Just to be clear, because I do like to call it as I see it, The Walking Dead is a primetime soap opera with zombies. Same relationship dynamics. Same quiet and not so quiet interpersonal tension and melodrama. People hooking up with this person and that person.

And walking dead people, nearly dead people and should probably be dead people. Maybe that’s what all television is anyway, just variations on soap operas, so if you take a bunch of graphic novel creators and lock them in a room with the writers of Dallas or Dynasty, you get The Walking Dead. I’m fine with that, but let’s not pretend it’s anything different than it is. Perfectly okay by me.

That said, I’m a sucker for any situation drama that puts regular people into extraordinary circumstances to see how they fare. Stretch it out over a few seasons and that’s even better. You get a closer picture of how the new circumstances change them. You get to see evolution, or de-evolution as the case may be. I’m always down to see a decent argument about morals and ethics and entertain questions about how entirely situational (and not at all absolute) morality is. Seems to me there is a sliding scale that’s based on situation. Every situation has an optimum balance of appropriate or inappropriate balance. Again, draw that out over a few seasons examining individual characters that may or may not be well written characters and you get to have some fun with that.

Do I recommend The Walking Dead? Sure, why not, if you like zombie thrillers but now about four seasons in I suspect it’s going to jump the shark as most TV series of any genre eventually do. This one is getting an old smell about it and it’s getting a bit repetitive and formulaic. The core cast starts and ends most episodes coming into contact with a new group and there is a bit of respite however strained by any clashes of personalities or values. The action slows for a bit and then all goes to shit as the world catches up to them. The core cast escapes, maybe minus one or two regulars and they go on the run again. The metaphorical aspect that there is no safe haven from the problems of the world, or no Utopia… Yah, it’s all there and I do get that but we’ve seen it an awful lot in the zombie genre.

Yawn.

Sorry, but I’ve seen it so many times now. I’m committed to moving through this though to the end. What else is there to do during lockdown but catch up on what the rest of the world was doing while I was doing my thing?