The Historic Downfall of The Walking Dead

[Neil]

[beat_truck]

What went wrong? One word: Gimple

[MinionZombie]

I still love the show, but it did peak at 7x01. A long-running issue with the show was too many episodes. It was okay for a while, but the longer the shows goes on, the more a season order of 16 episodes becomes a problem - there's so much time to fill up with story, and after such a long run you'll inevitably run out of potent ideas and start repeating yourself. This then also plays into actors wanting to pursue other (better paid) projects and cash-in on their rising star or, indeed, they want to spend more time with their family (in the case of Andrew Lincoln, who had to spend so much of each year away from them). Smaller season orders (10 should be the absolute maximum for any season of any show nowadays) would help solve these, and more, problems. Another issue, which really was noticeable in the latter seasons, was too many characters. Few of them really got juicy meat to sink their teeth into, so the impact of sketch-thin characters' deaths is weak. Gimple's later seasons in-charge also rose many problems - one of the considerable ones was the meagre passage of time. Late in season 4 through season ruddy 8 marks a mere first trimester in Maggie's pregnancy. For us viewers, though, that represents four or five years of our life time. It's silly. It also severely limits your storytelling. The time jumps in season 9 were a breath of fresh air and freed-up the narrative. The difference was significant. Also in Gimple's later seasons he got too caught up in being cute with not revealing anything (see his appearances on Talking Dead), but also with getting too complicated and too 'clever'. Also - killing Carl was a stupid idea narratively.

[JDP]

Let's be honest: the dumbest decision in the whole history of the show was to get rid of Rick. This was the central and most important character. The whole show revolved around him and how his decisions affected the course of events. The majority of people who watched the show stopped watching after that.

[MinionZombie]

Let's be honest: the dumbest decision in the whole history of the show was to get rid of Rick. This was the central and most important character. The whole show revolved around him and how his decisions affected the course of events. The majority of people who watched the show stopped watching after that. Which ties-in to my point about fewer episodes meaning more flexibility for actors (to either pursue work or go home to their families). If TWD had been 10 episodes per season, then I think Lincoln might have stuck it out for the entire run. Having a show be such a huge commitment is inevitably going to lead to having to deal with cast problems outside of the showrunner's and writers' control, which is not a good thing at all.

[shootemindehead]

Getting rid of Rick wasn't the show's idea. That was entirely down to Andrew Lincoln. But yeh, the show ends for me when Rick departs. There was, literally, no point in sticking with after that. Far too many C list "characters" that I couldn't give a fuck about cluttering everything up. I can't even remember their bloody names.

[JDP]

Getting rid of Rick wasn't the show's idea. That was entirely down to Andrew Lincoln. But yeh, the show ends for me when Rick departs. There was, literally, no point in sticking with after that. Far too many C list "characters" that I couldn't give a fuck about cluttering everything up. I can't even remember their bloody names. I bet that if they had offered Lincoln a "juicier" contract he probably would have changed his mind and stuck around for a couple more seasons until the end of the show. Instead, they came up with that whole "3 Rick Grimes movies" thingy that never materialized.

[beat_truck]

I bet that if they had offered Lincoln a "juicier" contract he probably would have changed his mind and stuck around for a couple more seasons until the end of the show. Instead, they came up with that whole "3 Rick Grimes movies" thingy that never materialized. Yep, and now we are (supposedly) getting the Rick and Michonne spin-off, which will be too little and too late. And, it will probably suck dog shit, too.