If you want to know the current state of The Walking Dead universe, one of the two shows it has been reduced to, the Maggie-Negan team-up series Dead City, is about to do an alternate universe episode that looks as ridiculous as that concept sounds.
Next week, Dead City will imagine a world in which The Walking Dead never happened. As in, no zombies, no destruction of the world and society. The idea is that we get to see what Negan and Maggie are up to in this alternate timeline in which somehow, they end up meeting anyway, with fans once again fearful that this will result in some sort of romantic entanglement now that this is set in a time where Negan didn’t beat her husband to death with a bat. Though from the short preview, it’s not entirely clear if Maggie is aware she is in an alternate reality or not.
The show is also using this as an excuse to bring back Maggie’s sister Beth, played by Emily Kinney. Beth died 12 years ago in season 5 of The Walking Dead when she was accidentally shot in the head, a prime candidate for the “unnecessary death list” in The Walking Dead that amassed over the years.
It looks, frankly, ridiculous, but some fans are noting that many, many series do this. I would counter this by saying this is almost always a terrible concept for an episode, as it essentially never has any ramifications for the main show, and always feels like bad fan fiction. This happened briefly at other points in The Walking Dead with Michonne hallucinating a normal life, a scene with Glenn with a child, a peaceful Old Man Rick future for a moment. But this seems different.
I do wonder what Jeffrey Dean Morgan feels about all this, given that he was almost ready to leave the show after he didn’t like how Negan was written in season 2. Nice, non-warlord Negan here in this episode is quite a departure as well, even if it’s just for one night. Hopefully, anyway.
Dead City remains a strange show in the eyes of many viewers, especially among outside observers, who wonder why Negan and Maggie are working together after being mortal enemies. There is a constant fear that the show will try to make them get past Glenn’s death in full and hook up, though that hasn’t happened yet. It feels like the final red line to cross.
Scott Gimple recently said that more Walking Dead shows, big and small, are coming, as the universe is far from over. Daryl Dixon will end with season 4, and it’s unknown whether Dead City is meant to continue past season 3 here. Rick and Michonne already had their spinoff, so it’s not clear what other characters could be drawn back to the world that are as high-profile as the ones they’ve done already. If not, they’d risk trying to make something work with an entirely new cast of characters, always a challenge.
I haven’t watched this season of Dead City, but I’m almost willing to tune in to see how ridiculous this is going to be.
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