i was not a fan of the finale.....i feel like this season was essentially wasted.
they build the whole season around a confrontation between prison and woodburry/rick and governor.....they went as far as to have a meeting to discuss things and post that meeting both said "we're going to war" to have the war be something so small and not culminate in the death of one of the two principal characters was a horrible payoff for the finale.
Andrea dying sucked and was a well done scene, but i almost feel like her death didn't mean anything. What did she die for?
Basically this whole season's impact was a close to the merle story, close to lori's character, and andrea's idiocy leading to her death. To me that is not a whole lot of story development for a whole season of shows.
I agree with you in a lot of ways but those characters departing from the show was quite cathartic. Andrea and Merle were way too embroiled with the storyline to truly allow a "new" season/start. Also, if there was such a thing as a karmic balance Andrea did die for her stupidity but on some levels I think her death was another nail in the coffin of morality, especially when we watch Carl straight shoot that kid in the face.
I'll definitely give you that there wasn't a whole lot of development this season but with a new approach for the group and a "human" element to the dangers they face will make things very interesting. I think, and hope, that we'll be seeing a but more of season 1 type behavior or at least a little more of a biologically investigative approach as to what the fuck this thing actually is. Personally that's always something that had been lacking for me but anyway...
Edit: a couple things I found pretty funny:
http://www.buzzfeed.com/daves4/undeniable-proof-that-the-walking-dead-and-toy-story-have-th
http://www.buzzfeed.com/mjs538/things-youll-only-find-funny-if-you-watch-the-walking-dead