Did 'Walking Dead' Push Fans Too Far?

The season-seven premiere of The Walking Dead finally hit the air Sunday night, resolving the cliffhanger that had fans agitated all summer. Those fans had waited months to find out the identity of Negan's victim, and when they at last had answers, at least some fans wished they didn't.

WARNING: We're going to try avoid major spoilers here, but if you don't want to know anything about Sunday's episode before you see it, don't read any further.

Sunday's episode resolved the cliffhanger at an excrutiatingly slow pace, jumping ahead and then flashing back to walk us through Negan's sadistic monologue all over again before finally revealing who was going to end up dead. When the reveal came, it was extremely graphic in its violence, and the drawn-out lead-up to the killing, the bloody murder itself, and its immediate aftermath took up the entire episode.

Critics overwhelmingly blasted the episode, citing the excessively manipulative attempts to lengthen the suspense and the episode's general failure to do much to advance the series' plot. The critical consensus seems to be that the episode was, by far, not worth the wait.

At least in their immediate reactions, many fans seemed to be more disturbed by the episode's violence than its weak writing. The on-camera violence outdid anything the infamously violent series had come up with so far, leading some to accuse the producers of using violence gratuitously (the term "tortue porn" came up more than once).

Ultimately, the talk of poor writing and over-the-line violence overshadowed discussion of what was supposed to be the dramatic impact of the episode: the death of a major character and the introduction of a major new villain.

So now TWD, having turned off both critics and fans, faces a season in which it must prove that it still has an entertaining story to tell.