"Judge, Jury, Executioner" is the eleventh episode of the second season of the post-apocalyptic horror television series The Walking Dead.

In this episode, Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) and his group opt to execute Randall (Michael Zegen), much to the frustration of Dale Horvath (Jeffrey DeMunn).

Meanwhile, Carl Grimes (Chandler Riggs) behaves recklessly and carelessly, going as far as to steal Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus)'s gun and harass a walker, which will ultimately initiate grave consequences for the group.

Dale finds most of the group agree with Rick's decision, and attempts to change their minds by appealing to their humanity, civilization and morality.

The walker suddenly frees one of its legs and lurches forward; Carl panics and drops the gun before running back to camp, not telling anyone what happened.

[2] As part of a promotional campaign, cast member Norman Reedus participated in a live chat on Entertainment Weekly coinciding with the airing of "Judge, Jury, Executioner".

Jeffrey DeMunn was "furious" about the firing of longtime friend Frank Darabont, who developed and previously acted as showrunner for the series, and asked to be let go from the show.

[2] Kirkman proclaimed that Dale's death was a momentous occasion, ultimately marking a turning point for future development of The Walking Dead.

"[1] In "Judge, Jury, Executioner", Carl evolves into a desensitized character and ultimately relinquishes his naïveté to the world around him.

Although Entertainment Weekly writer Clark Collis drew parallels to a serial killer, Kirkman suggested this was an initiative to give more screen time to the character.

But to have barely even really recognized what the world is and how it works and what to expect and then to be thrust into this apocalyptic threat and to grow up and mature with these kinds of situations.

It became the highest-rated cable telecast of the day, attaining significantly higher ratings than that of Storage Wars on A&E Television and Real Housewives of Atlanta on Bravo.

Mark A. Perigard of the Boston Herald called it an "incredible episode"; "Walking Dead again proves it is one of the best dramas on TV and almost makes me feel good about paying my cable bill.

"[8] Writing for the San Antonio Express-News, Rene Guzman opined that it "delivers all that messy drama in spades with a true gut-wrenching end to one of the series’ core characters".

[9] Wetpaint's Molly Friedman stated that in "Judge, Jury, Executioner", the audience "finally had a reason to shed some tears and remember just how much we care about the original gang of apocalyptic misfits".

Online journalist Tierney Bricker concluded that the episode managed to effectively surprise the audience,[11][12] while Cyriaque Lamar of io9 declared that "Judge, Jury, Executioner" was inferior to its predecessor by writing that it "served up a bunch of quasi-entertaining scenes of people arguing and capped them off with one of the most accidentally funny closers ever committed to basic cable".

[14] Josh Jackson of Paste was intrigued with the series' exploration of morality during an apocalyptic event in "Judge, Jury, Executioner".

Dale, unlike any of the other survivors, maintained his humanity to the very end of his waking life—but even he couldn't choose not to come back as something amoral and inhuman.

"[17] Gina McIntyre of Los Angeles Times echoed synonymous thoughts: "It's left to Daryl to shoot the man to end his suffering, which is profoundly too bad.

"[18] Handlen and Calgary Herald's Kimberly Potts thought that it was among the shocking moments in the series,[14][19] while Friedman expressed that she was "riveted by the awesome attack [...] and filled with sadness, as the original gang watched their friend die a slow and painful death".

"[14] Verne Gay of Newsday described the sequence as "violent", and ultimately summated that DeMunn's absence will be felt as the show progresses.

Dale's redeeming quality was his ability to guilt everybody into paying lip service to rule of law; his weakness was his naïveté.

"[13] Time journalist Nate Rawlings drew allusions from Dale's attack to the episode title, commenting that "when the lone zombie we see in this episode tears open Dale’s stomach, spilling the contents of his body onto the cold ground, we’re reminded that the walkers are the judges, they’re the jury, and this particular one was a most brutal executioner.

[16] Handlen felt that the character development of Carl Grimes was more stable than similar developments in the episode; "Using Carl to both resolve the episode’s plot, and making him semi-responsible for Dale’s death, has a satisfying neatness, and serves as a reminder that for all their talk, Rick and the group have no idea what impact their choices will make.

[22] Jackson concluded that it was one of the episode highlights, writing, "He awakened from his coma talking about the beautiful doe, but ever since the dead body of Sophia limped its way out of that barn door, he's become colder and harder.

"[15] Jackson commented on Carl's reaction to the death of Dale, saying that despite a gradual change to a dark nature, he "realizes [...] that he's still very much a kid".