The Walking Dead: World Beyond

***The Walking Dead: World Beyond*** is an American post-apocalyptic horror drama limited series created by Scott Gimple and Matt Negrete that premiered on AMC on October 4, 2020. It is a spin-off series to *The Walking Dead*, which is based on the comic book series of the same name by Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore, and Charlie Adlard. It is the third television series within *The Walking Dead* television universe. The first season consisted of 10 episodes. The second and final season premiered on October 3, 2021, and also consists of 10 episodes with the final episode aired on December 5, 2021.

## Premise

The series is set in Nebraska ten years after the zombie apocalypse. The show features four teenage protagonists. The series begins in a college town in Nebraska, which is a reference to an episode of Season 2 in the original show. In the episode, it mentions that Nebraska was well-poised to resist the zombie apocalypse because of their low human population density and high level of firearms.

In TWD: World Beyond, the Campus Colony comes into being when the Nebraska State University campus is declared a safe zone at the beginning of the zombie outbreak. Civilians flee to the campus, which is protected by U.S. military personnel. As the rest of the world descends into chaos, the enclave at Nebraska State University survives and thrives to enable a generation of children to grow up in relative safety.

Thus the main characters of The Walking Dead: World Beyond have lived a pretty sheltered existence and at the start of the series have rarely left the safety of the campus. It is eventually revealed that Omaha is part of the Alliance of the Three, which is an association of three survivor cities: Portland, Omaha and the Civic Republic. In this confederation, the Campus Colony with about 10,000 residents is viewed as a mere satellite branch of the larger Omaha outpost, which has about 100,000 inhabitants.

## Production

### Development

In July 2018, during San Diego Comic Con, executive producer Scott Gimple announced that a new spin-off was in the works. In April 2019, AMC gave a ten-episode order for the series. In July, the series was given the working title of *Monument*. On November 24, 2019, Gimple revealed the show's title. In January 2020, alongside the series premiere date announcement, AMC confirmed that the series would only consist of two seasons.

### Casting

In July 2019, Alexa Mansour, Nicolas Cantu, and Hal Cumpston were cast as main undisclosed roles. The same month, Aliyah Royale and Annet Mahendru joined the cast. The following month, Nico Tortorella. Julia Ormond was announced as a cast member in November 2019, playing the role of Elizabeth Kublek, the "charismatic leader of a large, sophisticated and formidable force".

In August 2019, Joe Holt was cast in a recurring role. In November, Natalie Gold, Al Calderon, Scott Adsit and Ted Sutherland were cast as Lyla Belshaw, Barca, Tony Delmado and Percy.

In May 2021, Robert Palmer Watkins joined the cast in recurring role for the second season. For the second season, Joe Holt, Jelani Alladin, Natalie Gold and Ted Sutherland were promoted to series regulars.

### Filming

Filming for the series began late July 2019 in Richmond, Virginia and was expected to last until November 2019. Jordan Vogt-Roberts was originally announced to be the director of the pilot episode. Vogt-Roberts was replaced with Magnus Martens, who previously directed for *Fear the Walking Dead*. The change in directors was a result of the writers mapping out the rest of the season and production had to go in a different direction; Negrete said Vogt-Roberts contributed ideas to the first episode. The series was looking to film a plane crash in the vein of *Lost* with filming to take place in Hopewell, Virginia during the first two weeks of August.

### Broadcast

The series was originally set to premiere on April 12, 2020, on AMC, after the tenth season finale of *The Walking Dead*. However, in March 2020, AMC announced that the premiere was delayed and would instead debut "later this year". On July 24, 2020, it was announced that the series would premiere on October 4, 2020. The series premiered on October 1, 2020, on AMC+, AMC's premium on-demand service and each episode became available three days before their broadcast premiere. The final season premiered on October 3, 2021 on AMC.

Outside the United States, the series is distributed by Amazon Prime Video and first premiered on October 2, 2020.

## Reception

*The Walking Dead: World Beyond* has received mixed reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, the first season has a score of 46% with an average rating of 4.90/10 based on 24 critics. The website's critical consensus reads: "The series' strong performances and new perspective within *The Walking Dead* universe aren't enough to make it stand out in an increasingly crowded franchise." On Metacritic, the first season has a score of 48 out of 100 based on 10 critics, indicated "mixed or average reviews."

Daniel D'Addario of *Variety* gave it a generally positive review and wrote, "This is not a perfect series... And yet there's a willingness to reinvent, to genuinely probe a corner of the universe previously untouched, that makes this series feel serious in its intent and, for fans of the forerunning series, well worth checking out". In a more negative review from Candice Frederick of *TV Guide*, she graded it two out of five stars and wrote, "*World Beyond* doesn't offer audiences fresh ideas or even fascinating characters for which to root."

## Trivia

* This is the second spin-off series of *The Walking Dead.* The first was *Fear the Walking Dead*.
* The series' events take place roughly ten years into the apocalypse.
* *World Beyond* refers to zombies as "empties".
* Gimple confirms there will eventually be crossovers.
* *World Beyond* will only have 2 seassons.
* Originally the name *Endlings* was considered for the title of the show.
	+ This was later used as the name for the main group of survivors seen on the show.
* This is the only spin-off show to not feature any characters who originated from the Comic Series.
	+ Although, Beta makes a brief photographic appearance.