Captured, alone and increasingly panicked, Princess frantically tries to keep Yumiko conscious, Eugene on point and Ezekiel in control as the soldiers’ questions just keep coming…

Paola Lázaro deserves awards for this week’s episode. She won’t get them, odds are, but that doesn’t change the impossibly impressive work she does here. Because this week the show embraces the traumas of the individual and shows that individual, and jus what those trauma can do to the outside world.

Regular cast members Josh McDermitt, Eleanor Matsuura and Khary Payton all get a workout this week and all do good work. Matsuursa has the hardest and easiest job; a disembodied voice the next carriage but none less pleading or effective for that. Likewise McDermitt revelling in Eugene’s unique speech patterns gets a chance to ground the episode with his customary caution.

And then Ezekiel arrives and things get really interesting. The chances are you’ll have figured out what the episode is doing before this, but the Ezekiel scenes make it explicit: these aren’t the show’s characters. These are Princess’ impressions of them, embodying elements of her own terror and PTSD. She sees Yumiko injured in the fight and so makes her someone to help and assist. She hears Eugene speak and makes him the avatar of multi-syllabic caution. She sees Ezekiel talk and move and reimagines him as the man he used to think he was; a vibrant, violent swashbuckling monarch. None of which is true.

None of which matters. Because in the end, they do the same thing the actual characters would do anyway. Inspire Princess to do the right thing. As we see the events of the episode over again, as we see a second Ezekiel (brilliantly, just hanging out with a pair of Walkers), we and Princess both realize the truth. She’s always known what to do.

This is the genius of the episode and of Lázaro’s performance. She shows us everything; Princess as a swaggering heroine, Princess foetal and reciting train station names as a means of regaining control, Princess realizing what she’s capable and finally realizing what she’s able to do with that capability. Everything from voice to motion is used to show us a character waking up to herself at either the best or worst possible time and it’s an astonishing piece of work. I’ve genuinely never seen another show do character development this well at this stage, or have the guts to have a brand new character carry an entire episode. Not to mention knock it for six.

This is powerful, brave, intensely personal TV that’s also crammed full of worldbuilding. Cameron Scott Roberts as the hapless trooper Princess attacks embodies a lot of that and we end the episode no closer to knowing what their captors want or what the plan actually is. In that light, the final shot cliffhanger seems a little perfunctory and annoying but even that can’t distract from a bravura central performance.

Verdict: Another immensely strong Season 10C entry. 10/10

Alasdair Stuart