The Walking Dead season 8 episode 2 is show's most action-packed outing yet - review

Our spoiler-filled verdict on 'The Damned'

This week’s episode of The Walking Dead is bookended with a montage sequence showing all five million of the show's characters striking their most brooding pose. It's been established that all are a far cry from where we first met them whether eight years ago or eight episodes ago and this latest outing - titled 'The Damned' - succeeds in clicking their direction into focus. For the first time, it feels like everyone is as important as another - All Out War has eradicated character hierarchy and the stakes are higher for it.

This episode is dedicated to all those who not-so-lovingly once branded the series 'The Talking Dead,' a nickname that has been put to pasture with balletic bravado. Fortunately, the series doesn't seem like it's putting its entire foot on the pedal - 'The Damned' is as riddled with silence as it is gunfire: it's talking that's the sideshow, our characters - split into four factions - prowling Saviour corridors in scenes evoking video game thrills as they begin taking out Negan's house of cards from the bottom up.

There's Aaron (Ross Marquand), wounded Eric (Jordan Woods-Robinson) and company firing rifles - a far cry from the humane souls we met in season five - and there's Carol (Melissa McBride) who has been shunted with the quote-spewing and, at times eye-rolling King Ezekiel (Khary Payton). Then there's Morgan (Lennie James), Tara (Alanna Masterson) and Jesus (Tom Payne) who each get their succinct arc, the former especially who after almost meeting his maker in a hail of bullets curbs his conscientious objecting past to fast track his way to the show's most deadly character.

Jesus has taken his place, the bearded wonder intent on capturing all surrendering Saviours as opposed to murdering them in cold blood, preaching to Maggie's kindness as motivation. "Even if Maggie listens to you, Rick will listen to me," a disapproving Tara tells him, almost comically sandwiched by scenes showing Rick impaling somebody on a spike and then abandoning an unmanned baby lying in a cot. It's these scenes which encapsulate what The Walking Dead does so well - should we be rooting for these band of bloodthirsty heroes? The line between villainy is murkier than ever.

Andrew Lincoln shines as an evidently perturbed Rick hesitates, his emotions bubbling beneath the grizzled surface. He looks into a mirror, rifle in hand, clothes drenched in blood - a far cry from waking up in that hospital bed in Atlanta. Such thoughts are echoed by the preternatural arrival of a character not glimpsed since te the heady days of season one - Morales (Juan Gabriel Pareja).

The Walking Dead is facing a minor quandary - while favouring balls-to-the-wall action, shunning much of what many fans criticised about its seventh season, this episode struggles to reach the heights you’d hope. In some eyes, the reintroduction of Morales may be one shark jump too far - to others, however, it'll serve as an enticing twist embracing a continuity the sprawling show has failed to manage in many seasons. If season 8 continues rewarding original viewers in this way- much like it did with the premiere's many callbacks - it has the potential to be the show's most exciting run in years.

For now, the jury remains out.

The Walking Dead season eight airs every Sunday in the US on AMC with the UK premiere arriving the following evening on FOX. It will also be available on NOWTV