Cliff Curtis' character showed his true colours in last night's season finale of Fear the Walking Dead, writes Chris Schulz. (This review may contain spoilers).
Is that Cliff Curtis with a shotgun? Did Cliff just pummel a soldier to death with his fists? Is he just going to stand there and watch his girlfriend shoot his ex-wife in the face on the top of a, er, cliff? Our Cliff?
Yes, all those things happened tothe Kiwi actor's character in last night's season finale of Fear the Walking Dead, a six-episode spin-off from The Walking Dead that has quickly become something for zombie fans to get bloody excited about.
It's something for Kiwis to get excited about too. Curtis, a fantastic actor at home (see The Dark Horse) but whose talents have so far been wasted in the US (don't see Trauma), is battling zombies with his bare hands on a top-rating TV show that's already broken the record for the most-watched cable debut in US history.
Cliff Curtis as Travis Manawa in class during Fear the Walking Dead's first episode.
Millions are watching because of the success of its predecessor, which has stuttured along until realising its best bits focus on humanity enforcer Rick Grimes and his downward spiral into, well, we're yet to see.
We might find out next week when The Walking Dead returns for its sixth season.
But Curtis' Travis Manawa, a gentle father figure and classroom do-gooder with soft eyes and incredible eyebrows, had, until last night, shown little potential to go full Grimes.
Fear the Walking Dead's stop-start middle episodes that focused on a section of Los Angeles under military law made much of Manawa's worried pout, expressed when he was concerned about his family, worried about his neighbours, and watching someone holed up in a bunker flash a torch for help that never came.
That changed last night as Manawa, his family, and several hangers-on learned of military plans to blitzkrieg their suburban prison and everyone - zombie or not - in it. Their response was to escape, unleash an entire stadium of zombies, and storm a military stronghold in search of some missing members of their entourage.
That meant Manawa was finally forced to get blood on his hands. And it was glorious.
By the third episode, Travis is accustomed to taking on zombies.
First came the military hospital break-in, which saw Manawa toting surely the largest shotgun ever brandished by a Kiwi on US TV. Then came the brutal punishment he dished out to a soldier, who had been tortured for information then let free, only to return seeking revenge. That pummelling showed Manawa has plenty of rage buried underneath his soft exterior.
Finally, the episode ended with Manawa's family holed up with weirdo trickster Victor Strand in a clifftop mansion. It seemed to be a safehaven to the zombie madness outside until Manawa stumbled upon his gun-toting girlfriend Madison - how good is Kim Dickens? - preparing to shoot his ex-wife in the face after she got a bit of a zombie bite.
Travis Manawa trying, but refusing, to take a zombie pot shot in the middle of The Walking Dead's first season.
Afterwards, as Manawa collapsed into the ocean, pouting one last time, with a hint of stubble finally appearing on his face, the hauntingly ethereal song Kettering by Brooklyn indie band The Antlers played in the background.
That track is from an album called Hospice, a beautiful but depressing record charting the demise of a terminal bone cancer patient.
A song about the slow onset of death was surely the perfect ending to an occasionally unperfect season charting the beginnings of a zombie apocalypse - and a great soundtrack for Curtis' transformation into a zombie-hating hero of prime time.
* What did you think of Fear the Walking Dead's first season? Post your comments below.
