The Walking Dead's Downfall and How It Can Redeem Itself

Disclaimer: This article will explore spoilers from The Walking Dead TV show and comic, as well as potential future spoilers and rumours.

AMC's The Walking Dead was once considered one of the best TV shows ever. In its glory days, which most people consider seasons 2-6, the story was ever expanding and had really interesting story lines and arcs. We fell in love with characters like Glenn and Rick, and tuned in every Sunday to see what was going to occur next. We watched every interview with the cast and some of us even went to Comic Con to meet everyone and ask them questions. But then during season 7 and 8, many fans were driven to stop watching their once favourite television show. But why?

The Walking Dead's Downfall

With season 6's intense cliffhanger of antagonist Negan ending the lives of two (at the time unknown) of Rick's gang, left people scrounging for the answer of just who were the people that were murdered. People checked subtitles for names, tried to look for leaked scripts and more. A leaked video of Maggie dying surfaced, which was believed to be the real ending, however it was discovered that the crew had filmed 3 different endings to hide the real death. When season 7 of the show aired, people were met with the gruesome deaths of Abraham and Glenn, a fan favourite character. Blood was sprayed everywhere and Glenn's eye even popped out. Steven Yeun, Glenn's actor, stated that the death could of been "too far", however it was nothing that The Walking Dead hadn't done before.

After these somewhat controversial deaths, many viewers were actually led to stop watching the show. Glenn had already been portrayed to have died before, although he rolled under a dumpster and survived, but now he'd actually died, and fans were saddened to the point of boycotting the entire show. This, matched with season 7's repetitive sadistic natures and many filler episodes, angered fans greatly. Season 7 ended with a huge battle between The Saviours and Alexandria, started by Ezekiel's tiger attacking Negan's vicious group. Season 8, however, was what made many fans bored and angry with what the show had become.

Season 8 was a drawn-out mess, with poorly written episodes that just didn't mean anything to viewers. Carl's death in the mid-season finale angered fans so much, as he was another greatly loved character added to the list of unnecessary deaths. The season ended with all out war (which some of us honestly didn't see coming after the two whole seasons of Negan), which was a relief, but ultimately didn't feel as satisfying as it should of. After all of the time we've seen Negan killing our favourite characters and destroying communities, he was left with merely a slit neck which didn't even kill him. Rick and Michonne decided to leave him inside a prison-like cage to watch the civilisations grow, and that's where the season ended. On the whole, it was a disappointing season, but can The Walking Dead make a comeback to what we loved?

How can 'The Walking Dead' make a comeback?

Though The Walking Dead has been been spiralling downwards for the past two seasons as we've shown, could it make a hit comeback? In the season 9 trailer, we see a 2-year time jump of the group. Aside from all of the developments in the camps and settlements, near the end of the trailer, we hear a drawn-out, raspy voice saying, "Where are they?" This indicates that the Whisperers, a group from the comics, are going to be an enemy in this season. The Whisperers disguise themselves as walkers to go unnoticed by other walkers, and served as primary antagonists during the comic for a notable period of time. This could really help the show move forward and add a lot of drama. We know that Rick and Maggie will only be in 6 episodes, and Lauren Cohan (Maggie's actress) said that something big will be happening in the sixth episode of season 9. Could this be to do with The Whisperers?

The new showrunner, Angela Kang, said that she wants to return the show to its glory days of season 4 and 5, so how might she go about pulling that off? We've lost a lot of character we really cared about, so pulling a complete 180 in terms of the show's writing could prove difficult. Andrew Lincoln (who plays Rick Grimes) stated that season 9 was his favourite thing to film since the pilot episode, meaning that the show may just have a chance to positively surprise us with the first quality season for years.

Though we may not see it until a future season, another huge part of The Walking Dead comic series is The Commonwealth, a huge civilisation of people like The Walking Dead has never seen before. How the TV show may approach this could be extremely interesting to watch. The Commonwealth in the comics has over 50,000 people spread across of different connected towns. The group is led by Pamela Milton, based in Ohio. The Commonwealth has huge sports arenas, a stadium used for concerts, and many restaurants which its members can enjoy. Could this be a settlement that lays the foundation for the ultimate ending of the TV show, or could it be another enemy for the group to face?

Only time will tell. Until then, we'll have to wait for season 9 of The Walking Dead to air on AMC on the 7th of October, and on FOX UK the next day.

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