There are spin-offs, I roll my eyes and think: “Does it have to be that way?” And there are spin-offs, I think to myself: “What the hell is happening here?” For example, when Daryl Dixon will fight with super zombies in front of the Eiffel Tower in the spin-off The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon. Hopefully.
‘France is going to have a frigging heart attack’: The Daryl series breaks free from The Walking Dead mush
In the beautiful finale of the 11-season zombie epic The Walking Dead, a really stupid thing happens: Daryl makes a decision that destroys his whole development from lone wolf to father substitute. Instead of staying with his foster children Judith and RJ, he moves out into the big wide world. His motivation? Its spin off.
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Judith and Daryl
In doing so, he robs the finale of its magic and even destroys certain parts of The Walking Dead’s ending. Out of defiance, I didn’t want anything to do with Daryl’s own series.
Then the information about the Daryl spin-off started flying left and right at me and a new emotion formed: anticipation. The Daryl series wants to be something completely different than the parent series The Walking Dead. It drove me insane for 11 years with the same dried up forest floor colored filter and zombie shambling on, well, forest floor.
Daryl actor Norman Reedus is well aware of this and promises in an interview with Entertainment Weekly:
We knew we wanted to go in the opposite direction with this series. (…) It will be completely different. The story is completely different. The characters are completely different. It hits a whole different tone, different light, different sound.
At the New York Comic-Con in October, he also emphasized that France has a “damn heart attack” will have. Because we haven’t even talked about the best yet: The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon is set in Paris. A city that is more poster boy than living space. Showing Paris from its ugly end-time side sounds exciting.
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The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon
We don’t yet know how he gets there. What awaits him there sounds pretty gaga.
Zombie John Wick? Daryl awaits you in the erotic club, super zombies and maybe even battle nuns
The Daryl series not only seems to want to break new ground in the audiovisual production, the themes and locations are also new. Of course there were already other locations and ideas in other spin-offs like Tales of the Walking Dead (German launch is pending) and Fear the Walking Dead.
But that curious hodgepodge of novelties in The Walking Dead universe in the Daryl series stands out.
For example, Deadline reported two acting additions in November: Clémence Poésy as Isabelle and Adam Nagaitis as Quinn – owner of one “sexy underground nightclubs”. Love and relationships were always at the heart of the story in The Walking Dead, but the series never ventured into an erotic staging.
To be honest, I can’t wait for Daryl’s awkward reaction to people in lingerie.
The previous story and character snippets sound as if there is a lot of functioning infrastructure to be discovered in Paris. I’m starting to feel like we’re dealing with some kind of thing here Zombie John Wick to do. This represents an immense change from the endless meadows and improvised villages of the parent series.
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Daryl and Carol
We don’t know much about the plot yet: Daryl will travel around France with Clémence Poésy’s Isabelle and will encounter her dark past in Paris. plus erotic club, battle nuns (based on an unconfirmed set video on Reddit) and super zombies.
After 11 years, the slow-motion gurgling of the biters, whose jaws are already hanging down to their thighs, is enough. Paris has super zombies, which were already hinted at in a post-credits scene from the otherwise rather uninteresting spin-off The Walking Dead: World Beyond.
The Daryl series thus uses 28 Days Later and all of its imitators. This gives the spin-off the chance to let off steam in the action scenes (with an Eiffel Tower ambience) in a completely new way.
Melissa McBrides Carol was originally slated to fight French super zombies alongside Daryl in the spin-off, but she dropped out at short notice.
Daryl without Carol is sad but necessary
As much as I love Carol and actress Melissa McBride, I’m glad she’s leaving The Walking Dead. On the one hand she gets a wonderful ending in the finale, on the other hand Daryl Dixon finally breaks free from all the shackles of the mother series. He doesn’t owe anyone an explanation for what he plans to do in his spin-off.
Putting The Walking Dead’s most popular character in this all-new setting is a bold move. But without a change of scenery, the spin-off would just be Season 12 with fewer characters. So unnecessary. The Daryl series, unlike other The Walking Dead spin-offs, sounds like it actually wants to start something new.
The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon is said to be 2023 celebrate their premiere at AMC.