Adaptational Early Appearance: In Michonne’s hallucination, Laura and DJ appear far earlier than in the Prime timeline due to Michonne joining the Saviors.
Thanks to her hallucinations, Michonne relives various moments from the series.
Siddiq was killed by Dante while Michonne was away to Oceanside in “Open Your Eyes”.
The Cameo: Various characters appear in Michonne's hallucinations, even ones long dead, such as Andrea, Sasha, Abraham, Glenn and Carl. Still living characters like Rick, Daryl and Negan also appear. The injured man Michonne rescues at the end is played by King Bach.
Michonne experiences a drug-induced hallucination of what her life would’ve been had she not rescued Andrea in Season 2’s “Beside the Dying Fire”.
In Season 3’s “Clear”, she is the one wearing the orange backpack who was not rescued by Rick, Carl, and Daryl (who takes her place in the party). She gets to survive, unlike the unnamed survivor.
This Michonne later makes it to the east coast where she is rescued and brought into the Saviors by Negan, Laura, and DJ. Savior Michonne is eventually promoted to become Negan’s second-in-command, and manages to survive the attack on the satellite outpost in Season 6’s “Not Tomorrow Yet”, where she kills Glenn and Heath.
She is later present at the infamous Negan lineup in “Last Day on Earth” and Season 7’s “The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be”, where Negan gives her the honor of choosing a victim.
Finally, she imagines herself being killed by Rick and Daryl during the Savior War that took place throughout Season 8.
Michonne’s alternate history is similar to what happened to Atlanta camp founding survivor Morales, who as revealed in Season 8’s “The Damned” and “Monsters”, left Atlanta, and fell in with the Saviors after being rescued by them, only to run afoul of Rick’s group. Unlike Morales, however, Michonne rises in the ranks to become Negan’s second-in-command.
Rick of course disappeared in Season 9’s “What Comes After”. In “Who Are You Now” and “Scars”, both Daryl and Michonne expressed suspicions about Rick’s true fate given they never found his body.
Dead Person Conversation: During her trips, Michonne hallucinates that the recently killed Siddiq is cursing her for his death at Dante’s hands.
A Death in the Limelight: Or rather A Departure in the Limelight. The episode revolves entirely around Michonne who gets written out at the end because Danai Gurira wanted to leave the show.
Death by Adaptation: In Michonne’s hallucination, Andrea is eaten by walkers during the events of the season 2 finale, whereas her prime counterpart died in the season 3 finale. As a Savior, she later kills Glenn and Heath; the former didn’t die until the season 7 premiere, whereas Heath is still missing. Laura is also killed by Glenn during the raid on the satellite outpost, many years before her murder at Beta’s hands. And of course, Michonne’s Savior counterpart dies in the Savior War.
Devoured by the Horde: Hallucination Michonne returns to find Andrea having been eaten to the point of now being a bloody skeleton at the most.
The Dog Bites Back: Virgil's prisoners are at first resigned to keeping quiet, stating that resisting makes him more angry. When Michonne breaks them out, they are absolutely ready to kill him for how they were treated.
The Dragon: In her hallucination, Michonne eventually became Negan’s right-hand woman, supplanting even Simon.
Dramatic Irony: Michonne imagines Laura being killed by Glenn in her sleep during the satellite outpost attack, unaware that back home, Laura has likely already been killed by Beta.
The hallucinations emphasize that in choosing to save Andrea, Michonne ultimately recovered from her catatonic state and became a good person again. She joined the Atlanta group, found the love of her life and a new family, and helped build the foundation of what may be a true shot at restoring civilization to the world - all because she decided to save a stranger at the last second.
It also goes the other way for Rick’s group in both the hallucinated timeline and the main one. In the hallucinated timeline, Rick, Daryl, and Carl refuse to help the hitchhiking Michonne and coldly leave her behind, only for her to end up on the east coast, joining the Saviors, killing Glenn, Heath, and someone else during the Negan lineup and participating in traumatizing the group for life. In the main timeline, Rick taking in Michonne led to rescuing Glenn and Maggie from being tortured to death by The Governor, finding the second love of his life, and the communities having the strong leader that Michonne eventually became, and so on and so forth.
Honorary Uncle: Rosita is briefly mentioned as “Tia Rosita”, confirming she is also considered extended family to the Grimes children.
Hope Spot: After years of believing Rick was dead, Michonne finally learns that he may still be alive.
Internal Reveal: Michonne finds evidence which suggests Rick survived the destruction of the bridge, something the audience was already aware of.
I Shall Return: This episode sees Michonne leaving the show in order to search for Rick. She promises Judith that she will try and bring him back.
I Will Find You: After discovering Rick’s survival, Michonne decided to go and find him.
Kick the Dog: Michonne’s hallucination of herself allows Andrea to be devoured by walkers. Later, Michonne returns and simply loots her remains for supplies. She even cleans Andrea’s knife on her corpse.
Mushroom Samba: Virgil gives Michonne tea spiked with some kind of drug that gives her hallucinations. Apparently he does the same, enjoying some rather pleasant drug trips. Michonne's trip is much darker.
Posthumous Character: Deceased characters Andrea, Siddiq, Laura, DJ, Glenn, Abraham, Carl, Sasha, and Simon appear in Michonne’s hallucinations. Among them, only Laura and DJ appear via newly shot footage. The rest appear in stock footage spliced with the newly shot footage of Michonne, Negan, Laura, and DJ.
Put on a Bus: Michonne decides to not return to Alexandria, but instead start searching for Rick, leaving it unknown if or when she will return. Ironically this even is a direct result of Rick himself being Put on a Bus last season. Also like Rick's departure, this is case of Adaptation Deviation, as Michonne stayed with the main group for the entirety of the comic series.
Sequel Episode: In some ways to season nine's "What Comes After". It focuses on a main character having hallucination induced flashbacks, cameos of characters who left the show, and said main character leaving the series. It also contains some hints regarding Rick's fate after that episode.
Sequel Hook: The end of the episode was designed to set up a planned trilogy of movies that were to tell Rick’s story after being spirited away in the helicopter by Anne as Michonne sets out to find him. The movies were eventually reworked into a TV series.
Survivor Guilt: Michonne’s hallucinations of Siddiq and DJ make it clear that she still blames herself for their deaths at the hands of the Whisperers. It is all but said that this applies to the hitchhiker she hallucinated herself taking the place of, since in the main timeline she was complicit in leaving the man to die.
What Could Have Been: In universe example. While drugged, Michonne hallucinates how her time in the series might have gone differently had she not stepped in to save Andrea during her introduction. She imagines that she would have ended up working with the Saviors, killing Glenn and Heath in the first attack, using Lucille instead of Negan in the "Eeney, meenie, miney, moe" segment, before finally being killed by Rick and Daryl during the war.
