Walking Dead spin off series!

[Rancid Carcass]

A "companion series" to AMC's The Walking Dead is being developed for launch in 2015...

"An entirely new story and cast of characters"

http://www.denofgeek.com/tv/the-walking-dead/27304/the-walking-dead-spin-off-announced

This should be interesting... wonder if they plan to use the Telltale characters?

[kidgloves]

Aye. This is CONFIRMED as well.

http://www.slashfilm.com/amc-plans-the-walking-dead-spinoff/

Im always in the "more is good" camp, so naturally very very excited by this.

[MinionZombie]

Well this is a bolt from the blue surprise! :stunned:

My concern is - how will it be different? Will it just be the same kind of stuff, but with people we don't know and aren't connected to (yet)? It would really have to show some other angles on events - i.e. preferably not civilian, as we've got that covered with the existing show.

Better Call Saul makes more sense out-right as it's a jumping off point after one show has ended, and (apparently) it's a prequel. I also hope it doesn't distract too much from making The Walking Dead proper - I'd hate to see the main show suffer as a result of this idea, or for the spit-off to overdose us on it.

I'm really quite surprised by this, personally ... I didn't really think there was a need for a spin-off ... we'll see what's what when it comes to pass in 2015.

Will the spin-off take place during the missing months between seasons 2 and 3, and likewise 3 and 4? That's a possible avenue for exploration ... will it go right back to the very beginning ... that too is another good possible avenue for exploration. Again, a different type of perspective would be welcome - governmental or military, for example.

[AcesandEights]

I'm very pessimistic, as they may be watering down the brand, their efforts and what mystique the show still has. That said, this may free them up from fan expectations, which would be nice. Kill whoever, whenever, however without worrying about what the f*ck twitter feeds and facebook petitions have to say.

That said, this seems like a bad sign, sounds like the flushing of a toilet.

[facestabber]

Not sure how I feel about this. As mentioned above the watered down theory kind of worries me. I dont want anything to distract from TWD. If AMC wants to make a statement go back to 1.5 hour season premiere and give us some story.

[EvilNed]

Will give it a chance, even tho I'm not a huge TWD fan. I hope it's set during the outbreak, rather than skipping through it like TWD did. Otherwise, I see little point...

[shootemindehead]

I'm very pessimistic, as they may be watering down the brand, their efforts and what mystique the show still has. That said, this may free them up from fan expectations, which would be nice. Kill whoever, whenever, however without worrying about what the f*ck twitter feeds and facebook petitions have to say.

That said, this seems like a bad sign, sounds like the flushing of a toilet.

Yeh, I'm in your corner. I reckon it'll end up being 'The Walking Dead - Lite'. These things are very rarely a good idea, and ja know what...

...put the bleedin money your going to waste on a spin off into the original feckin show!!!

:/

[Neil]

Will give it a chance, even tho I'm not a huge TWD fan. I hope it's set during the outbreak, rather than skipping through it like TWD did. Otherwise, I see little point...

It would be nice to spend a little more time in the first few weeks again!

[MinionZombie]

It would be nice to spend a little more time in the first few weeks again!

Yes!

Separate from the main TWD-verse, we'd be freed up to explore it. It'd be great to see how it all began - without a medical explanation - but it'd be cool to see, for example, what went on inside the CDC (perhaps even witnessing the death and resurrection of Test Subject 19), but to also see things like the bombing of Atlanta from a military perspective, as well as the government's side of things. You could perhaps even see certain aspects that are glimpsed in the main show after-the-fact, but go back and see how it happened - another thing you could do is show us what happened to the Vatos gang as their fate was ultimately cut out of the season two premiere. To see it actually go down - e.g. perhaps following the gang who did it - you could be introduced to them and not know exactly who they are, but the first thing you see them do is take down the Vatos gang.

I'm very much in two minds about this - there's loads of cool things you could do with it in the right hands, but I'm also dearly hoping they don't bugger up the main show by splitting their resources or whatever. It should really be two entirely separate teams, with the producers overseeing both (but mainly the original show), to maintain quality and consistency.

[Morto Vivente]

As far as some extra back story on characters/events that were just touched upon, I'd like to see some of the antics of Dave and Tony (episode Nebraska) in the early days of the outbreak. Loved those characters/performances.

[facestabber]

Yeh, I'm in your corner. I reckon it'll end up being 'The Walking Dead - Lite'. These things are very rarely a good idea, and ja know what...

...put the bleedin money your going to waste on a spin off into the original feckin show!!!

:/

You make a damn good point. Put the money in the original. As much as I want to see other parts of this apocolypse Id hate to see a divide amongst fans hurting the interest and ratings of the original. Now if it didnt run concurrently with TWD that may not be too bad. But this may oversaturate.

[bassman]

With my interest in TWD tv series fading in the last two years or so, I just can't really get excited about this. Sure, I'll watch it just like the current show, but the hype just isn't there for me.

It's funny that Kirkman used to say in the letter hacks that he wasn't interested in a spin off series because the core of TWD is all about Rick and these characters, but now he seems excited about it for a TV series....

[MoonSylver]

Well, TV is a different beast. I could see him not being interested in another comic, but another show could be a breath of fresh air. It would alieviate some of the "same, but different" angst of trying to make it LIKE the comic, but different at the same time. A clean slate with no ties other than the setting = unlimited possibilities. Look at the recent video game. I watched a playthrough of it on Youtube & loved it. It was proof of concept to me that there are still plenty of stories to be told. :)

[ProfessorChaos]

not really too excited about this, to be honest. seems like there is an over-saturation of zombie stuff out and the quality is really slipping.

[kidgloves]

Bit of a stretch but how about Max Brooks as showrunner?
I think he's written for SNL so he's no stranger to a writers room.

[Ragnarr]

As long as they don't hire Zack Snyder to direct it. They'd have to name the spin-off "The Running Dead" then. :rolleyes:

[bassman]

As long as they don't hire Zack Snyder to direct it. They'd have to name the spin-off "The Running Dead" then. :rolleyes:

All kidding aside.....Snyder's current collaborator on the new Superman/Batman films, David Goyer, is directing an episode this season. Kinda scary...

[krisvds]

If the main series continues on it's downward spiral towards mediocrity I'll doubt there will be any hype or good will left among even the hardcore fans for this.
I mean, season 4 is just a couple of weeks away and anticipation/hype seems at an all time low.

I hope I'm wrong though, and the coming season will be killer. I'll watch it, but after how they handled Woodbury I refuse to get my hopes up.

[facestabber]

If the main series continues on it's downward spiral towards mediocrity I'll doubt there will be any hype or good will left among even the hardcore fans for this.
I mean, season 4 is just a couple of weeks away and anticipation/hype seems at an all time low.

I hope I'm wrong though, and the coming season will be killer. I'll watch it, but after how they handled Woodbury I refuse to get my hopes up.

What makes you think anticipation/hype is at an all time low? I keep meeting people who have netflixed the series to get caught up.

[krisvds]

What makes you think anticipation/hype is at an all time low? I keep meeting people who have netflixed the series to get caught up.

Hype among the fans of the genre seems a lot lower now than last season. On here for one. Among the people I know in Belgium as well. There's just less of a buzz in the 'media' as well.
Don't know about netflix. Over here in sorry old Belgium we don't get that.

[babomb]

There does seem to be alot less hype this season. They hyped the shit out of it last season. So much that it put expectations too high and then failed to deliver. I remember having a discussion about that very thing last year a few episodes into the season.:rockbrow:.....:confused: Damn........what if they read what we talk about..:stunned:

:sneaky:What we need is Beth and Maggie naked!!!:sneaky: They don't have to be together when they're naked, they just need to be naked!! Or at least in very little....often.....But,,,,if they were to be together naked......that works too.......even just some prolongued sexually charged embraces between women.....as long as it's not Carol!! In fact, while we're at it, we need less Carol altogether. really, she could just be a walker locked in a cell somewhere and show her rotting away every few episodes, or outside the fence and have kids throwing rocks at her and laughing...

[MinionZombie]

Oh babomb, you cheeky chappy. :p

As for "hype" - I think we fans just feel secure in the knowledge that the show isn't going to be cancelled anytime soon. In the early days of the show we were so glad to have a zombie TV show - and a good one too - the best thing in zombies in a long old time. Now, with ratings so high and the fanbase so fervent, there's no chance of it going off the air anytime soon - so we feel secure - therefore that nervous energy of new episodes is tempered.

Arguably they did overhype season 3, and some of that overhyping was no doubt due to we the fans, so it's wise to calm ourselves down a bit and just enjoy the show when it gets here.

Also - the final season of Breaking Bad as well as the release of GTA V has been keeping a lot of people distracted, it certainly has for me - now that BB is over and I've been playing a lot of GTA V, I'm very much ready for TWD Season 4.

Finally - from what I've seen all over social media for the last several weeks, the hype and excitement is very much alive.

[babomb]

Yeah it's really depressing to see breaking bad gone!! It was a hell of a ride though.

AMC is sure taking their sweet ass time with these webisodes! They got the date wrong on the site, they say Sun Oct-1st. Now they're delaying it.

[MinionZombie]

AMC is sure taking their sweet ass time with these webisodes! They got the date wrong on the site, they say Sun Oct-1st. Now they're delaying it.

*ahem*

http://dailydead.com/walking-dead-new-webisodes-released/

Thar they be, lads and ladies. Check 'em out. Around about 25 minutes of content. :)

[facestabber]

There does seem to be alot less hype this season. They hyped the shit out of it last season. So much that it put expectations too high and then failed to deliver. I remember having a discussion about that very thing last year a few episodes into the season.:rockbrow:.....:confused: Damn........what if they read what we talk about..:stunned:

:sneaky:What we need is Beth and Maggie naked!!!:sneaky: They don't have to be together when they're naked, they just need to be naked!! Or at least in very little....often.....But,,,,if they were to be together naked......that works too.......even just some prolongued sexually charged embraces between women.....as long as it's not Carol!! In fact, while we're at it, we need less Carol altogether. really, she could just be a walker locked in a cell somewhere and show her rotting away every few episodes, or outside the fence and have kids throwing rocks at her and laughing...

Did you see Maggie's Maxim photos.....daummmmmn!!!!! I think you will disappointed as Carol is now the new knife fighting teacher for the children

[babomb]

*ahem*

http://dailydead.com/walking-dead-new-webisodes-released/

Thar they be, lads and ladies. Check 'em out. Around about 25 minutes of content. :) Took em long enough. It was kind of a let down though. I just can't see that being the way the shit went down. It was like a fan film with good practical FX.

[bassman]

Yeah it's really depressing to see breaking bad gone!! It was a hell of a ride though.

AMC is sure taking their sweet ass time with these webisodes! They got the date wrong on the site, they say Sun Oct-1st. Now they're delaying it.

From my memory, they released the previous webisodes series around the same time. AMC's heavy promotion of TWD always begins around October 1st. Then from there the promotional items lead into AMC's Fear Fest and the premiere of TWD.

[MinionZombie]

Aye, the timing makes sense - Breaking Bad is finished, so now it's Walking Dead time - it'd be a waste of promotion to overlap the two ... besides, you want to strike while your promotion's hottest, which always confuses me as to why some films/shows get advertised waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay in advance, so by the time they actually come out your excitement has already peaked a few weeks prior.

[Wyldwraith]

I dunno,
Speaking hypothetically, it IS possible to make effective spinoffs even if the spin-off is of lower quality than an already not-that-deep original. Love em or hate em, but Buffy the Vampire Slayer STILL holds some records for TV show longest in *unbroken* syndication. On some channel, somewhere, that show has continued to run every day since the series ended, and is STILL going. Ran 11 seasons and did right well for every channel's that handled it. Then look at Angel, inarguably a step down quality wise, but again a successful long-running (if not quite as long as Buffy) show.

The point here is that if it can effectively be done with material that ISN'T the most-watched show for the 18-49 crowd, it can be done with TWD. However, can isn't necessarily WILL, so there's definitely room for this to go horribly wrong. I'd say cautious, mildly skeptical, but still hopeful is the way I'm going on this one.

[kidgloves]

Some more info here.

http://www.horror-movies.ca/2013/11/walking-dead-spin-off-could-be-a-prequel/


It’s going to be set in this world, but it is a new cast and a new setting, and it’s going to be very different. It’s just exciting to be able to start over again and try to do cool stuff.

It’s a really different location with completely different people, so we are going to see an entirely different corner of the Walking Dead world. It definitely won’t be set in Georgia, I can at least say that. It’s important to us that this show exists on its own. The spinoff has to be a show worthy of existing, or else we’ve all sold out. So that’s something we’re all working hard towards doing, and I think we can pull it off. I think that the ideal situation is, when you’re watching the spinoff, you’re like, “Wow, this is a really awesome show.” The whole other show doesn’t need to exist for this show to be cool and stand on its own.

[Legion2213]

Will give it a chance, even tho I'm not a huge TWD fan. I hope it's set during the outbreak, rather than skipping through it like TWD did. Otherwise, I see little point...

They could do what they wanted and tell stories from any point during the crisis if it's just individual characters and locations...a sort of "tales of the walking dead" thing.

They could do the same with WWZ, use all the stories from the novel with the scope to add as many as they want after that.

[Ragnarr]

Hell yeah, I'm for a TWD spin-off series. Why? Well have you noticed the couple hundred channels of complete crap when surfing the cable channels? The very scripted "reality" shows, reruns of sitcoms, movies we've all seen a bunch of times already, sports and more sports, boring talk shows, cooking shows, lame followed by more lame. And why oh gawd why does the show 'Ancient Aliens' continue to exist! Even the producers of AA know that they're just making sh*t up now! I'll take a TWD spin-off more than gladly at this point.