Is the walking dead over for good

Is the walking dead over for good

Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) and Greg Nicotero - The Walking Dead, Season 1 - Photo Credit: Scott Garfield/AMC

The Walking Dead will air its final episode ever on November 20, 2022, and marks a sad time for TWD fandom. This series that began in October 2010 has created a universe more significant than anyone could have imagined. The first season is iconic for many reasons and it set the bar for any other ZA series to try and reach.

Many fans in TWD Family will agree that seasons 1-3 are some of the best of the series. The early episodes were outstanding as characters were introduced, and the type of zombies for this series was revealed. These early episodes didn’t see the characters venture very far from Atlanta and had a smaller pool of characters to keep track of. As the series continued, storylines were overwhelmed with more characters making it seem less intimate.

The Walking Dead season 1

The first season of The Walking Dead introduces all of the main characters, several of which had been featured in comic books. Readers of the comic story enjoyed seeing the familiar characters portrayed on the screen.

Is the walking dead over for good

Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) – The Walking Dead – Season 2, Episode 1 – Photo Credit Gene Page/AMC – TWD_201_0616_3558

The first scene sets up the tone for the entire series. Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) comes to a gas station that has long been abandoned with signs stating there was no gas at this station. He hears a sound and discovers a walker, the term used for the undead, and not just any walker but a child. The look on his face is devastating as he realizes he will have to put her down. To make the first kill of the series, a child showed viewers that this was more than just a typical zombie show.

To answer whether or not season 1 of The Walking Dead is good, the answer would be yes. It begins as a unique take on the zombie genre that focuses on survival rather than only destruction. If you talk to die-hard fans, they will admit the series has had its highs and lows, but overall this is a very good series.

The other aspect of The Walking Dead is that when it comes down to it, the undead isn’t the real threat. Humans will always be worse than any of the walkers encountered by the survivors. Over the course of the series, the significant threats have been the villainous humans and their desire to watch the world burn.

The first season consisted of six episodes: 

Plot 101 “Days Gone Bye”
102 “Guts”
103 “Tell It to the Frogs”
104 “Vatos”
105 “Wildfire”
106 “TS-19”

The first season is a quick binge with only six episodes and sets up the characters in the original Atlanta group. Of that group, only three have survived, Rick, Daryl and Carol, with only Daryl and Carol still on the series in season 11.

Is the walking dead over for good

(L-R) Shane Walsh (Jon Bernthal), Dale (Jeffrey DeMunn), Lori Grimes (Sarah Wayne Callies), Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln), T-Dog (Robert ‘IronE’ Singleton), Carl Grimes (Chandler Riggs), Andrea (Laurie Holden), Glenn (Steven Yeun), Sophia (Madison Lintz), Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus), Carol (Melissa Suzanne McBride), Jacqui (Jeryl Prescott) and Dr. Edwin Jenner (Noah Emmerich)

Follow Undead Walking on Twitter and sign up for the once-daily Undead Walking newsletter to avoid missing out on all things in The Walking Dead universe.

Fans were rocked by the news that The Walking Dead would be coming to an end after Season 11, but it turns out it wasn’t just the audience that was surprised by this development — it was the show’s creators and showrunner as well. Last September, AMC announced that Season 11 would be The Walking Dead's final season, announcing at the same time that a spinoff focused on fan-favorite characters Daryl (Norman Reedus) and Carol (Melissa McBride) would debut in 2023 to keep the TWD story going in a different direction. But in a new interview with Collider, The Walking Dead cast member Jeffrey Dean Morgan revealed that the flagship show’s conclusion was news to The Walking Dead chief content officer Scott M. Gimple and showrunner Angela Kang, suggesting the series was originally supposed to run into Season 12 and beyond.

Collider’s own Christina Radish spoke to Morgan as part of the press day for his new film The Unholy, and during their interview the actor discussed being surprised by the news that The Walking Dead Season 11 would be the show’s last.

“The news, when we got it in the middle of the pandemic, was a complete surprise, not only to me and the rest of the actors, but to everybody involved in the show from production. Scott Gimple and Angela Kang had no idea either. It came from nowhere and there was such a huge pivot. I think they had Season 11 all mapped out, where they were going to go, and suddenly it became, ‘We also have to close the story, in a way.’ It took everybody by surprise, so it was a massive pivot. And then, they threw in the six tacked-on episodes to Season 10, and instead of doing 16, we’re going to do 24 more. There was a lot of stuff to wrap our heads around.”

The Walking Dead Season 11 Jeffrey Dean MorganImage via AMC

When AMC announced that Season 11 of The Walking Dead would be the end, the network also added eight additional episodes to the season order to expand the storytelling runway for Gimple and Kang, bringing Season 11 to 24 episodes in total. Still, it’s interesting to hear that the show’s conclusion wasn’t 100 percent on Gimple and Kang’s terms, and in a way, it sounds like The Walking Dead was essentially cancelled.

At one point in time, the series was the most-watched show on television. But ratings began to decline around the time of Steven Yeun’s exit, and as the popularity of streaming grew, the numbers continued to dwindle — although at the same time, the way people watched the show evolved, and same-day ratings for a Sunday broadcast became less important.

AMC has also already announced big franchise expansion plans, including feature films from Gimple that will continue Rick Grimes’ (Andrew Lincoln) story and additional spinoff shows. It just sounds like everyone involved assumed that while the franchise expanded, the flagship series would keep going strong.

That said, there’s still a lot of ground left to cover. Morgan revealed that The Walking Dead Season 11 filming is going to take up an entire calendar year, and they’re only on Episode 3 after two months of production:

I’m just finishing Episode 3. We’ve been here for two months, so we’re really taking our time. We’re doing 24 episodes, I think. It doesn’t feel like the end yet and I’m glad because that’s a long time to be thinking about the end. We have another year here to shoot, and we’re shooting straight through. It’s brutal. But I know it’s there. It’s in the back of all of our heads that it’s there. After the COVID six episodes that we did, that are almost done airing, we’re back at full strength. We shot those COVID episodes with a quarter of our usual crew, and it was very weird and crazy and surreal. My episode, the big one called, ‘Here’s Negan,’ was really just me and Hilarie [Burton] getting to do our thing, which was great, with limited locations and all of that. That didn’t feel like a bottle episode at all, when we shot it. Matter of fact, I think it’s going to look really big.”

the-walking-dead-season-5-melissa-mcbride-norman-reedus-socialImage via AMC

Morgan continued, noting that Season 11 feels bigger than previous seasons:

“But now that we’re just getting to the end of Episode 3 of this new year, there’s so much story and it’s very grand in scale. Our first two episodes, we had 28 shooting days. Normally, we do that in 16. So, it suddenly seems a lot bigger somehow. I think everyone is keenly aware that it is our last year, as far as the writers and stuff. It feels good. It feels like the story is really good. I’ve only seen the first four scripts, and they’re great. There’s so far no reference and no feeling in the story that it’s ending at all. It’s opening up all of these new chapters that are really interesting and cool. I’m excited.”

At the same time, while the story doesn’t feel like it’s heading down a final path just yet, Morgan said the experience of it all coming to an end still doesn’t quite feel real:

“That being said, it’s fucking surreal as hell to think that this will be the last bit of it. It’s become such a part of my life, and a part of everyone’s life that’s in the show, that it’s hard to reconcile the fact this will be over in a year from now. Well, in fact, I will still be here a year from now, but you know what I mean. There’s not a Season 12. It’s very weird… So, in a nutshell, I’m not thinking about the end yet, although it’s back there. We still have a lot of story to tell.”

The Walking Dead Season 11 doesn’t yet have a firm premiere date, but AMC has confirmed it will start airing this summer.

Look for more in our full interview with Morgan on Collider soon.

Reporting by Christina Radish.

KEEP READING: Andrew Lincoln Reveals Why He Didn't Want to Be a Movie Star in Between 'The Walking Dead' Seasons

Will there be a spin off of The Walking Dead?

20 on AMC, The Walking Dead franchise is, in many ways, just getting started. Several spin-offs have already been announced to premiere in 2023 after the Mothership finally lands after 11 seasons and 177 episodes, but according to the star of one of them, his new series will be following a brand new flight pattern.

Will there be a 12th season of The Walking Dead?

The answer is no. The Walking Dead will end the current season with the series finale episode on November 20, 2022. The final season has been broken into three parts, the first of which began airing one year ago on August 22, 2021, and part two began airing in February 2022.

Is Rick coming back to The Walking Dead?

Fresh out of SDCC, AMC have announced that Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira will reprise their roles as Rick Grimes and Michonne for a special six-part Walking Dead spin-off series in 2023.