I've discussed this with my household the other day, actually.

We were split between this idea, that Rick outsmarted Gareth and was counting on him watching them, and used Gareth's sneakiness to his own advantage, and time being compressed on-screen - so, Rick and company arriving at the school, realising they'd fallen for a trap, and hurrying back. This would have taken approximately 15-20 minutes for them to get to the school and back, but compressed into the 3-4 minutes of screen time after they left the church.

You'd think that if time were compressed, we would have seen Rick arriving at the school, finding it empty, realising that they'd been tricked and hurrying back. But because we never saw this happen, I'm inclined to believe that Rick had it planned out all along.

He knew they'd been watching them for days, ever since Daryl first noticed somebody watching them in "Strangers." He knew they'd been out there, waiting for someone to slip up when Bob was taken. And he knew that they were still there when Bob was delivered back to them. He knew that Gareth was toying with them, thinking that he had them scared and trapped, and that they were in the church beginning to divide and turn against each other, just as Rick and Abraham (and Sasha and Gabriel) actually were.

So, Rick got himself one step ahead of Gareth. Turned the tables. Made Gareth feel like he had the upper hand, with all of the strongest members of the group on a wild goose chase. Only, Gareth underestimated Rick's ability to think ahead.

 

I think that was his plan from the beginning (turning back) similar to how they handled one of the woodbury attacks at the prison, when they pretended they all left the prison to catch them off guard

 

Yup. You are 100% correct on your theory as [MENTION=5424]BatmansHooker[/MENTION] agrees.

 

I know, right?! I was thinking, well hollering at the tv actually, "Where the hell are they all going? Everyone with a gun but Carl?! They know the Termites are outside watching!" As soon as the blood splattered I realized they had doubled back, and were in the church watching nearly the whole time. I was so happy. Heh...they didn't want to waste the bullets. So f***ing cool.

 

Yeah it was my assumption they went into the woods and just watched and waited to see if Gareth turned up.. knowing that there was a high probability they were being watched and were counting on them leaving a smaller number of them defenseless and without the toughest.

I had actually thought Gareth's screw might just set the church on fire, trying to burn the remainder alive, and draw them out that way. But It didn't go how I thought it would.

I do have to wonder more what Gareths plan was... Go into the church with the toughest gone/out of the way. Break in, shoot Carl, Father, Eugene, Rosita etc ?

Wait for Team Rick to come back, and kill them, too?

Hmm...

 

I thought they would be doubling back, but they made me nervous waiting so long to start taking the hunters down!

 

Maybe he was going to kill Carl, Gabe, Tyreese, Eugene and Rosita. Just leave their bodies there for Rick to come back to. Another scare tactic, a show of intimidation, a taunt. It'd send quite a message. "I'm smarter than you, Rick. I had everything planned out, and you fell for it. They're all dead because you fell for my trap."

It was an attack this time, after all. They weren't going in there to bring a meal home with them. The attack on the church was more revenge driven, I think.

Just too bad for Gareth that he was too cocky for his own good.

 

I think Gareth would have eaten Rosita first. And not her leg.

 

I thought there was a very telling sign, actually: everyone in that room looked way too calm when they heard Gareth and his crew come in. Especially since Judith was with them. Gabriel's reaction clinched it for me - he wasn't projectile vomiting.

 

Yes, think it was a rather daring plan by Rick though - all credit to him. To walk out the church and down the lane risking ambush - assuming the Termites would leave them alone and go for the "weaker" ones left in the church...well done Rick!!

I agree with Cheesy though that Gareth got a bit too cocky - after all, there were only 5 or 6 of them (including a couple of wimpish ones) against Rick's 10 or 12 with some hardcore zombie apocalypse survivors amongst them. Think Gareth should have picked them off one by one...

 

I thought they were going to capture and eat them, hence why they wanted them to come out of the office.

Would have been easier to light the church on fire and shoot anyone who came out if they just wanted to kill them, but then I guess that would be betting on the hunters like their meat well done.

 

Yes.

 

The reason that I don't think they were going to eat Carl, Rosita, Eugene, Gabriel, Tyreese and Judith is that there's simply too many of them. When they had a functional, organised community in Terminus, that many people wouldn't have been a big deal to them, but being out in the open, how would they keep so many people captive? It'd take a lot of rope, a lot of guarding, chances are they'd fight back, too.

I think Gareth just wanted to leave some bullet riddled corpses for Rick to find and watch him suffer the same way he suffered by losing Terminus, and his brother and mother.

 

Gareth fell into the classic comic evil mastermind pitfall - instead of just shooting everyone, he decided to instead take the time to gloat and explain his evil pan.

 

Could be, I just figured they capture them and then once under control execute whomever they wanted at that point and take however many they wanted with them. Don't forget Gareth likes to give long speaches. He's got to capture you so he can stand around blabbering. What did he tell Bob? "He I'm trying to be human to you, I'm talking to you" what a gem.

 

The only negative with the plan is that to be safe they would've gunned down Gareth and crew as they approached the church. Once they got inside if those initials shots had gone astray then someone in the back room could've gotten shot.

But on the flipside, the irony is that Gareth was lured into a trap the same way Rick's group was, and once he was inside the church there was no escape for him. Outside someone could've gotten away. So it was a calculated risk. You just need to make your shots hit their mark as they did. Great scene.

 

He didn't "fall into" it. Excessive monologuing/talking has been one of Gareth's more annoying qualities since the beginning of the season. The others didn't get killed at the trough because he decided to stop and talk to them first. He was asking about the bag Rick buried but if he'd just killed them all right then, he still would have had all the time in the world to look for that bag. The entire time they had Bob, he never stopped monologuing at him. Even as Rick was about to kill him, he was still talking. He's had more lines since the premiere than most of the main cast.

 

Since the forum has concluded that it was Rick aka Mr. I'll-shoot-Gareth's-fingers-off-from-20-feet-away-in-the-dark-no-biggie who took those first shots, those shots probably had about as low a miss percentage as you could get in this show. A show full of characters who seem to have a hard time missing headshots.