The Walking Dead, an American zombie apocalypse TV series, seems to be a craze lately. Its third season is coming soon and my local channel did a marathon run for the first two seasons; I’m not a fan of zombie shows but decided to give it a go regardless, and it was surprisingly good.
The main character is deputy sheriff Rick Grimes (starring Andrew Lincoln) who leads a group of survivors in Georgia after a worldwide apocalypse. They have to fight against not just the zombies – known as walkers in the series – but other survivors too, including threats from within the group.
Video below is a nice summary of the first season by IGN. The second season features similar (albeit darker) theme… with more people, relationships and also larger herd of zombies.
It’s not the first zombie show to dwell on humanity side in an apocalypse, but it’s probably the first to tell the stories in such depth. The series also struck a nice balance between human drama and horror plot; it could become a boring show if they focused too much on either part but they got that right.
Korean American actor Steven Yeun stars as the smarty of the group; that’s racial stereotype right there but good to see an Asian in a popular series regardless. The cast also includes Jon Bernthal, Sarah Wayne Callies, Laurie Holden, Jeffrey DeMunn, Chandler Riggs, Norman Reedus and Melissa McBride.
A few of the new faces in season two e.g. Lauren Cohan and Scott Wilson will probably be credited as the main cast in the new season, which will start airing on October 14 in the United States.