That about sums it up about the writing this season. They were so invested in getting us to this point in the story to introduce Negan, that they didn't really think about remaining authentic to what they had written already. Carol had gone full circle really, but her reasoning for leaving makes no sense. The moment you leave the safety of walls, the chance that you'll have to kill only goes up. So what, she's okay killing to keep herself alive, but not her friends? I don't see the difference really. Then you have Daryl completely reverting 3 or so seasons of progress and going lone wolf emo. And don't even get me started on Morgan, that character has been nonsensical for most of the season to me, seemingly only existing as a foil to Rick's ruthlessness for a couple scenes this half of the season. His whole bullshit about Carl being alive because he left that one Wolf live is utter nonsense and the definition of confirmation bias. That wolf seemed to lead the attack on Alexandria and it's only after he kidnapped Denise that he "saved" her. How does it make any sense that without his involvement with her that she would have been in the same predicament that she was?
Not really sure why they went this route instead of having the Saviors attack Alexandria like in the comics. It doesn't even really make sense that they wouldn't retaliate after their attack on their compound. They were already aware that Alexandria existed. But instead we had a couple painful episodes with people acting completely idiotic in order to get to the conclusion.