‘The Walking Dead’ is, no matter what we say, a franchise with enormous potential. The complex and immense world that it presented in its first seasons has ended up being exhausted, but its formula of small microcosms that replicate vices and virtues of the disappeared society, but on a small scale, fits with The founding bases of George A. Romero’s dead filmsits main reference.
Unfortunately, the formula was exhausted due to an increasing focus on the convoluted relationships between the characters and an almost complete forgetfulness of the dead. It’s not that we only like gore and rot, it’s also that the dead are an essential part of this metaphor that is “a world populated by zombies is almost the same as one without them.” So essential, in fact, that the franchise has only had to come up with a couple of spin-offs original enough for us to welcome them as a welcome breath of fresh air.
Dead cities and other spin-offs
At the moment, There are numerous series underway derived from the main ‘The Walking Dead’. The longest running, ‘Fear of the Walking Dead’ ends this year, in September, it has lasted eight seasons and began as an alternative portraying a dysfunctional family, but ended as a typical spin-off. ‘World Beyond’ lasted two seasons and focused on young protagonists. ‘Tales of the Walking Dead’ has an anthology format, a print cast and at the moment no second season (nor cancellation) has been confirmed. And in early 2024 ‘The one who lives’ is planned, which will tell the love story between Rick and Michonne.
The two most interesting remain, which have just landed on our screens. ‘The Walking Dead: Dead City’ can be seen in full in Spain on AMC+ and is more action-oriented thanks to the prominence of one of the series’ most beloved villains: Negan, who is joined by another old acquaintance, Maggie. The series has not hidden, from the beginning, its airs a la ‘1997: Rescue in New York’ from its promotional material, because the plot also coincides with its own.
Several years after the end of ‘The Walking Dead’, The two antiheroes will travel to a post-apocalyptic Manhattan in search of Maggie’s kidnapped son, at the hands of a villain who has common ties to Negan’s past. The ruined city is the perfect setting for a hyperviolent adventure that moves away from the rural environments that marked much of the main series. Its benefit is that it is a contained story and the extraordinary setting, which even gives rise to its good ‘Mad Max’ offshoots.
Daryl Dixon viaja a Europa
The new spin-off of the franchise, also recently arrived on AMC+, has just released a very promising first episode. In it, another of the most beloved heroes of the main series arrives in France, continuing the destiny that ‘The Walking Dead’ had in store for him. He wants to return to the United States, but first he decides to help reach his destiny to an almost miraculous child who may have with him the secret to rebuilding the world.
Indeed, it sounds like ‘The Last of Us’: a determined man relatively on the margins of the society rebuilt after an apocalypse agrees to escort a “magical girl” in a dangerous journey whose goal is the very salvation of the weak civilization that is trying to be reborn with great difficulty. Obviously, the coincidence is semi-casual (the series and ‘Daryl Nixon’ have coincided in time, but the Naughty Dog video game is much earlier… and before that, the travel-escort trope is well known in the world. fantasy genre, ‘Willow’ comes to mind, without going any further).
In any case, Daryl Nixon has his own personality, and works well under the codes of ‘The Walking Dead’. We have a violent future, a hero who is up for little nonsense, and some hope camouflaged under a bunch of supporting characters trying to survive in this desolate world. Perhaps it is more dependent in tone and style on the original series than ‘Dead City’, but the setting in France and the dry and direct style, plus the expansion of the franchise’s lore with new types of dead, makes one think that ‘The Walking Dead’ ‘He is also one of those dead people that we are going to see walking around for many years.
Header: AMC+
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