Daryl’s group arrive in Paris, where, it turns out some familiar faces are waiting for Isabelle.

This is the episode where it feels like the show has found its stride. The opening, terrifying interlude in Angers speaks very loudly to that. Stopping off at an ally who they think can help them, Daryl and co instead find a zombie orchestra, chained in place, being ‘educated’ in how to play. It’s an image that connects the core aesthetic of the universe with a much more European sensibility and it’s played not as action but as quiet, if discordant tragedy.

This opening sets the tone for an episode crammed full of character, incident and plot progression. We check in with Codron, still chasing Daryl, and get some welcome momentum on both that and his alliance with Genet. This massively helps both characters, giving them context and agency they’ve begun to desperately need. It also gives us a look at the experiments Genet is carrying out on zombies, which includes a terrifying hint of enhanced strength and speed. We saw, back in the closing scenes of The World Beyond, that a new strain had risen in Paris. This raises the horrifying concept that it may have been cultivated.

Isabelle gets the lion’s share of the development this episode though and it pays dividends. We return, literally, to the scene of the flashbacks last episode and it delivers plot, poignancy and abject horror. Searching for goods to barter for Daryl’s passage home, Isabelle is confronted with Aimée, her young neighbour, now dead. And, permanently, a child. It’s a horrifying moment, and it makes you see the dead in a new way. Aimée is a cross section of the past; unchanging aside from entropy. Laurent is, for better or worse, the future.

Isabelle’s devotion to her nephew is one of the most interesting elements of her character and Clémence Poésy does typically great work here. She also has some fascinating clashes with Daryl, the former convinced Laurent is a miracle and the latter… has a very different idea of what a miracle constitutes. This remains the toughest road the show must travel and so far it;s travelling it smartly. Keeping Laurent as an ambiguously smart, grounded, but unworldly child as opposed to a walking plot device makes a huge amount of sense. Especially as we meet his father this week.

Adam Nagaitis is one of the most naturally menacing performers I’ve ever seen and if you liked his work on The Terror you’ll love his work here. Quinn has landed on his feet, running a nightclub/bazaar in the Paris catacombs that places him in a fascinating position. He seems to be Rick from Casablanca in this new world. He’s clearly very dangerous, and is arguably more of a nemesis than Codron for Daryl, but his position is more complex and, perhaps, fragile. Nagaitis, Poésy and Norman Reedus bounce off each brilliantly and this uncomfortable trio looks set to drive the future of the show.

There’s so much here, and it all works. Fallou (Eriq Ebouaney) is a welcome voice of calm and an authority figure whose benevolence is the foundation for his authority, Louis Puech Scigliuzzi’s Laurent continues to grow and develop in interesting ways and the action this week is ridiculously inventive and nasty. Zombies throwing themselves out of window to get to their food is terrifying enough but the moment Daryl spears one of the chemical zombies we saw back in the first episode and uses it to burn through a door is a real highlight. Not just for the show but for the character. Daryl’s learning, fast, and based on what we’ve seen, he’s going to need to keep doing it.

Verdict: Pacy, grim, inventive and atmospheric. This is the best episode so far. 9/10

Alasdair Stuart