Thursday, January 19, 2012

Walking Dead Alternate Season 2 Plot Leaked


So with the title of my blog, I'd feel remiss if I didn't have the occasional post about zombies.  With that, one of the major zombie pop culture touchstones lately has been AMC's The Walking Dead.  Based on the long-running comic series, the tv show just ended the first half of it's second season, which is set to return February 12th.

I have to say, the very first episode of this show was fantastic.  Absolutely fantastic.  Unfortunately, it seemed like the rest of season 1 after that was a bit of a let down.  Not necessarily because it was bad, just because the premiere was that good.  Season 2 on the other hand, so far, has been bad.

I believe part of the reason for this was ongoing budget disputes between the showrunners and AMC, which led to Frank Darabont leaving the show.  The money issue seems to have been keyed on Mad Men getting new contracts, and the AMC execs subsequently tightening their belts through the rest of the network.  Darabont, if you don't know, is primarily a film director best known for helming the best Stephen King adaptations (Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, The Mist).  He really brought a cinematic eye to the small screen, evident in the 2-part premiere.  When he left, many of the other core writers from season 1 were let go.  The results in season 2 so far have been fewer locations, fewer zombies, and an agonizingly long arc involving searching for a missing girl, Sophia.  There was a payoff at the midseason finale, but somewhat dampened by the fact that every viewer just wanted the group to find the girl dead by about the 3rd episode in.

Now I say that the second season has only been bad so far.  Maybe the producers have backloaded the budget to the second half of the season, so we can get a different exciting location.  (I'm really tired of the farm and the woods).  For the show's sake I hope this is the case, otherwise I might bail on the show entirely.

But I recently saw this article which described Darabont's plans for the season 2 opener ( a little long but worth the read):
http://www.aintitcool.com/node/52526

Here's a video interview from the article with Sam Witwer (most recently, SciFi's[refuse to call it SyFy] Being Human):

Now this really is a shame because that idea sounds awesome.  So if want to find out how to ruin a great show and slowly kill its viewership, take notes from AMC.

But keep watching for now... I guess... maybe... It can't get any worse right?

11 comments:

  1. Way to ruin a good fuckin series AMC you had a gem here. As a long time fan I was looking forward to the awesomeness this show could of had but really budget cuts and money disputes? Wow..

    Ill keep watching but its a shame. I feel for Sam and Frank.

    Moneymoneymoneymoneymoney

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  2. man, how sad when you get really into a good new show, then it gets cut down, and looses steam. lame. But at least the first one is good, maybe I will watch just for that.

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  3. What companys do to save a buck! Damn this!

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  4. Yeah they so ****ed it up beyond belief with their damn budget cuts. And next year they have the same low budget but added more episodes, 16..lol..don't know how that works. I think his idea sounded good, but then it really took away from the show too, not that these crap episodes are much better.

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  5. I never much liked the show from the beginning (and its not because I've been reading since the comic started) it just wasn't ever any good..

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    1. i think I want to like it more than I actually like it, but I did think the premiere was good. I had read the comics beforehand as well

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  6. that Darabont was a master. Shawshank FTW!

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  7. I haven`t yet seen a single episode of this. But I do find it quite exciting. Thanks for the reminder!

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  8. I'm not gonna watch any of season two until it's on Netflix.

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  9. I haven't seen any of this show but I really want to! It looks like it puts a pretty good spin on a genre that has been out there forever.

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