The Rick Grimes Movies Are Dead, But ‘The Walking Dead’ Doesn’t Need A Rick And Michonne Spinoff

Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira—who play Rick Grimes and Michonne respectively on The Walking Dead—made a surprise appearance at Comic-Con this year during the zombie show’s main panel.

The actors had two big announcements:

The Rick Grimes movies that we’ve heard so much, and yet so little, about in recent years are no more. They are toast. They have expired. They are no more.

Replacing these ill-conceived films, however, is a new Rick and Michonne spinoff. This means that as The Walking Dead winds down, we will instead have several spinoff shows in its place. Now, instead of one show with all these characters in it, we’ll have:

• The Daryl spinoff that’s taking place in Europe. Carol was supposed to be involved but Melissa McBride turned down the role since it would involve a big move to a different continent. Norman Reedus, then, and his bike and maybe Dog.
• The Maggie (Lauren Cohan) and Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) spinoff that takes place in Manhattan. Morgan invited Fear The Walking Dead alum Alycia Debnam-Carey to join that show after she exited the burning dumpster that is Fear. I doubt she will but who knows.
• This Rick and Michonne show, where I guess the two of them will eventually find one another and fight to survive and maybe someday return to their children?
• Tales of the Walking Dead, an anthological spinoff.
• Fear The Walking Dead. Uh…if you’ve ever read anything from me before you know how I describe this show, so I’ll leave a picture instead:

The Rick Grimes movies were probably a bad idea from the beginning. I just don’t really see the point of taking one character out of the mix and doing an entire feature-film-length story about that character. Isn’t the reason we enjoy these characters in the first place because of how they interact with one another? How their actions and choices impact one another and the group?

All these spinoffs are doing is continuing the story of The Walking Dead in fractured pieces. Now we’re going to have to watch a show with Maggie and Negan in which they never come into contact with Rick or Daryl, because they’ll be off on their own shows, cut off from the larger group. Surviving against all odds because their plot armor is so thick, it transcends shows.

What next, a Morgan and Madison “spinoff” of Fear?

I don’t think that we’re necessarily facing a problem of “too man” Walking Dead shows. It’s possible to have several different shows set in this universe that are compelling and cool. No, not likely given the dearth of writing and storytelling talent on exhibit so far, but possible.

I think the real problem is that four out of five of these shows will just continue to feature characters we’ve known for years. Rick and Daryl are both Season 1 characters. Michonne is Season 3 and Maggie is Season 2. Even Negan has been around for close to half The Walking Dead’s run. Out of all five shows that will continue after the flagship show ends, only one will feature a wholly new cast. This seems like a pretty big problem to me. AMC is relying on diehard fans and star power to squeeze every penny out of The Walking Dead, instead of trusting in vision and ingenuity.

I think The Walking Dead should have brought Rick and Michonne back for the final season, even if that ended up being a Season 12. Rick started this story out, he should have been the one to end it—not pop up in a spinoff or in some silly movies.

But here we are. The Rick Grimes movies are dead. The Walking Dead shambles on, groaning and gibbering on its shaky, emaciated legs, long after it shut have been put down.