Dead City’ Actually Looks . . . Really Good

I haven’t been an enthusiastic fan of The Walking Dead in a very long time. The main show bounced back from a disastrous two-season Savior War era and gave us a pretty good Whisperer arc, but the show went out with a whimper in long slog of a final season. Meanwhile, spinoffs Fear The Walking Dead and World Beyond have been mostly awful. The series as a whole has been mediocre at best lately, and for many viewers it’s worn out its welcome.

But I have to admit, The Walking Dead: Dead City actually looks really good. At least whoever made the latest trailer did a damn good job, because for the first time my interest is piqued. Check it out:

After the last trailer, I was feeling pretty skeptical of this show, and spent most of my post joking around about how Maggie and Negan should hook up (mostly because a lot of people really react angrily to that suggestion, which I find hilarious).

I’m whistling a different tune after watching this trailer, however. Several things are working for me here:

• The urban environment of Manhattan is great. I always wished The Walking Dead would do more in cities, but that show mostly stuck to small towns and countryside after the first season’s Atlanta arc. This change of scenery looks great and the sheer scope of the zombie horde is awesome.
• Speaking of zombies, we get some seriously wild looking mutated/evolved undead in this trailer. I’m not sure what the story is with these things, but I am eager to find out more.

• I actually came to like Negan more than almost every other character on The Walking Dead so I’m always happy for more time with Jeffrey Dean Morgan. I also think that Negan and Maggie have a crackling chemistry (whether or not it ever gets romantic) and while Lauren Cohan has never been my favorite (her accent just never clicked for me, and then they wrote her into a corner after Glenn’s death) I do think she has her moments. She had one of the only good scenes in all of Season 11, and maybe this new show will give her a nice chance to grow her character.
• Hershel is much older now!
• Zeljko Ivanek plays the villain known only as The Croat, and I’m curious what his history with Negan is and where the whole kidnapping arc takes us.

Mostly, this was just a top-notch trailer with good music and editing that makes the whole thing look quite a lot more exciting and tense than anything we’ve seen from The Walking Dead in a hot minute. What do you think? Let me know on Twitter or Facebook.

Oh, and AMC also released key art for the show with the tagline “Keep your enemies close.” Maybe “The enemy of my enemy is my friend” would be more fitting.

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