the guano-induced hallucination just really messed him up. Presumably, Codron still lives and will reappear next season, but it does feel as if the series just needed some way to remove him for a while and leave only Carol and Daryl together.

Speaking of this titular pair, they handle their ghosts much better. For Daryl, he sees an apparition of Isabelle who encourages him to carry on when he’s beaten by their Scottish guides. It’s a sweet sendoff to a relationship that was so cruelly cut short. Daryl also hallucinates his grandfather’s ghost, which is a nice callback to him visiting his grave in Normandy. Daryl feared he’d die in France just like his grandfather, leaving behind the people back home who depended on him. That fear is put to rest, though, and he emerges all the more determined to go home.

For all the storytelling issues Daryl Dixon season 2 has had, it’s for cathartic moments like these that I continue to watch.

Carol, arguably, has the most visceral ghost confrontation with her daughter, Sophia. Twice now, Daryl Dixon season 2 has made it seem as if Carol has finally put this trauma to rest, but now I believe she’s truly confronted it. While hallucinating Sophia, she’s able to remember what her daughter looked like while alive, seeing her as she was before she became a zombie. Realizing she could only remember Sophia as “what came out of the barn” sent Carol spiraling into grief again, but now that she’s able to remember her daughter, she can also finally let her go.

Both Carol and Daryl let their children go in this episode, fulfilling the episode’s title, “Au Revoir les Enfants”. Grappling with parenthood and its many ups and downs has been a major part of both their arcs this season, and McBride and Reedus have delivered compelling, heart-wrenching performances. McBride, in particular, gives her most heartbreaking performance to date in this scene. And for all the storytelling issues Daryl Dixon season 2 has had, it’s for cathartic moments like these that I continue to watch.

Daryl Dixon Season 2’s Zombie Kill Of The Week

The penultimate episode is what delivered the sort of zombie kills we’d been waiting all season for, but the finale doesn’t disappoint either. The actual killing of the zombies in this episode isn’t anything noteworthy, but the fact that they encounter bioluminescent zombies while in the Chunnel is very cool. There’s never an explanation given for why these zombies glow other than a mention of how some organisms develop bioluminescence.

Scientific fact aside, glowing zombies create an especially spooky atmosphere that only enhances the scenes where the characters are tripping out of their minds. It’s a neat effect and the kind of thing The Walking Dead should be doing more. Daryl Dixon has included some cool variants, with France’s burners and the bog zombies of Greenland, but over a decade into the apocalypse, it’s fun to be surprised by new designs.

Daryl Dixon season 2 covered a lot of ground, and not always with great success, but it shows a lot of promise for what’s to come in season 3. We already know season 3 will eventually land Daryl and Carol in Spain, but there’s obviously a detour first to England. Getting to see how these two countries have handled the apocalypse will be interesting. That was much of the intrigue surrounding the France-set series, after all.

More importantly, Daryl Dixon season 3 will begin with our two main characters already together. As the original conceit of the show was to send Carol and Daryl off on their own adventures, it feels good to have finally arrived at that. Plus, with the French narrative more or less wrapped, there can be a fresh start once they arrive in England. Daryl Dixon’s first season benefited greatly by having little holdover from previous Walking Dead shows and season 3 can hopefully recapture some sense of that.