Washed ashore in France after being captured by pirates, Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus) struggles to get home. But he soon discovers he may be exactly where he needs to be…

Spoilers

For the first half, ‘L’âme Perdue’ is the sort of episode this franchise can do in its sleep. The smaller focus allows Norman Reedus to be the intensely physical actor and presence we know he is and a good chunk of that first half is almost silent. Reedus’ Daryl has become the face of the franchise and here that face is dogged, relentless and out of his depth. In the space of two fight scenes we see Daryl in more trouble than he’s been in for a long time. In one, we see him receive a chemical burn from a Walker, something which hasn’t happened before. Later there’s an off-hand reference to it being a ‘Burner’ and you realize the show is off to the races. We’ve seen, in the final scene of World Beyond, that France is a hub for the research effort that may have caused the outbreak. We know the intelligent walkers originated there and the implication of other types is a really interesting development. One that keeps Daryl as the compassionate badass he is but that puts him in big trouble.

The second half is where things get interesting and, odds are, the show is going to lose people. Badly hurt, Daryl is nursed back to health at a nunnery in Mont-Saint-Michael, Normandy. Daniel Percival does his best direction here and the action is up close and brutal when it comes. But before that there’s a sense of place and calm the core show often didn’t have in its final few seasons. This feels like a different place and that further emphasizes the challenges facing Daryl. It also, in Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi) gives us something familiar: a sad child for the patron saint of them to bond with. I’m not being facetious either, Daryl is a marshmallow and Laurent has his number straight away. Scigliuzzi has a hell of a job: play a child mature beyond his years who can hold his own, is still an innocent, still naive, may be a genius and who knows what Daryl needs before Daryl does. He does an excellent job too, and based on the premise we hit in this half, he’s going to need to keep doing that.

Because Laurent may be the Second Coming. He’s certainly presented as such to the sisters, who are revealed to be part of the Union of Hope, a cross-denominational theological group trying to rebuild the world. If PADRE is doing it with supplies and resources in Fear the Walking Dead, the Union is trying to do with it an enlightened, compassionate leader. No one says the word ‘messiah’ but it hangs over the entire episode and there’s one deeply unsettling moment where Laurent uses a very specific phrase that echoes something Judith told Daryl before he left. The kid is either genuinely odd or incredibly perceptive and I don’t know which.

There are a thousand ways this could go wrong and so few that could go right and the show wobbles in the set up for sure. The Cause, the political force that seems to oppose the Union, are, so far, central casting survivalists.

Romain Levi’s Codron is clearly set up to be Daryl’s nemesis, and there’s some resonant symmetry with Daryl killing Codron’s brother. But along with Genet (Anne Charrier), the Cause leader at the moment they’re just flash cards with ‘more soon’ on them. That’s not a fault, it’s a peril every pilot episode faces. But when you’re asking us to buy Daryl being the adoptive father of the second coming, it feels like a bigger ask than most. Clémence Poésy as Isabelle, the nun who explains Daryl’s part in this to him, is great but like the rest of the cast she’s mostly just curtsying and waiting for something more to happen right now.

This isn’t a bad thing, and it’s not a bad episode. But it’s a pilot and the only thing harder than them to do exceptionally well is a finale.

Verdict: This is a very good start, but it’s one that lays out a path as deeply hazardous for the show as the one Daryl must follow. I admire the audacity but no show in the franchise’s history has set itself a bigger challenge yet. Good luck, everyone. 7/10

Alasdair Stuart