Even zombies can’t live forever, I guess. This was at one point the best show out there, right up with my top tier TV shows.
It is now a long haul to sit through most weeks. Occasional good moments, but a drag mostly.
We quit watching when they killed off Carl.
In a discussion like this, I think spoilers are inevitable, so I have edited the title. However, I have spoilered the previous post since it was made before I did so.
I just finished season 9, which it the most recent one available on Netflix here in Panama. I haven’t really minded most of the recent deaths, because I found the characters pretty annoying and often having brought their fate on themselves.
Once I’ve started a series, I try to see it through, just out of curiosity as to how it will turn out. But I agree it’s become a chore. The good guys doing dumb stuff, unexplained plot points, things that are wildly implausible even in a show about zombies, and pretty much unrelenting ugliness and tragedy. The second half of season 9 was particularly bleak. They didn’t follow up the more interesting threads from the first half (I imagine they will do so in season 10), and instead introduced villains that were both absurd and loathsome.
Another thing is that the good guys never seem to do anything smart or clever. I never say to myself, “That was a great idea!” It seems that this long after the apocalypse they should have gotten things sorted out a lot better. One thing they should have been doing is systematically killing off the zombies. Since few new ones are being produced, in eight years they should have disposed of most of them (say by luring the herds into a quarry and then setting them on fire or killing them from a distance with slingshots).
Yes, those wrist braced sling shots firing ball bearings would be excellent, and they are quiet.
Cynically, when they had to pay him an adult salary they decided to kill him off. In my opinion, most of the blame for the decline of this series rests with the suits. Their first huge mistake was the firing of Frank Darabant.
Season 9 was the first time I recall a character using one much (though I think they were used occasionally before). It’s a perfect weapon against zombies if you want to conserve ammunition. Relatively easy to make, lethal at a distance with a little practice, and an inexhaustible supply of no-cost ammunition if you use stream pebbles. Everybody should carry one at least as a back-up. Instead, a lot of characters use weapons that are only good at an uncomfortably close distance.
One the things I find annoying is the infinite supply of crossbow bolts that Daryl seems to have. (And characters who use bows have infinite arrows.) He often shoots them into hordes of zombies when it would be impossible to retrieve them, but never runs out.
When they killed off DeMunn’s character Dale is when I first thought it was getting stupid. Dale pointlessly goes out on patrol by himself at night. When he stumbles upon a dead cow, he gapes at it like he can’t figure out what might have done it. Anybody with any sense would have immediately realized there was a zombie around and been instantly on alert. On top of that, why would a ravenous zombie abandon the cow to go lurk in the shadows? Too many of the deaths on the show were due to people being idiots.
They also mention the 16-episode seasons, which I also dislike. IMO would have been better to have tighter 10-episode seasons.
The problem with the show was always that the real conflict was human vs human and they just could not do human vs human fights not be incredibly stupid. First with the governor then with negan, its seasons of build up that ends in battles more fit for a show like the 80’s A-Team.
The Walking Dead has always been somewhat uneven. The pilot episode was fantastic and I thoroughly enjoyed the rest of the 1st season. But the 2nd season plodded along and if I hadn’t liked zombies so much I might have stopped watching after that. I enjoyed the third season but thought the last episode was really silly. When the governor’s forces went inside the prison and stumbled onto the established killing floor they should have been slaughtered by our heroes. Instead our heroes manage to simply drive them away just so the governor can be villainous and kill his own people later? It’s not that I want Grimes & Co. to be brutal murderers or anything, but the last part of the battle just didn’t make any sense to me.
TWD is no longer must see TV for me. I enjoyed season 9 but I haven’t started season 10 yet and I’ll watch it when it becomes available on Netflix. I don’t have any interest in any of the spinoff shows, save for maybe the movies they plan on making about Rick, as I absolutely hated the 1st season of Fear the Walking Dead.
I was already hate watching when Negan came on the scene–the first episode of that season was just disgusting and I quit right there. Seriously, those people are too stupid to keep breathing without regular reminders and the eyerolling was giving me migraines. I’m glad they’re finally pulling the plug on the whole mess although it’s probably about five years past when it should have been Old Yellered.
I had a glimmer of hope that they might do something more interesting when the Governor looked like he was reforming. That could have introduced the question of whether someone who had done such horrible things could be redeemed (an element that made Game of Thrones more interesting). But no, the Governor became bad again, so they didn’t have to deal with that question. I found that disappointing.
The only case where they really went against my expectations was when they didn’t kill Michonne off as soon as she got together with Rick. Up to that point, boinking Rick had been an automatic death sentence.
Negan was OK and I kept watching, but they fell in love with their charismatic villain and kept him on the show after he obviously should have been killed.
I loved The Governor, but they killed him at about the right point in the story. Should have done the same for Negan.
I agree.
The Speech he gave was a signal that he was going to buy the farm, said the actor.
I agree, that pause while he stared at the cow caused me to think, “Aw crap, he is going to be whacked.”
One of the problems is that the zombies individually are not a serious threat. Slow-moving, mindless, noisy, and easy to kill with a stick, any healthy adult can wipe out a half dozen easily. So in order to make them a threat, they have to set up very contrived situations. They have them assemble in huge herds, or have the human incapacitated, or have them suddenly fall out of a ceiling or closet. (I know expecting logical explanations in a show about reanimated corpses isn’t warranted, but I could never figure out what killed off 95% of the population to turn them into zombies. It couldn’t have been zombie bites, because zombies usually eat the people they catch (and most of the current zombies don’t show signs of even being partly eaten.) )
Like being slightly off frame so they show up in a jump scare even though they should have been 100% visible from the actors POV.
Or like having them constantly growling, except when it’s required for the characters not to notice them until they are too close.
What’s so frustrating is that occasionally they can be used effectively, like when Glenn is tied to a chair in a room (caught by the Governor) and then the door opens and a zombie is tossed inside. That was pretty well done.
It just makes the other bajillion times they do it in contrived or stupid ways even worse.
Wait. what!? That annoying shit have been killed in like season 2 or 3! I quit watching because he was still alive after like 7 seasons!
You’ve just renewed my interest.