“The Walking Dead – Michonne, Episode 2: Give No Shelter” Review

Now that The Walking Dead has wrapped up its sixth season on television, Telltale Games’ Michonne miniseries can take center stage with its second episode – Give No Shelter. Well, before Fear The Walking Dead, and The Walking Dead No…

Now that The Walking Dead has wrapped up its sixth season on television, Telltale Games’ Michonne miniseries can take center stage with its second episode – Give No Shelter. Well, before Fear The Walking Dead, and The Walking Dead No Man’s Land, and so on. After a fairly solid opener, this second episode turns things up to a highly enjoyable level.

What’s It About?

Give No Shelter picks up immediately where the first episode left off. Without getting into specific spoilers, someone just died (well, come on, it’s The Walking Dead!) and you’ll have to escape the situation you’re in with either a hostile relationship you just developed, or a one that is healthy enough.

The story won’t drive you back into your boat crew, but rather into a small homestead of sorts. It’s somewhat friendly, but relatively safe, for a short while. When dealing with some injury situations sustained by Sam, a young girl with you, Michonne dives deeper into her backstory through contained hallucinations. This is where the story will slow down, but to an intriguing degree, right before it picks up again for some intense situations.

Why Should I Care?

Now that much of the base has been settled with the first episode, Give No Shelter is really able to help Telltale’s miniseries come into its own. The first 10-15 minutes are filled with some solid decision making that seem to be the deepest decisions for the overall story, mixed with some great action sequences that play out far more smoothly than I experienced within the first episode.

The drama is built up incredibly well, especially when the story takes some time to slow down. What it does really well is start to question her methods. Pete, one of the members of the boat crew, calls her brutality into question, which makes me wonder whether she’s lost her sensitivity. But you’ll be given the opportunity to provide guidance to the young Sam as to whether she should move down the path of killing.

It’s a great discussion that had been explored within The Walking Dead’s universe before, but the Telltale writers sell it so well. Enough here to the point where the miniseries has already proven its worth. The problem, though, is that Give No Shelter is over fairly quickly. I’m usually one to explore as much as possible within a game, but even this episode took me maybe 90 minutes to complete — and that includes various pauses in the game to take notes.

Because of how strong Give No Shelter was, I would have liked to have seen a little more meat on it. The story only had one “SO OBVIOUS” point that stuck out compared to the rest of Telltale’s storytelling, so it was a shame not to see the rest of the strong elements. I would have liked to have seen one more visit to the backstory included here, as the rest of the current story could end up being so strong that the backstory could feel shoehorned. Of course, that remains to be seen.

What Makes It Worth My Time and Money?

While I clearly had some issues with this episode’s length, it’s ultimately such a strong showing for the game. You’d wish that there was just at least one more chapter included here, despite including the standard seven chapters for a Telltale episode.

If you weren’t quite sold on the Michonne miniseries before now, Give No Shelter should be your reason for getting on board.