"Carol hesitated while holding Paula at gunpoint, and got close enough for Paula to knock the pistol away. Lazy writing, IMO."
I disagree. I thought it was absolutely brilliant.
Carol was mesmerized by Paula, and to a degree, Paula was mesmerized by Carol.
The whole episode was about Carol and Paula seeing themselves in each other -- Paula seeing herself in the past, and Carol seeing herself in the future. In essence, Carol and Paula are the same person. Carol is still keeping count of how many humans she's killed, but you can see at points she's really wondering if it matters; Paula says she stopped counting at double digits.
Both lost their children, and both, in ways, killed men to whom they were intimately attached, Paula her boss, Carol her husband.
Carol's been struggling with what she is the last couple of episodes. She was hard, and getting harder, until Morgan showed up. While she disagrees with him, I think she's been affected by his "all life is precious" mantra. That still doesn't keep her from killing, but she's questioning it more and more.
That final dialog between Carol and Paula is all of that in spades, and Carol couldn't break free of that until she was forced to.
I think we're going to see more of Carol's search for self in the coming episodes, and I wouldn't be surprised if she falls more under Morgan's spell.
I was really hoping, though, that Paula would have just turned and ran and escaped. I would have loved to have seen the dance between Paula and Carol play out over a longer period of time.
