LADIES AND GENTLEMEN! Welcome back to the Walking Dead Chitty-Chat Club in which we chat and chitty about last night's brain-bustin' episode of The Walking Dead. Will I offer up SPOILERS and insensitive jokes about noggin bludgeoning after the jump? BAM! You know I will. Let's get chitty chatting!

Oh. So this is why the Cubs made the World Series.
Oh. So this is why the Cubs made the World Series. Courtesy AMC

Here's what I'm thinking about the season 7, episode one Walking Dead premiere, "The Day Will Come When You Won't Be."

1) Okay, so for the entire season my stomach has been churning over who got brain bashed by Negan's frankly kind-of-ugly girlfriend, Lucille. And they made us wait a little while longer to find out! Thanks to Ranger Rick's smart mouth, he was taken on a little joy ride in the Winnebago by Negan, who dared him to stick an ax in his noggin (he was unsuccessful), and then threw the ax out into a crowd of zombies, ordering Rick to go fetch. As we soon found out, this was Negan's way of denigrating Rick, breaking him down, and turning him into his own personal lapdog. (Which is exactly how the third Mrs. Wm. Steven Humphrey got me to fall in line. And she didn't even have to threaten me with a barbed wire baseball bat!)

2) Oh, and speaking of his bat, Negan's line about how Lucille wanted blood which made her a "vampire bat" was the worst joke I've heard since the original Full House went off the air. So CUT... IT... OUT.

3) Okay, so while Rick battles the throng of zombies to get the ax, he recalls who got their bean bashed by Negan, and it was... G.I. GINGER! That made me sad/mad, but I gotta confess I was happy it wasn't Glenn. I was totally expecting it to be him, because that's the way it went down in the comics, and... WHAMMO!!! Oh shit! He got Glenn, too? GODDAMMIT NEGAN (and Walking Dead writing staff)! You totally suckered me on that one.

4) Should we take a moment to talk about Glenn's popped out eyeball? Errrrr... let's not and say we did.

5) Back at the Winnebago, Negan forces Rick to stop stalling, jump off the vehicle, and on to the hanging body of a zombie—which provided the best money shot of the night when the head of the zombie was slooooowly ripped off its body. And the look on that zombie was priceless! He was all like, "What? Really? You guys are the fucking worst."

6) Seemingly properly humiliated, Negan brings Rick back to the gang, and yet? Is still not satisfied that Rick is going to be the obedient dumb Lab that Negan wants to eventually cuddle with in front of the fire. So he puts a gun to the back of the gang's head, and tells Rick to chop the arm off of his son (Carl's Jr.), or else everybody dies horribly. Rick's all like, "Noooooo, Negan! Take me instead! Noooooooo!" And Carl's Jr. is all like, "God, dad... just do it already, you're embarrassing meeeee!" But just when he's about to tear his son asunder, Negan's all like, "PSYCH! Just kidding. Though I am going to take Daryl hostage, and send him back in little bitty pieces unless you guys bring me awesome stuff from Alexandria on the reg. Okay? Okay. BYEEEEEE!" (Peels out in a cloud of dust.)

7) Left alone, the gang is still shell-shocked from the deaths of G.I. Ginger and Glenn, as well as Daryl's kidnapping, and Ranger Rick's embarrassing emasculation. But it's Maggie that's blaming herself the most! She thinks if it wasn't for her probable miscarriage, the gang wouldn't have been out there in the first place. (Ummmm... hey Maggie! Do you not recall how Rick formed a vigilante squad to murder Negan's men last season? HIS FAULT.) The gang picks up the remains of Ginger and Glenn and heads back to Alexandria—but not before Rick notices in his rearview mirror the sight of a zombie licking up the dead men's brains. EWWWWWWWWWW! (Just like a dog licks up vomit. EWWWWWWWWW!) This is some rather blunt imagery that shakes Rick, since after all he's Nagen's newest pet, and may be licking up brains and/or vomit himself one day. EWWWWW! Or cat poop. Dog's love cat poop. EWWWWWWWWW!!

8) Okay, well frankly I'm glad that episode's out of the way. I'll miss Glenn (and G.I. Ginger, less so), but you have to admit that Glenn dodged too many bullets over the years, and his time had probably come. (Though I could've done without the eyeball popping. Not a good look for him.) What does the rest of the season hold? Well, what do you think? Rick and the rangers will get in good with Negan's troops, sow the seeds of discontent, and eventually exact their revenge—probably with a "vampire bat" of their own. (BUT PLEASE NEVER USE THAT JOKE AGAIN. Talk about a bludgeoning!)

9) Got any chitty-chats to make about this episode? Leave them in the comments, and I'll take another "swing" at this column next week. (Heh. BOOOOO.)

Oh, cool. That cloud looks just like a bunny rabbit.
"Oh, cool. That cloud looks just like a bunny rabbit." Courtesy AMC