'The Walking Dead' Season 8: Ex-Fans Are Not the Only Ones Disappointed About the Show
To viewers who watched Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) navigate his way through the zombie apocalypse, "The Walking Dead" is nothing but a shell of the excellent post-apocalyptic drama it once was.
Many fans have given up on the show as they felt that it has slipped in quality. In the past few seasons, the story is noticeably being stretched with filler episodes to the point that the show has been mocked for being predictable in that the action will be saved in the premiere and the final installments only. Others are not too fond of the fake-outs as they feel the show is trading shock value for actual plot or character development and quality.
"The Walking Dead" fans who do not want the years they invested on the show to go to waste have resorted to recaps so as to still keep tabs with the fate of the now inflated cast of characters without having to watch the episodes, which has become a chore to some instead of a form of entertainment they actually look forward to.
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The latest episode, which depicted another round of warfare between the Alexandrians and the Saviors, has been criticized for the nonsensical writing that requires characters to do or say something to move the plot forward, even if it would be uncharacteristic for them or would just be plain stupid.
If this is anything to go by, one of the major culprits for the slip of "The Walking Dead" is the number of episodes. Its first season only had six and was met with critical acclaim.
The genius behind the first and what is being described as the best season of the show is Frank Darabont. He was kicked out of the television series due to what AMC claimed as "erratic behavior and management skills," pointing to his angry emails as he responded to the plan the network had with the show that clashed with his.
He defended that his behavior (in the emails, he vowed to "start killing people and throwing bodies out the door" and "hunted them down and f—ing killed them with a brick, then gone and burned down their homes"), was the result of how the show is being handled and bogged down by "laziness, indifference, or incompetence" of the writers and directors.
Darabont wanted to do fewer episodes of "The Walking Dead" and a bigger budget for each. However, Forbes says that quality was only second to AMC, who instead wanted to do 16 so as to make more money.
The publication says that the network even cut the budget for each episode from $3.4 million to $2.75 million and stopped investing on the show even as it turned a huge profit.
Darabont's ouster ultimately led to the death of Dale in "The Walking Dead," the character from the first and second season played by Jeffrey DeMunn, who worked with Darabont several times before the zombie drama.
In an interview with Cleveland.com, the actor gushed about the writing, in the beginning, saying it was "amazing" as well as the original cast, before revealing that it was his decision to have Dale killed off.
"I was furious about how Frank was pushed out of the show. I spent a week not being able to take a full breath. And then I realized, 'Oh, I can quit.' So I called them and said, 'It's a zombie show. Kill me. I don't want to do this anymore.' It was an immense relief to me," he explained.
Ever since the gruesome death of Glenn (Steven Yeun), the criticism towards "The Walking Dead" intensified. Many feel that the Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) storyline should have been wrapped up in just one season.
"The Walking Dead" season 8 is supposed to wrap up the All Out War though. On April 1, the penultimate episode, "Still Gotta Mean Something" will be aired. Negan will be back and is expected to deal with Simon (Stephen Ogg).
