All spoilers for The Walking Dead will be unmarked.
"You know, you have been sticking it to me in infinite little ways since the second we hooked up. Don't think I haven't noticed. And I get how having Hershel taken has you spinning out, stirring up emotions, memories, all sorts of shit, but vengeful thoughts that I thought you had put to bed, clearly you have woken the hell up. But what I don't get is after all these years, you still think I'm the bad guy? I'm not. No one is. Or you know what, Maggie? Maybe everyone is."
— Negan Smith
The Walking Dead: Dead City is a Zombie Apocalypse series and the fifth installment in The Walking Dead Television Universe, premiering in 2023. It is also the fourth spin-off of The Walking Dead, and notably the first series to debut following the main series' conclusion in 2022. As such, Dead City is a wholly original storyline not based on any of the source material by Robert Kirkman.
Years after the end of The Walking Dead, Hershel Rhee, the son of Maggie Rhee (Lauren Cohan), has been kidnapped by nefarious forces who have a vendetta against his mother. Maggie finds herself forced to do the unthinkable and turns to Negan Smith (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) for help - the very same man who murdered her husband Glenn and left Hershel fatherless. Though the two survivors formed a sort of peace years ago, they are now forced to work together to save Hershel from the undead-infested Manhattan Island, where a whole new world of horrors, villains, heroes, and dangers await them - that is, if the two survivors who have had a long, violent history don't tear each other apart first.
Gaius Charles, Željko Ivanek, and Lisa Emery co-star as new characters Armstrong, The Croat, and The Dama, respectively.
Dead City premiered on June 18, 2023 on AMC and has completed its first season, and has been renewed for a second season. The teaser can be seen here
, and the first official trailer here.
Another spinoff, The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon (following the eponymous character), premiered less than three months after this series.
The Walking Dead: Dead City contains examples of:
- Anachronism Stew
- Negan uses the word "neckbeard" in an insult. That word came to prominence in the mainstream lexicon during the early-to-mid-2010s (c. 2011–2015) due to online culture, which would have been after the zombie apocalypse had occurred in the Walking Dead's universe (c. August 2010).
- Madison Square Garden has an MMA octagon in it. MMA was illegal in New York in 2010. It would not be legalized until 2016, which would have been 6 years after the collapse of civilization.
- Every car on the streets of New York has the yellow "Empire Gold" license plate. That license plate was brand-new when the zombie apocalypse occurred (c. August 2010), so only a few cars would have had it then. Most cars would have still been using the blue-and-white Niagara Falls license plate design introduced in 2001.
- Negan uses the word "neckbeard" in an insult. That word came to prominence in the mainstream lexicon during the early-to-mid-2010s (c. 2011–2015
- Became Their Own Antithesis: Maggie has hated Negan for years for killing Glenn and taking her husband and her son's father from him. While she has understandable motivations, she is revealed to be plotting to turn Negan over to the Croat, taking him from his wife Annie and his young son Joshua.
- Big Applesauce: The series takes place in Manhattan.
- Big Bad: The Croat, a former Savior who now rules Manhattan and is responsible for kickstarting the plot by kidnapping Hershel. Though he turns out to only be The Dragon to The Dama.
- Call-Back: Flashbacks show Maggie screaming in horror as Hershel is taken from her, just like what happened in the final arc of Season 11 of The Walking Dead when both of them were captured and separated by the Commonwealth special forces.
- Central Theme:
- Why Black-and-White Morality isn’t a good thing to have and that there is usually much, much more to people, sometimes even your enemies, than what you think. Just look at the page quote, which sums up this idea nicely.
- Perlie is determined to find and kill Negan for killing New Babylon officials, unaware that while brutal, Negan was only doing it to avenge Annie, who was beaten and possibly even sexually assaulted by them. In the past he also didn’t know what to do when his beloved brother became addicted to drugs and went so far as to attack their parents, and used to believe he deserved to die alone in New York.
- Maggie works with Negan as her ally but is still resentful of him for killing Glenn. She has to contend with the fact that given how much time has passed and what Negan’s been up to since then, it’s just not as simple as she’s been telling herself it is. The fifth episode shines a spotlight on this when Tomasso is revealed to also have made a deal with the Croat but proves he genuinely wanted the best for Amaia, just like how Maggie herself is willing to sell Negan out to the Croat for Hershel’s safety.
- Continuity Nod: Negan has a bounty out for him for crimes committed in New Babylon's territories, just like how Maggie was targeted for death by Pope and the Reapers in Seasons 10 and 11 of The Walking Dead. In a cross-franchise example, the marshal hunting him is a Scary Black Man with a hat, not dissimilar to Emile LaRoux from Fear the Walking Dead.
- Diagonal Billing: Lauren Cohan and Jeffrey Dean Morgan receive this billing in the opening credits.
- Dumb Struck: Ginny became mute after a traumatic incident before the events of the show.
- End of an Age/ Dawn of an Era: From the first episode to the last, it becomes increasingly clear that the "tribal" ways which were so synonymous with much of The Walking Dead and Fear the Walking Dead, and which are still espoused by the Croat are slowly giving away to civilizations such as the Commonwealth and New Babylon, resulting in the return of borders, laws, police, economies and lines of production. More importantly, as the Dama professes, the clash of civilizations is surely to mark the second and third decades of the walker-infested Earth going forward.
- Even Evil Has Standards: According to Negan, the Croat stood out among the other Saviors for his cruelty. Even Simon, the most cruel and sadistic of them, was disgusted by the Croat being willing to torture children.
- Failure Is the Only Option: What the Manhattan Tribespeople's raid on The Croat's compound with Maggie and Negan amounts to. Since a member of both parties is secretly working with The Croat (Tommasso for the Tribespeople, Maggie for the main duo), it's likely that no harm could've come to him even if they hadn't walked directly into his trap. Tommasso needs The Croat alive to get the boat he promised him, while Maggie needs him alive in order to ensure her son's safe return (at best because she doesn't know exactly where they're keeping him, and at worst because the Burazi would likely kill Hershel in retaliation if her party killed The Croat first).
- The Federation: New Babylon is officially styled as a federation of communities. Whether it's a straight example in practice or a People's Republic of Tyranny (as indicated by its draconian laws), is yet to be seen.
- Godzilla Threshold: Maggie is not happy about having to resort to asking Negan to help rescue Hershel, but he is key to helping get him back. The fifth episode reveals the reason why Maggie turned to Negan of all people for help - she’s secretly planning to turn him over to the Croat in exchange for Hershel.
- Gray-and-Black Morality: At first the series starts out fairly black and white with a little gray from a third party. Maggie and Negan are the protagonists working together to save Hershel from a warlord who was a former Savior so vile that even Simon was repulsed by him, with Perlie as a self-righteous lawman on Negan’s trail, albeit for crimes Negan committed with reasonable intentions. As the season goes on, however, Perlie must realize Negan is not the straightforward villain he thought he was, and Maggie is revealed to be plotting to sell Negan out to the Croat in exchange for Hershel’s life, despite having been on good terms with Annie and previously accepting him as an ally.
- Happy Ending Override: Downplayed, and later subverted. The Walking Dead ended with Hilltop being shown as flourishing and well-stocked, with the damage from the Whisperer War and the Commonwealth revolution having been repaired, as well as the promise of the Commonwealth's resources now available to it if needed again. This show starts with Maggie now leading Hilltop's people out of a new community called the Bricks, with her claiming that Hilltop was too damaged to sustain them all. She's later shown to be lying about just how dire of a state the Bricks are supposedly in, so it's now up to speculation as to the current state of the original Hilltop.
- Late-Arrival Spoiler: The entire premise of the show is drama from the alliance formed between Maggie and Negan, the murderer of her husband Glenn. The murder informed the back half of The Walking Dead and remains well on the characters' minds going into this series.
- Living MacGuffin: Hershel's kidnapping is what sets the series in motion, with Maggie and Negan's driving goal to rescue him.
- Rescue Arc: The series' main premise is about Maggie and Negan teaming up to rescue Maggie's son Hershel. It's implied in the Season 1 finale that Season 2 will also serve as this for Negan himself, who is currently being held captive by The Dama, as Maggie hints that she intends to rescue Negan after having previously traded him to The Croat earlier in the episode in exchange for Hershel.
- Shout-Out: The series' poster has an obvious nod to that of◊ Escape from New York with the fallen head of the Statue of Liberty, only here it's a human skull wearing Lady Liberty's headgear. The premise (saving someone from the heart of a derelict Manhattan Island that's been turned into a death trap filled with savage criminals/zombies) is also roughly similar.
- Superman Stays Out of Gotham: Subverted. Maggie only goes to Negan for help rescuing Hershel despite having plenty of people in the Coalition as well as the much larger Commonwealth who would surely help her. Maggie claims she wants Negan's help since the Croat is a former Savior. The series eventually reveals that the Croat demanded Negan be captured and turned over to him in exchange for Hershel, explaining why she didn't reach out to any other Walking Dead character for help.
- Time-Shifted Actor: Hershel is now played by Logan Kim due to the series taking place years after The Walking Dead wherein he was played by Kien Michael Spiller.
- Time Skip: Enough time has passed between the end of The Walking Dead and Dead City that Hershel is now an adolescent. Word of God is that it's been two years since the former show's Distant Finale.
- Wasteland Warlord: The Croat rules post-apocalyptic Manhattan with an iron fist. The Dama, who is more or less his superior, wants the entire island under their command, however, and implies she’s willing to expand their rule to the mainland due to expecting a war with New Babylon and threatening to strike against the Bricks.
- Wham Episode: "Stories We Tell Ourselves" reveals that Maggie has been lying about the Croat stealing from Hilltop. He actually came looking for Negan, and Maggie intends to hand him over to the Croat in exchange for Hershel.
"...Because you and I together, we made one hell of a badass team."
