Your Movie Sucks: The Walking Dead

[AcesandEights]

The show lost a great deal of quality when the AMC guys kicked off Darabount. It is just a fact. No, that's called an opinion. The writing, pacing and characterization has been very uneven since before Darabont left. It's only now just getting solidly back on track and, for all we know, could slip back off the rails the last half of this season. - - - Updated - - - did you watch the videos? Nope, I'm well aware of issues with the show, don't need to listen to some nichster gibberish nitpicking the show (usually based on negative, rather than positive assumptions) to blow their own horn.

[Doc]

his points about carl's sudden transformation to a super dick-wad in just one episode towards the end of season 2 had me rolling too, particularly about how it was going to wind up getting somebody else (dale) killed by a walker....a walker who was too weak to get out of ankle-deep mud earlier in the episode, but suddenly became strong enough to take down and devour a full-size cow and disembowel dale with it's bare hands. Isn't this a problem in every zombie media? Even GAR's dead films have inconsistency on this issue. I love 'Dawn', but the zombies in it have to be some of the most weak-ass I've seen in any zombie film. Apparently, a couple of punches can bring a whole bunch down in mere seconds and their slow as hell that even a toddler can probably out run them. And yet they apparently can overwhelm some the biker gang members (in even fewer numbers than Roger and Peter faced no less) and tear them to pieces with relative ease later in the film. In 'Day' they can apparently, rip all the soldiers to shreds and completely disemboweled in some instances yet they have a hard time getting through that fence? Don't know doesn't jive well with me. I'm no 'Walking Dead' fanboy either. I say at its very best it's only on ok show with some good/great moments here and there, but no 'masterpiece' of television that some are making it out to be.

[ProfessorChaos]

^ yeah, dude, but the walking dead is guilty as oj simpson in regards to eye-rolling moments in the walkers' abilities and behaviors, and it's always convenient for the plot. examples off the top of my head: 1. fence climbing in episode 102 2. having a sense of smell that covering yourself in human guts will fool 3. everyone is infected, so no matter how you die you come back....unless you're one of the dozens of of corpses sitting in cars throughout the series (pilot, 201) 4. convenient walker surprises all the damn time, (the one that attacks andrea from behind a tree in 201, the one in the pharmacy that jumps at maggie from behind the shelf, the dozens that waited till shane broke the window in the "18 miles out episode") 5. hershell's wife walker being unconscious till beth approached it after the barn massacre and yeah, i realize that it's hard to find a film where the behavior of the living dead is consistent and constant, and dawn has some of the most non-threatening and laughable ghouls on film, but the writers on TWD take the audience for morons in this aspect, not to mention the some of the ridiculous behaviors by the characters (leaving cell doors unlocked at night, almost everything lori or andrea ever did or said, carl's non-stop fuck-assery, shane giving rick ample time to knife him when he had his gun aimed at his face for minutes on end, etc) i don't hate the show or think i'm better than those who blindly love it in spite of all its warts, i am genuinely excited now that they've gotten out of the damn prison. and i know that we just got rid of the governor, but i'm really interested in how they're going to handle   negan and the saviors when/if they ever get to that point. it's just that for every moment of brilliance and greatness, there are a handful of instances of the show just tripping over its own feet. and i wish the writers would stop thinking they can just throw a bunch of kooky walker kills at us each week and we'll turn our brains off even further and let them continue to use dumb walker/survivor actions in order to ramp up the tension. it's maddening.

[shootemindehead]

I've said it since the first series, it suffers from bad writing and will continue to suffer from bad writing, because by and large the writers (and producers) are TV show writers (and producers) and not "zombie" writers. A lot of them don't know the "lore" as it were, so they're going to make up stupid plot devices, like the "ninja zombies" and WTF moments, like Dale's "easy access" belly. That really could have been handled a lot better. Shows like this and especially Sci-Fi shows, need an oracle. A person who is there solely to provide a "no" to ideas that are just silly, or outside the realm of the fictional world that's being represented. One might say that Robert Kirkman is that...er...man. But, I don't think so, as Kirkman himself has made some stupid moves in the comic...e.g. "zombie super smell" and to be honest, I don't think that Kirkman actually has that much of a say on the show. We have to remember though, that the vast majority of the shows viewers are not like us. They haven't been steeped in zombies since the 80's (or 90's for some of you babies), so they literally have a bloody clue what should work and what shouldn't. The writers and producers are well aware of this and play to THAT audience first and foremost. That said, I think that the first half of S4 has been excellent. The worst thing about it, is that I have to feckin wait months before I can see the rest rest of the bleedin thing. I also think that S2 was fine as well, if a little slow moving. I think it gets a lot of flak for little reason and S3 is decent, but marred by an awkward divided attention, an irritating character (or two) and some very silly moments. I do, however, find myself making excuses for some of the decisions in the show, like the dead people in cars in S2. Perhaps there's some head trauma that we don't see? Or, Hershel's wife...perhaps she was just deaf and only reacted when whatsherface was near enough for a visual... ...or a sniff ...or maybe not.

[Legion2213]

If I don't like something, I simply stop watching it. Really got pissed off with "lost" sometime around the third season, so I stopped watching it, stopped bitching about it and certainly didn't go snooping around the web for videos having a pop at it...why would I bother hunting down stuff associated with something I no longer had an interest in? I also decided not to watch the last GAR dead movie, and as you'd expect, I don't go hunting around for anything that praises or denounces it. TWD is far from perfect, but I enjoy the Hell out of it all the same.

[Trencher]

No, that's called an opinion. The writing, pacing and characterization has been very uneven since before Darabont left. It's only now just getting solidly back on track and, for all we know, could slip back off the rails the last half of this season. Well you can fall back on the subjectivity of art I suppose to try to dismiss the obvious fall in quality after Darabount got kicked to the curb. 1. fence climbing in episode 102 2. having a sense of smell that covering yourself in human guts will fool 3. everyone is infected, so no matter how you die you come back....unless you're one of the dozens of of corpses sitting in cars throughout the series (pilot, 201) I agree that the zombies are to weak in the show. Darabounts zombies were more like the zombies in the original night of the living dead in that they could use rocks and sticks for example. 1: The moment when some of the zombies just climbed the damm fence gave me chills. Something the intellligent zombies in Land of the dead never did. 2: I dont like the whole smell thing to be honest, did not like it in the comic dont like it in the TV series. Atlest its unreliable. 3: They could have died before the infection spread to them. If I don't like something, I simply stop watching it. Really got pissed off with "lost" sometime around the third season, so I stopped watching it, stopped bitching about it and certainly didn't go snooping around the web for videos having a pop at it...why would I bother hunting down stuff associated with something I no longer had an interest in? Lol I stopped watching Lost when they spent to long time opening the hatch..

[AcesandEights]

Well you can fall back on the subjectivity of art I suppose to try to dismiss the obvious fall in quality after Darabount got kicked to the curb. I'm saying I think there have been problems with the writing off-and-on all along. If you look at viewer's reactions to the the back half of season 1 and first half of season 2 you will see people talking about uneven episodes, lapses in writing and problems with continuity and story flow.

[Trin]

I watched the first 2 videos and I enjoyed them. They were a little rantish but they were spot on. And reasonbly objective - he pointed out a lot of positives in addition to the criticisms. I found the vast majority of the criticisms to be valid and he did a great job backing up his opinions and statements with clips or commentary. I've always thought Season 2 was boring and kinda a slog. But he really brought into focus why. It's an interesting perspective looking at how much time was spent in dialogue that didn't advance the story or character development. I was rolling when he was doing the voice-over montage about the meaningless arguing. Funny stuff! I've always held the opinion that TWD has lazy writing (plot contrivances, implausible plot, inconsistencies, inexplicable character motivations) and a lot of what he noted I'd already grappled with. But he found a lot of stuff that I hadn't noticed! It left me wondering how the heck they get away with such lazy writing? Does anyone read this stuff before they start shooting? How many people had to be on that set with them trying to get a zombie out of the well that no one said, "Mr. Director sir... this makes absolutely no sense... there's no way anyone is drinking that water regardless of whether we get that zombie out intact." If that's the best storyline they could come up with to fill episodes, my god, what did they shitcan?!? Back on topic... his inclusion of interviews with various people was interesting. I didn't know about the stance AMC took on the budget, number of episodes, film locations, etc. That explains some things and makes me more sympathetic to the writers and directors. Though I did find his opinions to be Pro-Darabont to the point I wasn't buying all of it. I'm interesed to see the rest of these videos and also to get his take on Season 3. Sadly, I'm more interested to see these videos than I am in starting Season 4. Great find Prof!! Thanks!

[ProfessorChaos]

^ no problem, glad you can appreciate them for what they are and didn't just refuse to watch them out of conviction that the show is too cherished to be subject to some much-deserved criticism, a stance that some seem to take with great pride. not too sure how soon (and even if) this dude's gonna get around to a season 3 series of videos, but you can bet i'll be checking them out and sharing them on this site. kinda hard to lay the blame on a single entity, but between the suits at amc and the writers, they've really goofed some things up from some rather well-established and suitable source material. just look at how badly they fucked up and ruined andrea's character. to be fair though, if you've not got around to season 4 yet, there is still hope for this show. looking forward to seeing your response to the rest of the videos. btw, don't you love the sound of the mario brothers coins with each headshot? i just about laugh everytime.....that and jackie's bemused look he keeps bringing back as an exclamation point.

[Trin]

I'm not sure why anyone is casting this guy as all negative. He's clearly not a hater. Sure, he levels out a fair dose of criticism, but he's pretty good about stating things he likes about the show too. And those things are just as insightful. He also seems to have a good grasp of plot architecture, story pacing, character development, and even filmmaking. He made some great points about how effective the argument scene was at the end of Season 2 that resulted in Shane cracking open the barn. And he was complimentary over how the scene played out between Dale and Shane in the woods over the guns. I agree that the mario noises were funny. But there's tons of good stuff throughout. - "Zombie super fingers" - "I want to know how Herschel was going to get the zombies into the barn" - "We have a lead on Sohpia... we'll go check that out after target practice" I hate to be this blunt, but if the show wants to avoid this kind of nitpicky criticism it should suck less. I like the show plenty but it begs for this kind of thing.

[Doc]

1. fence climbing in episode 102 I actually do recall that! Honestly, zombies climbing anything is almost a big no-no to me! I still don't buy the zombies in 'Dawn' climbing the ladder up to the roof. It just seems strange to me and unzombie-like if that makes sense! 2. having a sense of smell that covering yourself in human guts will fool Agreed! I always thought the smell aspect was a bad move in both the comic and the tv show. 3. everyone is infected, so no matter how you die you come back....unless you're one of the dozens of of corpses sitting in cars throughout the series (pilot, 201) Oversight. Blame the crew if anyone. :-X 4. convenient walker surprises all the damn time, (the one that attacks andrea from behind a tree in 201, the one in the pharmacy that jumps at maggie from behind the shelf, the dozens that waited till shane broke the window in the "18 miles out episode") Eh. Something in this genre I always thought fans had to deal with. 5. hershell's wife walker being unconscious till beth approached it after the barn massacre Need to see that scene again. I don't even remember that! i don't hate the show or think i'm better than those who blindly love it in spite of all its warts, i am genuinely excited now that they've gotten out of the damn prison. and i know that we just got rid of the governor, but i'm really interested in how they're going to handle   negan and the saviors when/if they ever get to that point. it's just that for every moment of brilliance and greatness, there are a handful of instances of the show just tripping over its own feet.   Still a long time before we get to Negan and his crew! Still have to meet Abraham, Eugene, Father Gabriel, Rosalia (or whatever her name is) and the Alexandria Safezone story. Not to mention The Hunters. Which, is a story I'm wondering if they won't just skip over or really waterdown.