The Same Boat

"The Same Boat" is the thirteenth episode of the sixth season of AMC's The Walking Dead. It is the eightieth episode of the series overall. It premiered on March 13, 2016. It was written by Angela Kang and directed by Billy Gierhart.

Plot
Carol and Maggie must fight for their lives after being taken by a group of Saviors.

Synopsis
An armed man ambushes Carol and Maggie, who are guarding the perimeter of the Saviors' compound. Carol shoots him in the arm but spares his life. Three more Saviors move in and take Carol and Maggie hostage.

Paula, one of the Saviors and leader of her group, watches through binoculars as Rick's group beats up a fellow Savior, Primo. She radios Rick on Primo's walkie and tells him she has Carol and Maggie. Rick offers to trade Carol and Maggie for Primo. Paula tells Rick she'll get back to him.

Paula puts Maggie and Carol in a car and radios for backup.

Paula's group brings Maggie and Carol to a slaughterhouse, where they're gagged and bound in a makeshift cell. Left alone momentarily, Maggie tries to cut her bonds on the edge of a wall. Carol finds rosary beads on the floor and pockets them.

Paula's group returns to the cell. Carol hyperventilates. Maggie is concerned, unsure whether it's real or Carol is pretending. Upon Maggie's insistence, the Saviors remove Carol's gag and look pitifully at her as she gasps for breath and prays. Carol begs them not to hurt Maggie and the baby, and asks Molly, one of the Saviors, to refrain from smoking on account of the pregnancy. Michelle, one of the other Saviors, surprisingly backs Carol up.

Donnie, the Savior who Carol shot in the woods, shrieks with pain and threatens to kill Carol. Paula orders him to leave Carol alive as insurance until backup arrives in 30 minutes. Donnie smacks Paula. Maggie trips him as he goes for Carol, and they fight. Paula knocks Donnie unconscious with the butt of her gun and instructs Michelle to interrogate Maggie in another room.

During the interrogation, Michelle asks Maggie where her group lives. "You're not the good guys," Chelle states. "You should know that."

In the other room, Carol thanks Paula for helping her and Maggie with Donnie. "You're pathetic," Paula tells Carol.

Michelle wraps a bandage around one of her fingers and explains to Maggie that she was punished for stealing gas to look for her boyfriend's body. She reveals that she, too, was once pregnant. "I'm sorry," says Maggie. "No, you're not," Michelle replies. They both say that each one of them don't plan on dying today, to which Michelle responds by saying that one of us are wrong, then goes back to questioning her.

Rick radios Paula to ask if she's considered his proposal to trade hostages. Paula delays her decision and ends the transmission. Carol explains to Paula that her group killed the people at the outpost because the Saviors ambushed Daryl's group on the road, instilling them with a fear of Negan. "We had to stop him," Carol says. "Sweetie, we are all Negan," says Molly cryptically.

Paula tells Carol that her boss was the first person she killed after the fall. She says she stopped feeling bad about killing people when her body count reached the double digits. Carol accuses Paula of living among killers, but Paula counters that Carol's people are killers, too, making Carol a killer.

After Carol tells Paula that she'll die unless she makes the trade, Paula eventually radios Rick again and tells him to meet her in a nearby field. Afterwards, she worries that the absence of static on the walkie means that Rick's group is close, possibly already outside the slaughterhouse. Paula contacts her reinforcements, who are now only minutes away. She and Molly leave Carol alone in the cell. In their absence, Carol sharpens the crucifix on the rosary beads and uses it to cut herself free.

Carol finds Maggie and suggests they quietly escape, but Maggie insists, "We can't leave them alive. We have to finish this." They return to the cell and realize that Donnie died from his gunshot wound and is beginning to turn.

Molly returns to the cell and is attacked and bitten by a turned Donnie, who Maggie tethered to a pipe in range of the door. Maggie bludgeons the injured Molly to death, then Carol takes her gun and they race away. Moments later, Paula discovers the dead bodies and draws her gun.

Maggie and Carol find a hallway full of impaled but living walkers, designed to slow them down or trap them. From behind, Paula fires at them until she runs out of bullets. Carol aims her gun at Paula and orders her to run, despite Maggie's insistence that Carol kill Paula. A walker attacks, causing Carol to shoot Paula in the shoulder. Maggie kills the walker, then races over to fight Michelle. During their struggle, Maggie's abdomen is slightly slashed by Chelle's knife, but Carol then manages to shoot Michelle in the head killing her.

Maggie and Carol find Paula injured on the ground. Paula asks what Carol is so afraid of when she's so capable. "I was afraid of this," Carol says, alluding to Paula's death by her hands. Paula lunges at her. Carol shoves Paula into a speared walker, who tears off a portion of Paula's face and begins to devour her. Moments later, a Savior calls Paula's walkie to announce that reinforcements have arrived. "Meet us on the kill floor," Carol responds mimicking Paula's voice.

As Maggie and Carol wait for the Saviors, Carol confesses that she has killed 20 people. Maggie urges her not to think about it. "I can't stop," Carol says.

Carol and Maggie trap the newly arrived Saviors on the kill floor, which they've doused with gasoline. Carol throws her lit cigarette into the room and watches as the bodies go up in flames.

Maggie kills the impaled walkers, including Paula, as she and Carol make their way to the exit. They find Rick's group just outside the door, about to storm the building. As Maggie and Glenn reunite, Daryl asks Carol if she's okay. "No," Carol says. They hug.

Rick tells Primo that his friends are dead and demands to know if Negan was among the people they killed at the compound. "I'm Negan, Shithead!" Primo says. "I'm sorry it had to come to this," Rick says before shooting him point-blank while Carol has blood dripping from her hand while holding the Cross.

Co-Stars

 * Jimmy Gonzales as Primo

Uncredited

 * Linda Bell as Walker

Deaths

 * Michelle's Boyfriend (Confirmed Fate)
 * Frank (Confirmed Fate)
 * Michelle's Unborn Child (Confirmed Fate)
 * Paula's Husband (Confirmed Fate)
 * Paula's Four Daughters (Confirmed Fate)
 * Donnie (Alive and Zombified)
 * Molly
 * Michelle
 * Paula (Alive and Zombified)
 * Primo
 * 5 unnamed Saviors

Trivia

 * First (and last) appearance of Donnie.
 * First (and last) appearance of Molly.
 * First (and last) appearance of Michelle.
 * First (and last) appearance of Paula. (Physically)
 * Last appearance of Primo.
 * The title of the episode, "The Same Boat", comes from when Molly says to Carol, "I'm a dead woman walking... which puts us in exactly the same boat".
 * It could also refer to the similarities between Paula & Carol, and Michelle & Maggie.
 * The zombified Paula at the end of the episode was portrayed by another actor, as there wasn't time to get Alicia Witt made up as a walker.
 * Carol burning the remaining Saviors alive marks the first time she has killed others in such a way. The second time would be in "Who Are You Now?", where she does the same thing to Jed and the Saviors Marauders.

Comic Parallels

 * Molly's claim to Carol that "We are all Negan" is adapted from Issue 97.

Goofs/Errors

 * When Rick lifts Primo off the ground at the start of the episode, his bullet wounds have vanished despite being present in the previous episode.
 * In the previous episode, after Rick says over the walkie "Come on out, let's talk", Paula answers right away. In this episode, she takes several more seconds before answering.