Dawn Lerner is the Most Despicable Villain in The Walking Dead

Dawn Lerner was introduced in season 5 of The Walking Dead, when Beth Greene was kidnapped by her own people, believing that Beth needed to be saved and brought to their refuge, Grady Memorial hospital.

This wasn't exactly a refuge...because Dawn and her people expected favors to be done for them, after saving their lives...and they would do anything they wanted with the people they saved.

I believed that Dawn went crazy over time, due to her status as a police officer. There is a quick scene of Dawn looking at a photo of herself and an older man in a police uniform, and my theory is that this man was Dawn's father, and maybe her new role as leader made her go insane. Perhaps her father died, and she felt that she could not carry that same mantle as he once did, being a strong protector for people that needed saving, but instead, Dawn allowed evil to come to the people they were saving.

The police force that was running the show in the hospital all appeared to thrive on power, like Dawn did, physically assaulting Beth whenever she felt like it. Beth even confronted Dawn about another police officer that she was forced to kill, after he attempted to harm her. Dawn literally slapped her across the face in response, merely excusing what this man was planning to do to Beth.

These terrifying favors were expected from the people they saved, and if they didn't bother to please the officers with what was demanded of them, they would kill or harm their victims.

Dawn even mentioned a past attack on a woman that her people had saved, to a police officer that she decided to put down...for the hell of it, even though there were multiple other officers that had committed these same kinds of crimes. I felt that Dawn was a selective villain, only choosing to kill some of her own people as punishment, but she wanted to keep allowing this corruption, because of the large numbers she had for the 'safety' of her people.

Then when the moment of giving up Carol, Noah, and Beth to Rick's group was going to go down, she ruins the deal by asking for Noah. I think she did this to be petty in her own way, to get back at Beth and Carol for daring to leave her so called sanctuary.

Her power complex was unbelievably stupid, and I was 100% down for her death when she accidentally killed Beth. Daryl executing Dawn was so damn satisfying, because I think she died in fear, knowing that the one thing she couldn't control led to her own demise.

Beth knew that she was going to possibly die, but she wanted to break Dawn's stupid rule, and it literally blew up in her face.

I remember after watching this episode, I was so pissed off. I felt that the hospital really didn't get the karma that they all deserved, (minus the victims staying in their domain), and I really wanted all of them to get killed in some way. Sure enough, the writers of the show did confirm that due to their poor leadership, the officers running the show were all going to perish, including the patients that were staying there.

I was so upset that their victims had died, but they were prisoners that were stuck in an unfortunate environment that consisted of really evil people ruling the hospital.

It was even more sad that Rick offered the people staying there to leave with him, to have a fighting chance, but I think they were too afraid of possibly leaving, with a group that could potentially be worse. The fact that they were willing to stay in an environment where they were enduring torture at the hands of the people that rescued them was downright tragic. A hero was standing right there with them, but their fear of leaving their 'refuge' was more terrifying than what they going through behind the scenes.

Dawn Lerner is the reason why her rule went to shit, and I'm so glad she died at the hands of Daryl.

Thank you for reading!

Emy Quinn