'Fear the Walking Dead' Season 6 Episode 4 Review: Colby Minifie's Virginia is the show's weakest link
Spoilers for 'Fear the Walking Dead' Season 5 Episode 4 'The Key'
She's sent out bounty hunters, forced captives to fight molasses-covered walkers and sent scouts out scavenging with threats to harm their loved ones if they run away — the show has made it very clear just how bad life can be when you're on Virginia's (Colby Minifie) bad side. In this episode, we see for the first time just what things are like when you're on Virginia's good side — and things aren't a lot better there, either.
As John Dorie (Garrett Dillahunt) returns to a lawmaker's life as one of Virginia's rangers, he finds that as much good as he wants to do, the system is inherently corrupt and there's not a lot he can do to change that.
In the latest episode of 'Fear the Walking Dead', John falls in line with Virginia's rule and accepts a position as one of her law-enforcing rangers. When one of his fellow rangers winds up dead, however, he quickly learns that justice isn't something that Virginia's particularly concerned with and it's Janis (Holly Curran) who pays the price for John's investigation — something that a well-intentioned Victor Strand (Colman Domingo) is partially responsible for.
All shows in 'The Walking Dead' franchise have existed long enough for its characters to have dealt with the idea of moving past all they lost and keeping an eye towards the future they're building. Through John Dorie's eyes, living on the right side of the fence, life in Lawton can look downright pleasant — and then a blatant cover-up of a ranger's murder reminds everyone that there's rot in the system and that nobody is free.
It's a heartbreaking tale of a good man's slow corruption — a story that's weakened by the bland performance offered up by Colby Minifie's Virginia.
Virginia has, for most of this season, been an implied threat — we've seen the carrots and the sticks that she's offered, but not all that much from the woman herself. This episode shines more of a spotlight into how she operates and it really brings to light the fact that while Virginia is a well-written character, Colby Minifie's performance is forgettable at best.
While Minifie has made a great impression on shows like 'Jessica Jones' or 'The Boys', she brings neither a sense of intimidation nor nuance to the role of Virginia.
As far as the story goes, it's intriguing just how far out of her way Virginia goes to keep John on her good side and to keep appearances up. Considering the power she wields, she could have sent John back down to clean-up duty, or even just had him killed, but she goes all the way to frame an innocent victim just to appease John's investigation.
Not only that, but she promotes him afterward. She prioritizes useful people to such an extent that even John knows that June's (Jenna Elfman) medical knowledge will keep her safe. She's putting a lot of work into surrounding herself with people she's slowly corrupted, layer by layer, and John's story shows us just how hard she's willing to work to do so.
An episode like this misses its opportunity to establish Virginia as a threat worth remembering but all it ends up doing is emphasizing how much better the show is when Virginia's relegated to the background.
The next episode of 'Fear the Walking Dead' airs on November 8 at 9 pm ET on AMC.