The Walking Dead/The Rotten Core

The Rotten Core
Season 11, Episode 14
Airdate	March 27, 2021
Written by	Erik Mountain & Jim Barnes
Directed by	Marcus Stokes
Stream
← 11x13 Warlords	11x15 → Trust
The Walking Dead — Season Eleven

The Rotten Core is the fourteenth episode of the eleventh season of The Walking Dead, and the one hundred sixty-seventh episode overall.

Starring: Norman Reedus (Daryl Dixon), Melissa McBride (Carol Peletier), Lauren Cohan (Maggie Rhee), Christian Serratos (Rosita Espinosa), Josh McDermitt (Eugene Porter) (credit only), Seth Gilliam (Gabriel Stokes), Ross Marquand (Aaron), Khary Payton (Ezekiel) (credit only), Cooper Andrews (Jerry) (credit only)

and Jeffrey Dean Morgan (Negan)

Also Starring: Eleanor Matsuura (Yumiko Okumura) (credit only), Nadia Hilker (Magna) (credit only), Cailey Fleming (Judith Grimes) (credit only), Cassady McClincy (Lydia), Lauren Ridloff (Connie) (credit only), Paola Lázaro (Princess) (credit only), Michael James Shaw (Mercer), Lynn Collins (Leah Shaw), Josh Hamilton (Lance Hornsby), Margot Bingham (Max) (credit only), Laila Robins (Pamela Milton) (credit only), Jason Butler Harner (Toby Carlson), Medina Senghore (Annie), Wynn Everett (April), Okea Eme-Akwari (Elijah), Teo Rapp-Olsson (Sebastian Milton)

Co-Starring: Kien Michael Spiller (Hershel Rhee), Courtney Dietz (Kayla), Michael Hanson (Trooper Jake Daniels), Braian Rivera Jimenez (Green), Henry Bazemore Jr. (Sgt. Crowe), Camry Rose Brault (Shipment Trooper) Monique Grant (Colonel Vickers), J.R. Adduci (Alves)

Uncredited: Jason Fernandes (Livits)

Plot Overview

Maggie has to put her feelings regarding Negan aside to help he and the others protect Riverbend.

Daryl and Rosita are given a very dangerous task by Milton's son.

Arc Advancement

Happenings

• Maggie's forces help take out the soldiers and Toby is killed. Gabriel and Aaron don't trust the Commonwealth, but have to return because Hornsby will want to know what happened. They also fear he will come back for Riverbend.

• It's revealed that Leah was the one who hijacked the convoy and took the guns.

• Sebastian has Daryl and Rosita get money from a panic room in a house outside the walls. They learn there were others before. Mercer kills the two troopers who helped and Carol learns Hornsby selected the others based on their debt.

Characters

• Not only is Negan married to Annie, but she is about 12 weeks pregnant with his child. She explains to Maggie that he told her everything he did, but she has also done terrible things and is also trying to be a better person.

• Hershel learns that Negan is the man who killed his father. Negan talks him out of shooting him and promises that they'll deal with it when he's older.

Trivia

The Show

• This episode shares its name with Volume 31 of the graphic novels.

Memorable Moments

• Toby's defeat that sees him get shot multiple times and off the roof, only to survive, but helpless as the now dead he threw off earlier stir awake and begin tearing into him.

Quotes

• Aaron: You being here fits. You have a hand in putting any of those skulls on Ian's shelf?

Negan: Says the guy that rolled up with the Gestapo.

Gabriel: We didn't know. The place we're living now is different from any place we've ever seen.

Lydia: No, it isn't. I hoped that they might be, but... they just want to swallow up other communities. They're like the Whisperers. They just wear different masks.

• Annie: He's in good hands.

Maggie: He's in the hands of the man who killed his father.

Annie: I know who he is. And what he did. He told me.

Maggie: And you're still with him?

Annie: None of us have clean hands. I've seen what people will do to each other to survive. Sometimes, it was done to me. Other times, I did it to them. I'm not proud of it, but it happened. All I can do now is try to be better. Just like him.

Maggie: He doesn't get to forget.

Annie: He hasn't. What matters to me is who he is now. He's someone who'll do whatever he can to protect your boy.

• Negan: (to Hershel) You and I, we have some unfinished business, don't we? I tell you what. You go back with your mom. Help her rebuild your home. And in a few years, when you've grown up a bit... come find me. And I promise you, we will settle it.