The Walking Dead: World Beyond Season 1 - TV Review

When I originally started this site I started off with reviews of The Walking Dead. It was, and still is, my favorite show on TV. Not just because I'm a massive zombie fan, but it's a series that forces character growth, struggle, and great goal for our main characters: Not just survive, but thrive in this new world of the dead. Sadly I started my reviews with season 8 which is undoubtedly the worst season of the main show to the point I almost quit. I didn't though, stuck around for season 9, and was back on as a fan (though sadly dropping Fear The Walking Dead as it devolved from a truly epic season 3 finale to a horrible seasons 4 and 5). But a new spinoff has joined The Walking Dead universe: The Walking Dead World Beyond.

The Walking Dead World Beyond (or World Beyond to shorten it) is about four teenagers who leave their community established at Nebraska State University in Lincoln, Nebraska. Iris, the leader of the four, gets a message from her father, who works in a facility across the country, saying that he is danger. She, along with her adoptive sister, Hope, are joined by Elton, their innocent, but wise friend from school, and Silas, the young janitor that people view oddly. Soon after they start they are tracked down and joined by Felix, Iris and Hope's protective older brother figure, as well as Huck, Felix's friend and experienced soldier. All six travel across America to reach the facility where Iris and Hope's father is. But it's not as easy as the original four think and they have a lot of growing up to do to survive. And with that I will say there are going to be a few spoilers in this review.

After Fear The Walking Dead took a nosedive in quality after seasons 4 and 5, to the point that the stress of the show was literally causing me pain and I had to drop it, I felt quite down that I had only the main show for comfort. As I've said in previous articles on the main Walking Dead show, it has improved a lot since season 8 and is so damn fun. But I also the variety that the first three seasons of Fear gave me. So hearing a new Walking Dead show was being made filled me with excitement. But hearing that it would once again take place in America and would be mostly lead by young actors fill me with concern. The most we've explored outside of America in The Walking Dead universe is Mexico, and that was just around border. I recently read the book, The Walking Dead Typhoon, which takes place in China, and that was excellent to go through. They need to explore beyond the USA. There was also somewhat of a reliance on the previous shows and the chance of Rick Grimes being mentioned or even having a cameo in this spinoff that made me worry more because I was hoping for the show to stand on its own. In a ways I did get that because World Beyond does stand on its own as a TV show and a part of The Walking Dead universe. Not all in a positive way though.

My first and biggest issue with World Beyond is the tone of the show. This whole first season feels like it written like a "young adult" novel like The Hunger Games or The Maze Runner series. You know what I'm talking about guys; The main characters are these young teens that live in a post-apocalyptic/ dystopian future and think they're "special" or are different from everyone else. They then decide they want to go against the rules or what they've been taught and explore a bigger world and fight against the system they've lived their lives by. Then there is possible, cheesy romance, along with drama that doesn't feel realistic or could be easily solved if people were more open about their feelings. Secrets are later revealed that unveil a conspiracy from the big, bad adults the rule the system and the new generation, lead by our heroes, must save the world/ day/ existence/ whatever.

Typing that out made me both laugh really hard and feel sick at the same time because that is how I am seeing the story of World Beyond going so far. And I don't like that one bit. The Walking Dead has never been intended to be light in the wake of humanity's destruction and seeing these new characters going through lighthearted conflicts so late into zombie apocalypse (since this takes place during the time skip between The Walking Dead's seven-year timeskip between the ending season 8 and midway through season 9) when we've seen Rick and his group fight tooth and nail to survive walkers and hostile humans makes this show's feel out of place with the rest of the franchise. Seeing this and thinking back to older seasons of the main show, like with Rick rips out a man throat when one of that guy's crownies is about to rape Carl... It just disappoints me. It feels like the show was on baby mode through most of the season.

The characters, when the leave their community to go on their adventure, know nothing about killing walkers (or as they call them on this show "Empties"). Throughout most of the season they just shove walkers away and don't stab them in the brains or smash their skulls in. From I've divulged from the season they were trained to kill the undead, but they don't do it and it infuriated me to no end because it doesn't realistic or smart for them to go traveling across the United States on their own without any experience in fighting of walkers when there are hordes and hordes of them out there. It's only in the last couple of episodes where they start to do it and really show that they can survive, but by this point it's too late and most people will think these main characters are idiots. I mean we've seen kids much younger than these four, like Carl, Judith, and Lizzie, killing walkers and bad humans like their adult mentors and seeing these older kids just shoving the walkers away like morons... Ughhhhhh, it hurts my brain.

Saying all that though I didn't hate these characters or their actors because their acting like teenagers was great and they all grew on me as the show progressed. All four of them, plus Felix and Huck, have potential to be really good characters in the TWD universe. Elton and Silas were my favorites of the group, with Felix being a strong contender as well. Elton, played by Nicolas Cantu (the voice of Gumball from The Amazing World of Gumball), as I mentioned, was kind of innocent (often to the point of annoying at first) to the world of the walkers, but had some wisdom to him that I really enjoyed. He was true friend to his group and he realizes he has to fight against the overwhelming odds of humanity not being able to last a few more years. Silas, played by Hal Cumpston, also hit me as a great character because we find out he has a dark past in that he murdered somebody and he isn't entirely mentally stable. However, he like Elton has strong loyalty to his friend and he has a massive potential to evolve as a character. Felix, played by Nico Tortorella, we find out is gay, which most people would not expect from his appearance (which I really liked) and he has his very honorable demeanor that I really liked. He is definitely the leader when it comes to age and experience and he's always ready to teach his younger companions how to survive in this new world.

Now you might be thinking, "Wait he only named the male characters as ones he really liked, you don't like the female characters?" No, I did enjoy them as well, but they all had some problem with them that kind of lessened my enjoyment of them. Let's start with Iris, played by Aliyah Royale, was kind of a bland leading protagonist. Her actor was great, but there isn't much to her character. She's kind of smart and sketches some, but there isn't much more than that. Not much personality either expect a bit of heroic altruism, which is just how main characters in my before mentioned young adult novels are like. Hope, played by Alexa Mansour, was a bit more developed and had more defining personality, being a troubled young that gets into trouble because she's a bit of a rebel. However she's also not written very well because some of the choices she makes throughout the show go back on each other. First she's smart like her sister, but the does stupid things the next episode, then is smart again. This is terrible writing and I really don't like it. And then we have Huck, played by Annet Mahendru. To be honestly she's actually a pretty great character, it's just that we barely get any screentime out of her throughout most of the season. But near the end of the season we get a lot more out of her and it's quite thrilling. Still, with other female characters in the franchise like Michonne, Carol, and Madison Clark, I feel like most of these women need more flair to them.

Now I got to veer away from the kids for a bit to talk about the only character in this series I really, really didn't like: Elizabeth Kublek, played by Julia Ormond. She is a lieutenant colonel of the Civic Republic Military (CRM), a massive organization that serves as a military force for a huge connected group of communities in the midwest/ western areas of the United States. They have guns with cool attachments that allow them to stab walkers up close, helicopters with tons of fuel, and a ton of soldiers. And Elizabeth is very poorly written. In the first episode of the show, after the kids leave their community, she kills everyone left because Iris kind of hinted that the CRM shouldn't always be around for them because they're sketchy (or something). Almost 10,000 survivors killed off because of the words on a single, young girl... What the ever-loving fuck?! This is especially stupid since this community lives on a campus and are all about knowledge and learning things, something that is a very rare thing to be able to do in a post-apocalyptic world. There is also a scene in another episode where she turns on literally everything electronic appliance, all the water, and heating to their max to show this one disillusioned soldier that they're the good guys and are fighting for the greater good. It's almost cartoonish the way she and the CRM have so much power, yet use it in such stupid ways. It's terrible writing, just really terrible writing that the franchise doesn't need and should know not to include.

Okay, back to the kids. Even with the negatives I gave them though I think all the kids have some good chemistry. In the earlier episodes of the season we see them interacting with each other very well. There's one particular scene where they decided to hold up in a clubhouse for the night and they're rolling around a bowling ball and it's really heartwarming because they have the youth to them and you feel a little sad that soon they're going to lose that. It shows that they have the potential to become real survivors like the original group lead by Rick Grimes. It's just that the show needs to harden them, face more consequences and dangers because most of the season they're kind of dodging around their problems and responsibilities in growing up in this zombie-filled world. They can keep their youthful ways, but they also need to understand and accept the dangerous world around the because most of the show they've been lucky to avoid conflicts with other humans and hordes of the undead. That's got to change for next season.

Other than that the walker/ empty makeup is great, though that's kind of one of the biggest things a zombie show (especially The Walking Dead) requires. There weren't as many walkers as I was hoping there would be, but there's enough to keep me somewhat satisfied. There are also plenty of new elements in this show that work with the setting, from walkie talkies having corroded batteries (unlike Fear The Walking Dead and their I swear to god fetish with walkie talkies and how they can contact people from across a whole state) to wildlife such as wolves becoming more common in the world since humans no longer are in control. That makes the show stand out.

There is one last thing though I got to mention and that is the plot involving Iris and Hope's father, Leopold. While we don't know the whole truth behind his work, the CRM is working/ using Leopold to either end the zombie virus or find a way to control and weaponize the walkers. This is a topic that the creator of the franchise, Robert Kirkman, has never gone or intended to go very deep with. He wanted the franchise to be about building up society after it faces almost certain destruction and the uses of walkers as weapons is more in tone with the walkers being considered a force of nature, a entity that can be swayed, but never fully controlled, just the like weather. If they do go down either of these paths I hope that the CRM ultimately fails. Both in the older Fear seasons and the main show the characters have stated and realized that the world will never return to the way it was before the zombie virus. We've seen cannibals, people just brutally murdering each other, and just the walkers roaming about... you cannot forget that or erase that. It's just the new world now. Plus the idea of weaponizing zombies sounds as stupid as the idea of weaponizing dinosaurs that Jurassic World movies just cannot let go of for some insane reason.

The Walking Dead World Beyond has potential to be some really good. It's only going to be a two-season long series, which I think is an excellent choice. But now that we're halfway through the show needs to step up its game for next season. No more stupid, young adult novel writing, more kids learning to fight the undead and really get the hell beaten out of them. No more lazy, half-ass writing for the villains. Make them actually scary and smart! You already have built up great and likable leading characters and are showing them learning that the world outside their old home is a very dangerous place. Now we need the villains to be better written, no more young adult novel writing, and some real conflict. Give us that and World Beyond is going to rock next season. But if next season is the same as this season then people are going to find it boring and campy.

Tentative Score: 6/10

Definitive Score: 6.5/10

While I am eager to see The Walking Dead season 10 return with some extra episodes in February and see characters like Negan, Daryl, Yumiko, Carol, and Jerry back on screen once more, I am kind of excited for what World Beyond is planning for in its next and final season and what it'll end up bringing to the TWD universe.