Munya Vomo
When the news first broke that a spin-off of The Walking Dead, called Fear the Walking Dead, was on the cards, many purists were disgusted. We do need more TWD content (says this comic book collector), but there is also a need to get the dose “within” reason to avoid imminent overkill.
Then there’s the incredible mind of executive producer Robert Kirkman who is also a writer of the show. He is behind the writing of the comic book ideas which have done well on the shelves. So well, in fact, that the books were adapted into a hit show, and now a spin-off show.
Two things are likely to happen. Fear the Walking Dead might fail because we are inundated with zombie/alien apocalypse stories on TV. Think Falling Skies, The Strain and even Under The Dome. So not only is Fear the Walking Dead coming into an arena where its predecessor made waves, it is competing against established end-of-times shows.
That’s not the only problem. The Walking Dead has become a cult classic, so much so that trying to milk it further with another spin-off is likely to split audiences on the two shows. It’s like trying to choose between two children.
Yet the inclusion of Kirkman will most certainly have a huge influence on how well this show will be received. He may have worked with great artists like Tony Moore and Charles Adlard on the books, but it was his exceptional writing that kept the project going.
When a chance came to make the TV show, Image Comics’ Kirkman returned as executive producer and he obviously had a say in the direction the show would go. The one thing no one from the comic book anticipated was that the book and TV stories would differ. The same characters are used, but the two stories take different paths, making it hard to choose which one did better. As you are reading this, both the comic and the TV series are still in production.
So where does Fear the Walking Dead fit into this successful well-oiled machine? The answer is “genius”. We have learnt that the story in both the comic and the tv show ( TWD) first started with the zombie apocalypse already spread around the world. Kirkman and team thought it a great idea to rewind and tell a story of how the world got infected. You know how there is always some scare in the news? If it’s not swine flu then it is Ebola. That’s what the writer is cashing on in Fear the Walking Dead. We meet a different group of people (from LA, not Georgia) in a world like today. They are the ones who see the illness coming, people dying and then “undying” and spreading the illness. With Travis Manawa and Madison Clark leading this cast, Fear the Walking Dead has room to make its own legacy.
l Fear The Walking Dead starts tonight at 8pm on StarSat.