All spoilers for The Walking Dead will be unmarked.
"I've been out there a long time. I lost someone. Years ago. And then things changed. I found out that he's alive."
— Michonne Hawthorne
The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live is a Zombie Apocalypse series that premiered in 2024. It is the seventh installment in The Walking Dead Television Universe and the sixth spin-off of The Walking Dead. Like its immediate predecessor, The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, the series is a wholly original storyline not based on any of the source material by Robert Kirkman.
When we saw last saw Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln), he had seemingly sacrificed himself in a bridge explosion to prevent a walker herd from reaching Hilltop and its other communities. Unbeknownst to all who knew him, he was rescued by Jadis (Pollyanna McIntosh) and the mysterious group she works for: the Civic Republic Military. Now stuck in a community that will not let him go, Rick must find a way out, and it may come in the form of his old love: Michonne Hawthorne (Danai Gurira), who is finally catching on to the trail he left behind.
The Ones Who Live premiered on February 25th, 2024 on AMC. The first teaser can be found here
and the second teaser can be found here. For the first official trailer, see here.
The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live contains examples of:
- Anyone Can Die: This series has a pretty high body-count, and by the end, almost every character who isn't Rick and Michonne is dead. This includes: Donald Okafor, Nat, Aiden, Bailey, Jadis, Red's group, Beale, and Thorne. The only survivors of the characters introduced in the show are Esteban and Cleo.
- Arc Welding: As the series has the Greater-Scope Villain of the franchise, the CRM, front and center, it also welds together story from across the universe. In the first episode, Okafor reveals that he led the napalming of Atlanta and Los Angeles, which resulted in the creation of the main groups of the original show and Fear. The series also builds upon the lore primarily established by World Beyond, and alludes to the variant walkers introduced there that play a prominent role in the original show and Daryl Dixon.
- Badass Boast: In the first episode, Major General Beale orders Rick to look him in the eyes, asking whether he exists to kill, to die or to escape again. Rick responds with this:Rick: Look in my eyes, sir. You tell me.
- Call-Back:
- There's a shot in the second teaser trailer where a bloodied Rick is lying against a wall, in a near-identical pose that's reminiscent of the day after Rick killed the Claimers.
- Another shot in the second teaser trailer has Rick holding a phone with a white drawing of Michonne's face, just like the phone Michonne found in Bloodsworth Island, which contained white sketches of Michonne's and Judith's faces that were accompanied by a Japanese message.
- In the official trailer, the same footage of Operation Cobalt is reused, hinting that the CRM may have something to do with the bombing of Atlanta.
- The official trailer ends with a close-up of Michonne's face, smiling as the wind blows around her. It parallels the last shot of Rick from the parent series' Grand Finale.
- Continuity Nod:
- In the first teaser, Michonne says that "[she] lost someone, years ago", referencing Rick's bridge sacrifice. Afterwards she says that things changed because she found out about Rick's survival, which she discovered from a boat at Bloodsworth Island.
- The second teaser's narration has Rick recount how he tried and failed to escape. In his last scene of the parent show, he had made it onto a riverbank and got caught by a Civic Republic Military helicopter.
- The subtitle of the show is taken from Rick and Michonne's last line in the original series.
- Crossover Finale: Despite being a Spin-Off, Season 1 of this series functionally resolves plot threads that stretch back years in the parent series and its associated tie-in shows, which were never properly resolved in its grand finale. This includes Rick and Michonne finally reuniting with their loved ones, the death of a supporting antagonist (Jadis/Anne) who served as both a minor villain in the parent series and a Big Bad in World Beyond, the Arc Villain (the Civic Republic Military) largely ending its villainous actions due to Rick and Michonne's interference, and Alexandria and other locations mentioned and seen through the spinoffs being spared from the CRM's wrath.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: After both spent years away from each other and their children, Rick and Michonne succeed in decapitating the CRM leadership and saving the continent from their genocide and finally get to return home to Judith and R.J., who is introduced to his father for the first time.
- The Heavy: Jadis serves as the most direct threat to Rick and Michonne since she threatens that if they try to escape the CRM together, she'll either lead the CRM right to Alexandria to destroy it, or upon her death a dossier with Alexandria's location will be found.
- Mythology Gag:
- The Back-to-Back Badasses pose that serves as one of the main posters for the show is similar to one of the covers of Issue 92 from the original comics.
- The first five episodes’ titles are taken from the titles of the original pilot episode of The Walking Dead, "Days Gone Bye", and Season 10's episode "What We Become", which was the final episode for Michonne before she left the series to search for Rick.
- The trailers show that Rick encounters and recognizes Major General Beale as an enemy. He’s making up for some lost time on the original show, where the similarly bald and evil Alpha and Pope menaced the Coalition long after his disappearance. For bonus points, Beale is a military leader like how Pope was the commanding officer of the villainous Reapers.
- The first episode sees Rick cut off his left hand in a bid to escape, giving him the amputation his comic counterpart suffered.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The official trailer has Thorne sarcastically thanking Rick for showing her the lack of escapes from CRM's grip.
- Unseen No More: The trailers show that this series marks the onscreen debut of Major General Beale, the unseen Greater-Scope Villain of World Beyond.
"We have to stop them, because we can stop them."
