Maybe they are trying to show Merle as a changed man? I think he is starting to see just how much he has been in the wrong. I think the change may still be in the very beggining process of a long road though.

 

Not so much a changed man but a more complex one. IMO.

 

Agreed he's still the same guy from the rooftop he's just got another personality over the top of that.

 

Merle is showing an inkling of change but he also needs the group and doesn't want to lose Daryl again. Merle is about Merle.

 

To piggy back on all of these, complex, changed, another personality, maybe even misunderstood? By no means am I thinking Merle is being misunderstood as an ass, he is a total ass... but as we saw last week, Daryl and Merle were physically abused as children. The look on Merle's face when he finally realized that their father beat Daryl too, it was an expression I had not yet seen from him. The closest I have seen would be back at Woodbury when Andrea showed up and they "bonded" over lost siblings... He seemed very genuine back then while searching for Daryl.

IMO--- He is definitely capable of being more than just a bad ass survivalist only looking out for himself and Daryl. Although it's possible he will never realize his full potential... until it's too late... BUM BUM BUM

 

It's not that out of place for a guy in the South to know the Bible frontwards and backwards despite not having a lot of education.

 

It was weird to see how Merle knows some part of the Bible. Unexpected from him. But probably they didn't wanted to show him only as a bad guy. He's still the same he was before, but maybe now he has opened his eyes in the prison and sees his brother as a different man in this group. He tries to help and talk with other people. The part where he said that he misses the library in Woodbury was a pretty much funny part, just as I've expected something like that from him.

 

I was just surprised he could read.

Just kidding. I feel like there's more to Merle than we've seen so far.

 

I'm trying to not look too hard into this, but he definitely must've learned the Bible before the outbreak. I mean, its hard to think he read it a couple times at Woodbury and it allowed him to memorize the entire thing. I've read many books many times and couldn't recite a random line word for word. I know the Bible is not just another book, but there has to be some deep background with Merle and the Bible. Maybe when he ran from home he joined a monastery (obviously didn't work out {the clap comment}), maybe he was taken in by a religious family, or maybe his parents were devout Christians who felt the were doing the right thing by punishing their children? It isn't an impossibility by any means. Hmmmmm

 

Mom was a drunk and dad was an abusive drunk. Maybe he read the Bible during his stints in juvie/jail? He probably was movitated to read about a lost hand.
Merle is more complex than the ranting racist we first met, he did risk the Governor's wrath in his search for Daryl. Still, don't trust Merle, there was something prophetic in Rick telling Daryl that Merle's action were on him (Daryl).

 

agreed. I was much more surprised that he liked Woodbury's *library* than by the fact he was versed in the New Testament.

 

Yes, I know people who were raised by evangelical Christians who can quote chapter and verse of the bible, even though that sort of thing is pretty rare in Australia.

 

Honestly I think that whole Bible thing was thrown in to validate the title of the episode. Nothing more, nothing less. Hitler read the bible. Doesn't make him any less a monster.

 

In prison, reading is pretty much the only escape. It's a sticky habit. And memorizing Bible verses is a good way of sucking up to those in authority. That verse was one of the ones that really get authoritarian types going.

His character isn't any more complex now. It's just that he's in a much more vulnerable position.

And his conversation with Michonne was not about apology - it was about power and control. It was about him being able to say, in the future during some public conflict with her - that he tried to make nice. If he actually wanted to make a meaningful apology to her, he would do so with actions, not words.