I think this season has been okay, but they’re forcing bad things to happen for the sake of having bad things happen.
Gabriel gets trapped with Negan for no reason. People start dying at the bottom of Rick’s outpost even though the defenders were being attacked by zombies and those same defenders couldn’t win when they were fighting without undead besiegers. People with Jesus and Morgan forget how to shoot at exactly the wrong time. Kingdom people get wiped out when they’re celebrating in a wide open field.
Like honesty, you don’t expect to win every battle in a war but the writing is forcing adversity in an unusual and unrealistic way.