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The 1980s produced an incredible number of television shows that somehow remain lodged in people’s memories decades later. Some had unforgettable characters, some had theme songs that nobody could stop humming, and others simply captured something about the decade that made them impossible to forget. Even shows that have not been watched in years can bring back remarkably specific memories the moment someone mentions the title. Whether they were family sitcoms, action series, workplace comedies, or completely bizarre television experiments, these shows became part of the cultural landscape of the decade and left behind moments that audiences still remember today.

The post 15 Shows You Remember from the 1980s appeared first on Den of Geek.

The Walking Dead may have concluded its run back in 2022, but the universe lives on in a string of spinoffs like Dead City and Daryl Dixon. Not content with waiting for viewers to demand more franchise stories, AMC also explored a few spinoffs while the mothership show was still on the air. But how many of those spinoffs are worth a watch, and how many of them should you feel comfortable skipping?

We’re ranking every The Walking Dead spinoff so you can figure out if you should spend your precious time on them. However, if you’re a true Walking Dead completist and you’ve already seen them all, feel free to have a read through and let us know if you’d rank them differently in the comments!

6. The Walking Dead: World Beyond

Unfortunately, The Walking Dead: World Beyond lands at the bottom of our ranking because its first season was so slow and unengaging. We spent a lot of time following its group of teens as they navigated the universe’s post-apocalyptic world, but this coming-of-age focus sacrificed the gritty survival drama we expected from The Walking Dead universe, and it didn’t help that the characters were extremely unmemorable.

To be fair, some of them did develop as the series went on, but we were way too frustrated by that point. The fact that the show was also marketed as the key to understanding the mysterious Civic Republic Military, but then saved all that good stuff until the second season, only added to its problems.

Still, World Beyond wasn’t all bad. The second season was a decent improvement, with much better pacing and a greater focus on the CRM. And if you’re thinking about checking out The Ones Who Live, it offers some good background on the shady group ahead of Rick’s encounter with them; it’s just not very compelling on its own.

5. Tales of the Walking Dead

Tales of the Walking Dead earned points for trying something different, as its anthology format allowed the show to experiment with different characters and genres without getting bogged down in longer arcs and lore. One highlight was the fascinating “Blair/Gina,” which used a time-loop structure to introduce two new people (Parker Posey and Jillian Bell) who disliked each other at first but grew closer as events repeated. It was a fun and funny installment far removed from the typically grim storytelling of The Walking Dead.

The spinoff also added depth to characters we already knew, like the villainous Alpha (Samantha Morton). In the episode “Dee,” we saw how Alpha’s violent nature initially grew out of a desire to simply protect her daughter, bringing context to some of her terrible actions in the mothership show.

Giving characters one episode to evolve had its drawbacks, though. Some of their development felt rushed and their decisions too convenient, and unlike the mainline series, we often weren’t attached enough to this new blood to care what happened to them. Overall, this made Tales of the Walking Dead feel like a passing amusement that faded into the background quite quickly as the larger storyline came back into focus.

4. The Walking Dead: Dead City

Maggie and Negan’s long-running beef over the murder of Maggie’s husband, Glenn, continues in this lively Walking Dead spinoff, which takes the action to New York and shows how Negan’s mentorship and leadership style have corrupted things there, too.

We’re thrown into a scenario where Maggie’s son Hershel has been taken by The Croat, one of Negan’s old Saviors, so Maggie reluctantly teams up with Negan to rescue him. Negan’s knowledge of The Croat proves useful as he and Maggie run into rival New York factions, and the city’s crumbling skyscraper setting makes everything feel more claustrophobic.

The show paints a tragic portrait of two of The Walking Dead’s most beloved characters. Since the mainline series wrapped up, they’ve both tried to move on, with Negan starting a family but unable to properly care for them, and Maggie trying (and failing) to connect with Hershel while still consumed by vengeance. It’s also quite a visually impactful show, offering a daunting snapshot of Manhattan’s dense urban environment left to fall apart. New York is a dangerous city for Negan and Maggie to be roaming around in, and there are more threats around every corner than ever before, so the tension is always high.

Though the first two seasons of this post-Walking Dead show didn’t reach the philosophical highs of Daryl Dixon or the excitement of bringing back Rick Grimes in The Ones Who Live, it’s still a watchable zombie romp that explores some fascinating themes of redemption and love in this post-apocalyptic world.

3. The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live

Years after he disappeared in the mothership show, Michonne finally locates Rick Grimes in this “one and done” spinoff that gives us a long-awaited conclusion to Rick’s storyline. It turns out that Rick has been trapped with the Civic Republic Military for a long time, and we get a really emotional reunion between him and his wife before she also realizes that escaping the CRM will prove tricky.

Boasting higher production values than the main series and a more focused story, The Ones Who Live is a satisfying end to Rick and Michonne’s onscreen romance and offers a truly cinematic look behind the curtain at the long-feared CRM baddies. It’s lacking some of the intricate world-building that something like Daryl Dixon manages to pull off, yet it’s still a great watch for anyone who made it through The Walking Dead but really missed Rick after Andrew Lincoln was written out of the show.

The Ones Who Live certainly isn’t a spinoff for newcomers, and the limited nature of the series makes it feel a little rushed at times, which is why it didn’t rank any higher on this list. Despite that, it’s a solid adventure in the Walking Dead universe for OG fans.

2. Fear the Walking Dead

Developed as a companion series to the mothership show, Fear the Walking Dead eventually ran for eight seasons alongside it. Though the first seasons were considered rocky, depicting the start of the zombie apocalypse through the eyes of a new group of survivors, the show got a significant boost after a post-season 3 soft reboot that added a Morgan Jones (Lennie James) casting crossover.

Honestly, we quite liked the vibe of those first seasons. It was interesting to see how ordinary people reacted to the outbreak when it first began. We often heard stories about those events in other characters’ lives, told through their memories, but seeing them play out visually was a real treat. Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) also proved to be a fascinating lead character, initially depicted as a woman trying to save her family, yet evolving into someone more morally grey and complex.

Fear the Walking Dead’s main problems mirrored those that can affect many long-running shows. As the series progressed, the start of the apocalypse slipped into the rearview mirror, and conflicts between rival groups overshadowed the initial struggles. While some episodes were action-packed and fantastic, others slowed the pace to focus on deeper character development instead of moving the story forward, while the show also threw the characters into some entirely unrealistic situations to make things exciting again. The Walking Dead had some of those by that point, but many felt that having two shows set in the same universe on the air with similar pacing and story problems was too much.

Nevertheless, Fear the Walking Dead avoided becoming too repetitive by moving the action from Los Angeles to Mexico and Texas, giving our characters fresh challenges. The Abigail yacht escape and the conflicts on the Mexican ranch particularly stand out as great, memorable scenarios in the series’ tenure and definitely add to the spinoff’s rewatchability.

1. The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon

At the time of writing, Daryl Dixon hasn’t finished its run, but it’s still the best Walking Dead spinoff by a long chalk. Any future series set in this universe is going to have to pull out a lot of stops to beat it!

After years of stories set in the U.S., the show finally moves the zombie action to France and beyond, and these unfamiliar locations and new pockets of survivors (who Daryl often struggles to understand) make the Walking Dead world feel instantly bigger and more daunting.

The show also flaunts visuals that match its ambition. In the first season alone, we’re treated to sweeping shots of the French countryside, medieval castles, old cathedrals, and ruined cities, and the show uses them to build genuinely great moods and tension – the kind that the mothership series was starting to really lack in its later seasons.

Of course, the spinoff’s central character is a big draw. Norman Reedus has long been one of the franchise’s most popular actors, but this series gives his character room to grow in ways that weren’t always possible in a large ensemble, and Reedus opens up different sides of his character lost in European danger zones while still staying true to the person he’s always been. Later in the show, Carol shows up as well, and the pair’s enduring friendship proves to be never anything less than fantastic.

Daryl Dixon also refreshes the horror elements that made The Walking Dead so fun and scary early on. Its faster, stronger, weirder walkers are truly unsettling, bringing a real sense of unpredictability back to the zombie universe. But ultimately, Daryl Dixon is the best of the spinoffs because it has delivered something fresh and (so far) utterly unique.

The post Ranking Every Spinoff of The Walking Dead appeared first on Den of Geek.

There was a time when you could go almost anywhere and somehow run into the same television shows. They were on constantly, people talked about them at work, classmates quoted them, commercials referenced them, and entire conversations could revolve around what happened in the latest episode. Even if you never watched them yourself, avoiding them completely was practically impossible. Some became cultural landmarks because of their enormous audiences, while others simply seemed to be playing on every television in every waiting room, restaurant, or living room you entered. These are the shows that felt less like television programs and more like unavoidable parts of everyday life.

The post 15 Shows from the Past it Felt Impossible to Escape appeared first on Den of Geek.

The Walking Dead may have concluded its run back in 2022, but the universe lives on in a string of spinoffs like Dead City and Daryl Dixon. Not content with waiting for viewers to demand more franchise stories, AMC also explored a few spinoffs while the mothership show was still on the air. But how many of those spinoffs are worth a watch, and how many of them should you feel comfortable skipping?

We’re ranking every The Walking Dead spinoff so you can figure out if you should spend your precious time on them. However, if you’re a true Walking Dead completist and you’ve already seen them all, feel free to have a read through and let us know if you’d rank them differently in the comments!

6. The Walking Dead: World Beyond

Unfortunately, The Walking Dead: World Beyond lands at the bottom of our ranking because its first season was so slow and unengaging. We spent a lot of time following its group of teens as they navigated the universe’s post-apocalyptic world, but this coming-of-age focus sacrificed the gritty survival drama we expected from The Walking Dead universe, and it didn’t help that the characters were extremely unmemorable.

To be fair, some of them did develop as the series went on, but we were way too frustrated by that point. The fact that the show was also marketed as the key to understanding the mysterious Civic Republic Military, but then saved all that good stuff until the second season, only added to its problems.

Still, World Beyond wasn’t all bad. The second season was a decent improvement, with much better pacing and a greater focus on the CRM. And if you’re thinking about checking out The Ones Who Live, it offers some good background on the shady group ahead of Rick’s encounter with them; it’s just not very compelling on its own.

5. Tales of the Walking Dead

Tales of the Walking Dead earned points for trying something different, as its anthology format allowed the show to experiment with different characters and genres without getting bogged down in longer arcs and lore. One highlight was the fascinating “Blair/Gina,” which used a time-loop structure to introduce two new people (Parker Posey and Jillian Bell) who disliked each other at first but grew closer as events repeated. It was a fun and funny installment far removed from the typically grim storytelling of The Walking Dead.

The spinoff also added depth to characters we already knew, like the villainous Alpha (Samantha Morton). In the episode “Dee,” we saw how Alpha’s violent nature initially grew out of a desire to simply protect her daughter, bringing context to some of her terrible actions in the mothership show.

Giving characters one episode to evolve had its drawbacks, though. Some of their development felt rushed and their decisions too convenient, and unlike the mainline series, we often weren’t attached enough to this new blood to care what happened to them. Overall, this made Tales of the Walking Dead feel like a passing amusement that faded into the background quite quickly as the larger storyline came back into focus.

4. The Walking Dead: Dead City

Maggie and Negan’s long-running beef over the murder of Maggie’s husband, Glenn, continues in this lively Walking Dead spinoff, which takes the action to New York and shows how Negan’s mentorship and leadership style have corrupted things there, too.

We’re thrown into a scenario where Maggie’s son Hershel has been taken by The Croat, one of Negan’s old Saviors, so Maggie reluctantly teams up with Negan to rescue him. Negan’s knowledge of The Croat proves useful as he and Maggie run into rival New York factions, and the city’s crumbling skyscraper setting makes everything feel more claustrophobic.

The show paints a tragic portrait of two of The Walking Dead’s most beloved characters. Since the mainline series wrapped up, they’ve both tried to move on, with Negan starting a family but unable to properly care for them, and Maggie trying (and failing) to connect with Hershel while still consumed by vengeance. It’s also quite a visually impactful show, offering a daunting snapshot of Manhattan’s dense urban environment left to fall apart. New York is a dangerous city for Negan and Maggie to be roaming around in, and there are more threats around every corner than ever before, so the tension is always high.

Though the first two seasons of this post-Walking Dead show didn’t reach the philosophical highs of Daryl Dixon or the excitement of bringing back Rick Grimes in The Ones Who Live, it’s still a watchable zombie romp that explores some fascinating themes of redemption and love in this post-apocalyptic world.

3. The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live

Years after he disappeared in the mothership show, Michonne finally locates Rick Grimes in this “one and done” spinoff that gives us a long-awaited conclusion to Rick’s storyline. It turns out that Rick has been trapped with the Civic Republic Military for a long time, and we get a really emotional reunion between him and his wife before she also realizes that escaping the CRM will prove tricky.

Boasting higher production values than the main series and a more focused story, The Ones Who Live is a satisfying end to Rick and Michonne’s onscreen romance and offers a truly cinematic look behind the curtain at the long-feared CRM baddies. It’s lacking some of the intricate world-building that something like Daryl Dixon manages to pull off, yet it’s still a great watch for anyone who made it through The Walking Dead but really missed Rick after Andrew Lincoln was written out of the show.

The Ones Who Live certainly isn’t a spinoff for newcomers, and the limited nature of the series makes it feel a little rushed at times, which is why it didn’t rank any higher on this list. Despite that, it’s a solid adventure in the Walking Dead universe for OG fans.

2. Fear the Walking Dead

Developed as a companion series to the mothership show, Fear the Walking Dead eventually ran for eight seasons alongside it. Though the first seasons were considered rocky, depicting the start of the zombie apocalypse through the eyes of a new group of survivors, the show got a significant boost after a post-season 3 soft reboot that added a Morgan Jones (Lennie James) casting crossover.

Honestly, we quite liked the vibe of those first seasons. It was interesting to see how ordinary people reacted to the outbreak when it first began. We often heard stories about those events in other characters’ lives, told through their memories, but seeing them play out visually was a real treat. Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) also proved to be a fascinating lead character, initially depicted as a woman trying to save her family, yet evolving into someone more morally grey and complex.

Fear the Walking Dead’s main problems mirrored those that can affect many long-running shows. As the series progressed, the start of the apocalypse slipped into the rearview mirror, and conflicts between rival groups overshadowed the initial struggles. While some episodes were action-packed and fantastic, others slowed the pace to focus on deeper character development instead of moving the story forward, while the show also threw the characters into some entirely unrealistic situations to make things exciting again. The Walking Dead had some of those by that point, but many felt that having two shows set in the same universe on the air with similar pacing and story problems was too much.

Nevertheless, Fear the Walking Dead avoided becoming too repetitive by moving the action from Los Angeles to Mexico and Texas, giving our characters fresh challenges. The Abigail yacht escape and the conflicts on the Mexican ranch particularly stand out as great, memorable scenarios in the series’ tenure and definitely add to the spinoff’s rewatchability.

1. The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon

At the time of writing, Daryl Dixon hasn’t finished its run, but it’s still the best Walking Dead spinoff by a long chalk. Any future series set in this universe is going to have to pull out a lot of stops to beat it!

After years of stories set in the U.S., the show finally moves the zombie action to France and beyond, and these unfamiliar locations and new pockets of survivors (who Daryl often struggles to understand) make the Walking Dead world feel instantly bigger and more daunting.

The show also flaunts visuals that match its ambition. In the first season alone, we’re treated to sweeping shots of the French countryside, medieval castles, old cathedrals, and ruined cities, and the show uses them to build genuinely great moods and tension – the kind that the mothership series was starting to really lack in its later seasons.

Of course, the spinoff’s central character is a big draw. Norman Reedus has long been one of the franchise’s most popular actors, but this series gives his character room to grow in ways that weren’t always possible in a large ensemble, and Reedus opens up different sides of his character lost in European danger zones while still staying true to the person he’s always been. Later in the show, Carol shows up as well, and the pair’s enduring friendship proves to be never anything less than fantastic.

Daryl Dixon also refreshes the horror elements that made The Walking Dead so fun and scary early on. Its faster, stronger, weirder walkers are truly unsettling, bringing a real sense of unpredictability back to the zombie universe. But ultimately, Daryl Dixon is the best of the spinoffs because it has delivered something fresh and (so far) utterly unique.

The post Ranking Every Spinoff of The Walking Dead appeared first on Den of Geek.

The experiences we have at work are as varied as there are people on Earth, so not all claims of what happens in the workplace should be taken as fact. However, having insider knowledge of the ins and outs of certain companies can be more of a boon than a burden.

A recent Reddit thread asked people to share the things they learned on the job that customers, patients, travelers, and the general public probably never see, letting us have a peek at that insight. We’ve rounded up some of the strangest and darkest claims, always keeping in mind that this is just one side of the story.

The post 15 Ex-Employees Spill Their Dark or Unethical Company Secrets appeared first on Den of Geek.

The Walking Dead may have concluded its run back in 2022, but the universe lives on in a string of spinoffs like Dead City and Daryl Dixon. Not content with waiting for viewers to demand more franchise stories, AMC also explored a few spinoffs while the mothership show was still on the air. But how many of those spinoffs are worth a watch, and how many of them should you feel comfortable skipping?

We’re ranking every The Walking Dead spinoff so you can figure out if you should spend your precious time on them. However, if you’re a true Walking Dead completist and you’ve already seen them all, feel free to have a read through and let us know if you’d rank them differently in the comments!

6. The Walking Dead: World Beyond

Unfortunately, The Walking Dead: World Beyond lands at the bottom of our ranking because its first season was so slow and unengaging. We spent a lot of time following its group of teens as they navigated the universe’s post-apocalyptic world, but this coming-of-age focus sacrificed the gritty survival drama we expected from The Walking Dead universe, and it didn’t help that the characters were extremely unmemorable.

To be fair, some of them did develop as the series went on, but we were way too frustrated by that point. The fact that the show was also marketed as the key to understanding the mysterious Civic Republic Military, but then saved all that good stuff until the second season, only added to its problems.

Still, World Beyond wasn’t all bad. The second season was a decent improvement, with much better pacing and a greater focus on the CRM. And if you’re thinking about checking out The Ones Who Live, it offers some good background on the shady group ahead of Rick’s encounter with them; it’s just not very compelling on its own.

5. Tales of the Walking Dead

Tales of the Walking Dead earned points for trying something different, as its anthology format allowed the show to experiment with different characters and genres without getting bogged down in longer arcs and lore. One highlight was the fascinating “Blair/Gina,” which used a time-loop structure to introduce two new people (Parker Posey and Jillian Bell) who disliked each other at first but grew closer as events repeated. It was a fun and funny installment far removed from the typically grim storytelling of The Walking Dead.

The spinoff also added depth to characters we already knew, like the villainous Alpha (Samantha Morton). In the episode “Dee,” we saw how Alpha’s violent nature initially grew out of a desire to simply protect her daughter, bringing context to some of her terrible actions in the mothership show.

Giving characters one episode to evolve had its drawbacks, though. Some of their development felt rushed and their decisions too convenient, and unlike the mainline series, we often weren’t attached enough to this new blood to care what happened to them. Overall, this made Tales of the Walking Dead feel like a passing amusement that faded into the background quite quickly as the larger storyline came back into focus.

4. The Walking Dead: Dead City

Maggie and Negan’s long-running beef over the murder of Maggie’s husband, Glenn, continues in this lively Walking Dead spinoff, which takes the action to New York and shows how Negan’s mentorship and leadership style have corrupted things there, too.

We’re thrown into a scenario where Maggie’s son Hershel has been taken by The Croat, one of Negan’s old Saviors, so Maggie reluctantly teams up with Negan to rescue him. Negan’s knowledge of The Croat proves useful as he and Maggie run into rival New York factions, and the city’s crumbling skyscraper setting makes everything feel more claustrophobic.

The show paints a tragic portrait of two of The Walking Dead’s most beloved characters. Since the mainline series wrapped up, they’ve both tried to move on, with Negan starting a family but unable to properly care for them, and Maggie trying (and failing) to connect with Hershel while still consumed by vengeance. It’s also quite a visually impactful show, offering a daunting snapshot of Manhattan’s dense urban environment left to fall apart. New York is a dangerous city for Negan and Maggie to be roaming around in, and there are more threats around every corner than ever before, so the tension is always high.

Though the first two seasons of this post-Walking Dead show didn’t reach the philosophical highs of Daryl Dixon or the excitement of bringing back Rick Grimes in The Ones Who Live, it’s still a watchable zombie romp that explores some fascinating themes of redemption and love in this post-apocalyptic world.

3. The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live

Years after he disappeared in the mothership show, Michonne finally locates Rick Grimes in this “one and done” spinoff that gives us a long-awaited conclusion to Rick’s storyline. It turns out that Rick has been trapped with the Civic Republic Military for a long time, and we get a really emotional reunion between him and his wife before she also realizes that escaping the CRM will prove tricky.

Boasting higher production values than the main series and a more focused story, The Ones Who Live is a satisfying end to Rick and Michonne’s onscreen romance and offers a truly cinematic look behind the curtain at the long-feared CRM baddies. It’s lacking some of the intricate world-building that something like Daryl Dixon manages to pull off, yet it’s still a great watch for anyone who made it through The Walking Dead but really missed Rick after Andrew Lincoln was written out of the show.

The Ones Who Live certainly isn’t a spinoff for newcomers, and the limited nature of the series makes it feel a little rushed at times, which is why it didn’t rank any higher on this list. Despite that, it’s a solid adventure in the Walking Dead universe for OG fans.

2. Fear the Walking Dead

Developed as a companion series to the mothership show, Fear the Walking Dead eventually ran for eight seasons alongside it. Though the first seasons were considered rocky, depicting the start of the zombie apocalypse through the eyes of a new group of survivors, the show got a significant boost after a post-season 3 soft reboot that added a Morgan Jones (Lennie James) casting crossover.

Honestly, we quite liked the vibe of those first seasons. It was interesting to see how ordinary people reacted to the outbreak when it first began. We often heard stories about those events in other characters’ lives, told through their memories, but seeing them play out visually was a real treat. Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) also proved to be a fascinating lead character, initially depicted as a woman trying to save her family, yet evolving into someone more morally grey and complex.

Fear the Walking Dead’s main problems mirrored those that can affect many long-running shows. As the series progressed, the start of the apocalypse slipped into the rearview mirror, and conflicts between rival groups overshadowed the initial struggles. While some episodes were action-packed and fantastic, others slowed the pace to focus on deeper character development instead of moving the story forward, while the show also threw the characters into some entirely unrealistic situations to make things exciting again. The Walking Dead had some of those by that point, but many felt that having two shows set in the same universe on the air with similar pacing and story problems was too much.

Nevertheless, Fear the Walking Dead avoided becoming too repetitive by moving the action from Los Angeles to Mexico and Texas, giving our characters fresh challenges. The Abigail yacht escape and the conflicts on the Mexican ranch particularly stand out as great, memorable scenarios in the series’ tenure and definitely add to the spinoff’s rewatchability.

1. The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon

At the time of writing, Daryl Dixon hasn’t finished its run, but it’s still the best Walking Dead spinoff by a long chalk. Any future series set in this universe is going to have to pull out a lot of stops to beat it!

After years of stories set in the U.S., the show finally moves the zombie action to France and beyond, and these unfamiliar locations and new pockets of survivors (who Daryl often struggles to understand) make the Walking Dead world feel instantly bigger and more daunting.

The show also flaunts visuals that match its ambition. In the first season alone, we’re treated to sweeping shots of the French countryside, medieval castles, old cathedrals, and ruined cities, and the show uses them to build genuinely great moods and tension – the kind that the mothership series was starting to really lack in its later seasons.

Of course, the spinoff’s central character is a big draw. Norman Reedus has long been one of the franchise’s most popular actors, but this series gives his character room to grow in ways that weren’t always possible in a large ensemble, and Reedus opens up different sides of his character lost in European danger zones while still staying true to the person he’s always been. Later in the show, Carol shows up as well, and the pair’s enduring friendship proves to be never anything less than fantastic.

Daryl Dixon also refreshes the horror elements that made The Walking Dead so fun and scary early on. Its faster, stronger, weirder walkers are truly unsettling, bringing a real sense of unpredictability back to the zombie universe. But ultimately, Daryl Dixon is the best of the spinoffs because it has delivered something fresh and (so far) utterly unique.

The post Ranking Every Spinoff of The Walking Dead appeared first on Den of Geek.

The world of lions is full of shifting power dynamics, fragile monarchies, and feline strife. This applies not only to The Lion King; it extends into the savannas of Africa, where the roiling ecosystems showcase clashes between beasts of all shapes and sizes.  An upcoming docuseries is set to explore the exciting world of a […]

The post Lion: Exclusive First Look at Nat Geo Doc Is a Real Life Lion King Moment appeared first on Den of Geek.

The Walking Dead may have concluded its run back in 2022, but the universe lives on in a string of spinoffs like Dead City and Daryl Dixon. Not content with waiting for viewers to demand more franchise stories, AMC also explored a few spinoffs while the mothership show was still on the air. But how many of those spinoffs are worth a watch, and how many of them should you feel comfortable skipping?

We’re ranking every The Walking Dead spinoff so you can figure out if you should spend your precious time on them. However, if you’re a true Walking Dead completist and you’ve already seen them all, feel free to have a read through and let us know if you’d rank them differently in the comments!

6. The Walking Dead: World Beyond

Unfortunately, The Walking Dead: World Beyond lands at the bottom of our ranking because its first season was so slow and unengaging. We spent a lot of time following its group of teens as they navigated the universe’s post-apocalyptic world, but this coming-of-age focus sacrificed the gritty survival drama we expected from The Walking Dead universe, and it didn’t help that the characters were extremely unmemorable.

To be fair, some of them did develop as the series went on, but we were way too frustrated by that point. The fact that the show was also marketed as the key to understanding the mysterious Civic Republic Military, but then saved all that good stuff until the second season, only added to its problems.

Still, World Beyond wasn’t all bad. The second season was a decent improvement, with much better pacing and a greater focus on the CRM. And if you’re thinking about checking out The Ones Who Live, it offers some good background on the shady group ahead of Rick’s encounter with them; it’s just not very compelling on its own.

5. Tales of the Walking Dead

Tales of the Walking Dead earned points for trying something different, as its anthology format allowed the show to experiment with different characters and genres without getting bogged down in longer arcs and lore. One highlight was the fascinating “Blair/Gina,” which used a time-loop structure to introduce two new people (Parker Posey and Jillian Bell) who disliked each other at first but grew closer as events repeated. It was a fun and funny installment far removed from the typically grim storytelling of The Walking Dead.

The spinoff also added depth to characters we already knew, like the villainous Alpha (Samantha Morton). In the episode “Dee,” we saw how Alpha’s violent nature initially grew out of a desire to simply protect her daughter, bringing context to some of her terrible actions in the mothership show.

Giving characters one episode to evolve had its drawbacks, though. Some of their development felt rushed and their decisions too convenient, and unlike the mainline series, we often weren’t attached enough to this new blood to care what happened to them. Overall, this made Tales of the Walking Dead feel like a passing amusement that faded into the background quite quickly as the larger storyline came back into focus.

4. The Walking Dead: Dead City

Maggie and Negan’s long-running beef over the murder of Maggie’s husband, Glenn, continues in this lively Walking Dead spinoff, which takes the action to New York and shows how Negan’s mentorship and leadership style have corrupted things there, too.

We’re thrown into a scenario where Maggie’s son Hershel has been taken by The Croat, one of Negan’s old Saviors, so Maggie reluctantly teams up with Negan to rescue him. Negan’s knowledge of The Croat proves useful as he and Maggie run into rival New York factions, and the city’s crumbling skyscraper setting makes everything feel more claustrophobic.

The show paints a tragic portrait of two of The Walking Dead’s most beloved characters. Since the mainline series wrapped up, they’ve both tried to move on, with Negan starting a family but unable to properly care for them, and Maggie trying (and failing) to connect with Hershel while still consumed by vengeance. It’s also quite a visually impactful show, offering a daunting snapshot of Manhattan’s dense urban environment left to fall apart. New York is a dangerous city for Negan and Maggie to be roaming around in, and there are more threats around every corner than ever before, so the tension is always high.

Though the first two seasons of this post-Walking Dead show didn’t reach the philosophical highs of Daryl Dixon or the excitement of bringing back Rick Grimes in The Ones Who Live, it’s still a watchable zombie romp that explores some fascinating themes of redemption and love in this post-apocalyptic world.

3. The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live

Years after he disappeared in the mothership show, Michonne finally locates Rick Grimes in this “one and done” spinoff that gives us a long-awaited conclusion to Rick’s storyline. It turns out that Rick has been trapped with the Civic Republic Military for a long time, and we get a really emotional reunion between him and his wife before she also realizes that escaping the CRM will prove tricky.

Boasting higher production values than the main series and a more focused story, The Ones Who Live is a satisfying end to Rick and Michonne’s onscreen romance and offers a truly cinematic look behind the curtain at the long-feared CRM baddies. It’s lacking some of the intricate world-building that something like Daryl Dixon manages to pull off, yet it’s still a great watch for anyone who made it through The Walking Dead but really missed Rick after Andrew Lincoln was written out of the show.

The Ones Who Live certainly isn’t a spinoff for newcomers, and the limited nature of the series makes it feel a little rushed at times, which is why it didn’t rank any higher on this list. Despite that, it’s a solid adventure in the Walking Dead universe for OG fans.

2. Fear the Walking Dead

Developed as a companion series to the mothership show, Fear the Walking Dead eventually ran for eight seasons alongside it. Though the first seasons were considered rocky, depicting the start of the zombie apocalypse through the eyes of a new group of survivors, the show got a significant boost after a post-season 3 soft reboot that added a Morgan Jones (Lennie James) casting crossover.

Honestly, we quite liked the vibe of those first seasons. It was interesting to see how ordinary people reacted to the outbreak when it first began. We often heard stories about those events in other characters’ lives, told through their memories, but seeing them play out visually was a real treat. Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) also proved to be a fascinating lead character, initially depicted as a woman trying to save her family, yet evolving into someone more morally grey and complex.

Fear the Walking Dead’s main problems mirrored those that can affect many long-running shows. As the series progressed, the start of the apocalypse slipped into the rearview mirror, and conflicts between rival groups overshadowed the initial struggles. While some episodes were action-packed and fantastic, others slowed the pace to focus on deeper character development instead of moving the story forward, while the show also threw the characters into some entirely unrealistic situations to make things exciting again. The Walking Dead had some of those by that point, but many felt that having two shows set in the same universe on the air with similar pacing and story problems was too much.

Nevertheless, Fear the Walking Dead avoided becoming too repetitive by moving the action from Los Angeles to Mexico and Texas, giving our characters fresh challenges. The Abigail yacht escape and the conflicts on the Mexican ranch particularly stand out as great, memorable scenarios in the series’ tenure and definitely add to the spinoff’s rewatchability.

1. The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon

At the time of writing, Daryl Dixon hasn’t finished its run, but it’s still the best Walking Dead spinoff by a long chalk. Any future series set in this universe is going to have to pull out a lot of stops to beat it!

After years of stories set in the U.S., the show finally moves the zombie action to France and beyond, and these unfamiliar locations and new pockets of survivors (who Daryl often struggles to understand) make the Walking Dead world feel instantly bigger and more daunting.

The show also flaunts visuals that match its ambition. In the first season alone, we’re treated to sweeping shots of the French countryside, medieval castles, old cathedrals, and ruined cities, and the show uses them to build genuinely great moods and tension – the kind that the mothership series was starting to really lack in its later seasons.

Of course, the spinoff’s central character is a big draw. Norman Reedus has long been one of the franchise’s most popular actors, but this series gives his character room to grow in ways that weren’t always possible in a large ensemble, and Reedus opens up different sides of his character lost in European danger zones while still staying true to the person he’s always been. Later in the show, Carol shows up as well, and the pair’s enduring friendship proves to be never anything less than fantastic.

Daryl Dixon also refreshes the horror elements that made The Walking Dead so fun and scary early on. Its faster, stronger, weirder walkers are truly unsettling, bringing a real sense of unpredictability back to the zombie universe. But ultimately, Daryl Dixon is the best of the spinoffs because it has delivered something fresh and (so far) utterly unique.

The post Ranking Every Spinoff of The Walking Dead appeared first on Den of Geek.

The Walking Dead may have concluded its run back in 2022, but the universe lives on in a string of spinoffs like Dead City and Daryl Dixon. Not content with waiting for viewers to demand more franchise stories, AMC also explored a few spinoffs while the mothership show was still on the air. But how […]

The post Ranking Every Spinoff of The Walking Dead appeared first on Den of Geek.

The Walking Dead may have concluded its run back in 2022, but the universe lives on in a string of spinoffs like Dead City and Daryl Dixon. Not content with waiting for viewers to demand more franchise stories, AMC also explored a few spinoffs while the mothership show was still on the air. But how many of those spinoffs are worth a watch, and how many of them should you feel comfortable skipping?

We’re ranking every The Walking Dead spinoff so you can figure out if you should spend your precious time on them. However, if you’re a true Walking Dead completist and you’ve already seen them all, feel free to have a read through and let us know if you’d rank them differently in the comments!

6. The Walking Dead: World Beyond

Unfortunately, The Walking Dead: World Beyond lands at the bottom of our ranking because its first season was so slow and unengaging. We spent a lot of time following its group of teens as they navigated the universe’s post-apocalyptic world, but this coming-of-age focus sacrificed the gritty survival drama we expected from The Walking Dead universe, and it didn’t help that the characters were extremely unmemorable.

To be fair, some of them did develop as the series went on, but we were way too frustrated by that point. The fact that the show was also marketed as the key to understanding the mysterious Civic Republic Military, but then saved all that good stuff until the second season, only added to its problems.

Still, World Beyond wasn’t all bad. The second season was a decent improvement, with much better pacing and a greater focus on the CRM. And if you’re thinking about checking out The Ones Who Live, it offers some good background on the shady group ahead of Rick’s encounter with them; it’s just not very compelling on its own.

5. Tales of the Walking Dead

Tales of the Walking Dead earned points for trying something different, as its anthology format allowed the show to experiment with different characters and genres without getting bogged down in longer arcs and lore. One highlight was the fascinating “Blair/Gina,” which used a time-loop structure to introduce two new people (Parker Posey and Jillian Bell) who disliked each other at first but grew closer as events repeated. It was a fun and funny installment far removed from the typically grim storytelling of The Walking Dead.

The spinoff also added depth to characters we already knew, like the villainous Alpha (Samantha Morton). In the episode “Dee,” we saw how Alpha’s violent nature initially grew out of a desire to simply protect her daughter, bringing context to some of her terrible actions in the mothership show.

Giving characters one episode to evolve had its drawbacks, though. Some of their development felt rushed and their decisions too convenient, and unlike the mainline series, we often weren’t attached enough to this new blood to care what happened to them. Overall, this made Tales of the Walking Dead feel like a passing amusement that faded into the background quite quickly as the larger storyline came back into focus.

4. The Walking Dead: Dead City

Maggie and Negan’s long-running beef over the murder of Maggie’s husband, Glenn, continues in this lively Walking Dead spinoff, which takes the action to New York and shows how Negan’s mentorship and leadership style have corrupted things there, too.

We’re thrown into a scenario where Maggie’s son Hershel has been taken by The Croat, one of Negan’s old Saviors, so Maggie reluctantly teams up with Negan to rescue him. Negan’s knowledge of The Croat proves useful as he and Maggie run into rival New York factions, and the city’s crumbling skyscraper setting makes everything feel more claustrophobic.

The show paints a tragic portrait of two of The Walking Dead’s most beloved characters. Since the mainline series wrapped up, they’ve both tried to move on, with Negan starting a family but unable to properly care for them, and Maggie trying (and failing) to connect with Hershel while still consumed by vengeance. It’s also quite a visually impactful show, offering a daunting snapshot of Manhattan’s dense urban environment left to fall apart. New York is a dangerous city for Negan and Maggie to be roaming around in, and there are more threats around every corner than ever before, so the tension is always high.

Though the first two seasons of this post-Walking Dead show didn’t reach the philosophical highs of Daryl Dixon or the excitement of bringing back Rick Grimes in The Ones Who Live, it’s still a watchable zombie romp that explores some fascinating themes of redemption and love in this post-apocalyptic world.

3. The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live

Years after he disappeared in the mothership show, Michonne finally locates Rick Grimes in this “one and done” spinoff that gives us a long-awaited conclusion to Rick’s storyline. It turns out that Rick has been trapped with the Civic Republic Military for a long time, and we get a really emotional reunion between him and his wife before she also realizes that escaping the CRM will prove tricky.

Boasting higher production values than the main series and a more focused story, The Ones Who Live is a satisfying end to Rick and Michonne’s onscreen romance and offers a truly cinematic look behind the curtain at the long-feared CRM baddies. It’s lacking some of the intricate world-building that something like Daryl Dixon manages to pull off, yet it’s still a great watch for anyone who made it through The Walking Dead but really missed Rick after Andrew Lincoln was written out of the show.

The Ones Who Live certainly isn’t a spinoff for newcomers, and the limited nature of the series makes it feel a little rushed at times, which is why it didn’t rank any higher on this list. Despite that, it’s a solid adventure in the Walking Dead universe for OG fans.

2. Fear the Walking Dead

Developed as a companion series to the mothership show, Fear the Walking Dead eventually ran for eight seasons alongside it. Though the first seasons were considered rocky, depicting the start of the zombie apocalypse through the eyes of a new group of survivors, the show got a significant boost after a post-season 3 soft reboot that added a Morgan Jones (Lennie James) casting crossover.

Honestly, we quite liked the vibe of those first seasons. It was interesting to see how ordinary people reacted to the outbreak when it first began. We often heard stories about those events in other characters’ lives, told through their memories, but seeing them play out visually was a real treat. Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) also proved to be a fascinating lead character, initially depicted as a woman trying to save her family, yet evolving into someone more morally grey and complex.

Fear the Walking Dead’s main problems mirrored those that can affect many long-running shows. As the series progressed, the start of the apocalypse slipped into the rearview mirror, and conflicts between rival groups overshadowed the initial struggles. While some episodes were action-packed and fantastic, others slowed the pace to focus on deeper character development instead of moving the story forward, while the show also threw the characters into some entirely unrealistic situations to make things exciting again. The Walking Dead had some of those by that point, but many felt that having two shows set in the same universe on the air with similar pacing and story problems was too much.

Nevertheless, Fear the Walking Dead avoided becoming too repetitive by moving the action from Los Angeles to Mexico and Texas, giving our characters fresh challenges. The Abigail yacht escape and the conflicts on the Mexican ranch particularly stand out as great, memorable scenarios in the series’ tenure and definitely add to the spinoff’s rewatchability.

1. The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon

At the time of writing, Daryl Dixon hasn’t finished its run, but it’s still the best Walking Dead spinoff by a long chalk. Any future series set in this universe is going to have to pull out a lot of stops to beat it!

After years of stories set in the U.S., the show finally moves the zombie action to France and beyond, and these unfamiliar locations and new pockets of survivors (who Daryl often struggles to understand) make the Walking Dead world feel instantly bigger and more daunting.

The show also flaunts visuals that match its ambition. In the first season alone, we’re treated to sweeping shots of the French countryside, medieval castles, old cathedrals, and ruined cities, and the show uses them to build genuinely great moods and tension – the kind that the mothership series was starting to really lack in its later seasons.

Of course, the spinoff’s central character is a big draw. Norman Reedus has long been one of the franchise’s most popular actors, but this series gives his character room to grow in ways that weren’t always possible in a large ensemble, and Reedus opens up different sides of his character lost in European danger zones while still staying true to the person he’s always been. Later in the show, Carol shows up as well, and the pair’s enduring friendship proves to be never anything less than fantastic.

Daryl Dixon also refreshes the horror elements that made The Walking Dead so fun and scary early on. Its faster, stronger, weirder walkers are truly unsettling, bringing a real sense of unpredictability back to the zombie universe. But ultimately, Daryl Dixon is the best of the spinoffs because it has delivered something fresh and (so far) utterly unique.

The post Ranking Every Spinoff of The Walking Dead appeared first on Den of Geek.

What happens to a weather-controlling mutant when she gets put in an X-Men movie? Same thing that happens to every other-weather controlling mutant who gets put in an X-Men movie? She’s largely ignored, except for being saddled with the worst lines in the franchise. In the original X-Men from 2000, Halle Berry had to ask […]

The post The MCU X-Men Needs to Do Right By Storm appeared first on Den of Geek.

The Walking Dead may have concluded its run back in 2022, but the universe lives on in a string of spinoffs like Dead City and Daryl Dixon. Not content with waiting for viewers to demand more franchise stories, AMC also explored a few spinoffs while the mothership show was still on the air. But how many of those spinoffs are worth a watch, and how many of them should you feel comfortable skipping?

We’re ranking every The Walking Dead spinoff so you can figure out if you should spend your precious time on them. However, if you’re a true Walking Dead completist and you’ve already seen them all, feel free to have a read through and let us know if you’d rank them differently in the comments!

6. The Walking Dead: World Beyond

Unfortunately, The Walking Dead: World Beyond lands at the bottom of our ranking because its first season was so slow and unengaging. We spent a lot of time following its group of teens as they navigated the universe’s post-apocalyptic world, but this coming-of-age focus sacrificed the gritty survival drama we expected from The Walking Dead universe, and it didn’t help that the characters were extremely unmemorable.

To be fair, some of them did develop as the series went on, but we were way too frustrated by that point. The fact that the show was also marketed as the key to understanding the mysterious Civic Republic Military, but then saved all that good stuff until the second season, only added to its problems.

Still, World Beyond wasn’t all bad. The second season was a decent improvement, with much better pacing and a greater focus on the CRM. And if you’re thinking about checking out The Ones Who Live, it offers some good background on the shady group ahead of Rick’s encounter with them; it’s just not very compelling on its own.

5. Tales of the Walking Dead

Tales of the Walking Dead earned points for trying something different, as its anthology format allowed the show to experiment with different characters and genres without getting bogged down in longer arcs and lore. One highlight was the fascinating “Blair/Gina,” which used a time-loop structure to introduce two new people (Parker Posey and Jillian Bell) who disliked each other at first but grew closer as events repeated. It was a fun and funny installment far removed from the typically grim storytelling of The Walking Dead.

The spinoff also added depth to characters we already knew, like the villainous Alpha (Samantha Morton). In the episode “Dee,” we saw how Alpha’s violent nature initially grew out of a desire to simply protect her daughter, bringing context to some of her terrible actions in the mothership show.

Giving characters one episode to evolve had its drawbacks, though. Some of their development felt rushed and their decisions too convenient, and unlike the mainline series, we often weren’t attached enough to this new blood to care what happened to them. Overall, this made Tales of the Walking Dead feel like a passing amusement that faded into the background quite quickly as the larger storyline came back into focus.

4. The Walking Dead: Dead City

Maggie and Negan’s long-running beef over the murder of Maggie’s husband, Glenn, continues in this lively Walking Dead spinoff, which takes the action to New York and shows how Negan’s mentorship and leadership style have corrupted things there, too.

We’re thrown into a scenario where Maggie’s son Hershel has been taken by The Croat, one of Negan’s old Saviors, so Maggie reluctantly teams up with Negan to rescue him. Negan’s knowledge of The Croat proves useful as he and Maggie run into rival New York factions, and the city’s crumbling skyscraper setting makes everything feel more claustrophobic.

The show paints a tragic portrait of two of The Walking Dead’s most beloved characters. Since the mainline series wrapped up, they’ve both tried to move on, with Negan starting a family but unable to properly care for them, and Maggie trying (and failing) to connect with Hershel while still consumed by vengeance. It’s also quite a visually impactful show, offering a daunting snapshot of Manhattan’s dense urban environment left to fall apart. New York is a dangerous city for Negan and Maggie to be roaming around in, and there are more threats around every corner than ever before, so the tension is always high.

Though the first two seasons of this post-Walking Dead show didn’t reach the philosophical highs of Daryl Dixon or the excitement of bringing back Rick Grimes in The Ones Who Live, it’s still a watchable zombie romp that explores some fascinating themes of redemption and love in this post-apocalyptic world.

3. The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live

Years after he disappeared in the mothership show, Michonne finally locates Rick Grimes in this “one and done” spinoff that gives us a long-awaited conclusion to Rick’s storyline. It turns out that Rick has been trapped with the Civic Republic Military for a long time, and we get a really emotional reunion between him and his wife before she also realizes that escaping the CRM will prove tricky.

Boasting higher production values than the main series and a more focused story, The Ones Who Live is a satisfying end to Rick and Michonne’s onscreen romance and offers a truly cinematic look behind the curtain at the long-feared CRM baddies. It’s lacking some of the intricate world-building that something like Daryl Dixon manages to pull off, yet it’s still a great watch for anyone who made it through The Walking Dead but really missed Rick after Andrew Lincoln was written out of the show.

The Ones Who Live certainly isn’t a spinoff for newcomers, and the limited nature of the series makes it feel a little rushed at times, which is why it didn’t rank any higher on this list. Despite that, it’s a solid adventure in the Walking Dead universe for OG fans.

2. Fear the Walking Dead

Developed as a companion series to the mothership show, Fear the Walking Dead eventually ran for eight seasons alongside it. Though the first seasons were considered rocky, depicting the start of the zombie apocalypse through the eyes of a new group of survivors, the show got a significant boost after a post-season 3 soft reboot that added a Morgan Jones (Lennie James) casting crossover.

Honestly, we quite liked the vibe of those first seasons. It was interesting to see how ordinary people reacted to the outbreak when it first began. We often heard stories about those events in other characters’ lives, told through their memories, but seeing them play out visually was a real treat. Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) also proved to be a fascinating lead character, initially depicted as a woman trying to save her family, yet evolving into someone more morally grey and complex.

Fear the Walking Dead’s main problems mirrored those that can affect many long-running shows. As the series progressed, the start of the apocalypse slipped into the rearview mirror, and conflicts between rival groups overshadowed the initial struggles. While some episodes were action-packed and fantastic, others slowed the pace to focus on deeper character development instead of moving the story forward, while the show also threw the characters into some entirely unrealistic situations to make things exciting again. The Walking Dead had some of those by that point, but many felt that having two shows set in the same universe on the air with similar pacing and story problems was too much.

Nevertheless, Fear the Walking Dead avoided becoming too repetitive by moving the action from Los Angeles to Mexico and Texas, giving our characters fresh challenges. The Abigail yacht escape and the conflicts on the Mexican ranch particularly stand out as great, memorable scenarios in the series’ tenure and definitely add to the spinoff’s rewatchability.

1. The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon

At the time of writing, Daryl Dixon hasn’t finished its run, but it’s still the best Walking Dead spinoff by a long chalk. Any future series set in this universe is going to have to pull out a lot of stops to beat it!

After years of stories set in the U.S., the show finally moves the zombie action to France and beyond, and these unfamiliar locations and new pockets of survivors (who Daryl often struggles to understand) make the Walking Dead world feel instantly bigger and more daunting.

The show also flaunts visuals that match its ambition. In the first season alone, we’re treated to sweeping shots of the French countryside, medieval castles, old cathedrals, and ruined cities, and the show uses them to build genuinely great moods and tension – the kind that the mothership series was starting to really lack in its later seasons.

Of course, the spinoff’s central character is a big draw. Norman Reedus has long been one of the franchise’s most popular actors, but this series gives his character room to grow in ways that weren’t always possible in a large ensemble, and Reedus opens up different sides of his character lost in European danger zones while still staying true to the person he’s always been. Later in the show, Carol shows up as well, and the pair’s enduring friendship proves to be never anything less than fantastic.

Daryl Dixon also refreshes the horror elements that made The Walking Dead so fun and scary early on. Its faster, stronger, weirder walkers are truly unsettling, bringing a real sense of unpredictability back to the zombie universe. But ultimately, Daryl Dixon is the best of the spinoffs because it has delivered something fresh and (so far) utterly unique.

The post Ranking Every Spinoff of The Walking Dead appeared first on Den of Geek.

When Adam Driver was announced as the villain of the upcoming X-Men movie, fans felt both relief and confusion. Driver is one of our best working actors, someone who shines in indie films like Marriage Story and Paterson, but who can also bring depth to genre pictures, as his Kylo Ren was one of the […]

The post X-Men Has Already Got Its Mister Sinister Right With Nathaniel Milbury appeared first on Den of Geek.

The Walking Dead may have concluded its run back in 2022, but the universe lives on in a string of spinoffs like Dead City and Daryl Dixon. Not content with waiting for viewers to demand more franchise stories, AMC also explored a few spinoffs while the mothership show was still on the air. But how many of those spinoffs are worth a watch, and how many of them should you feel comfortable skipping?

We’re ranking every The Walking Dead spinoff so you can figure out if you should spend your precious time on them. However, if you’re a true Walking Dead completist and you’ve already seen them all, feel free to have a read through and let us know if you’d rank them differently in the comments!

6. The Walking Dead: World Beyond

Unfortunately, The Walking Dead: World Beyond lands at the bottom of our ranking because its first season was so slow and unengaging. We spent a lot of time following its group of teens as they navigated the universe’s post-apocalyptic world, but this coming-of-age focus sacrificed the gritty survival drama we expected from The Walking Dead universe, and it didn’t help that the characters were extremely unmemorable.

To be fair, some of them did develop as the series went on, but we were way too frustrated by that point. The fact that the show was also marketed as the key to understanding the mysterious Civic Republic Military, but then saved all that good stuff until the second season, only added to its problems.

Still, World Beyond wasn’t all bad. The second season was a decent improvement, with much better pacing and a greater focus on the CRM. And if you’re thinking about checking out The Ones Who Live, it offers some good background on the shady group ahead of Rick’s encounter with them; it’s just not very compelling on its own.

5. Tales of the Walking Dead

Tales of the Walking Dead earned points for trying something different, as its anthology format allowed the show to experiment with different characters and genres without getting bogged down in longer arcs and lore. One highlight was the fascinating “Blair/Gina,” which used a time-loop structure to introduce two new people (Parker Posey and Jillian Bell) who disliked each other at first but grew closer as events repeated. It was a fun and funny installment far removed from the typically grim storytelling of The Walking Dead.

The spinoff also added depth to characters we already knew, like the villainous Alpha (Samantha Morton). In the episode “Dee,” we saw how Alpha’s violent nature initially grew out of a desire to simply protect her daughter, bringing context to some of her terrible actions in the mothership show.

Giving characters one episode to evolve had its drawbacks, though. Some of their development felt rushed and their decisions too convenient, and unlike the mainline series, we often weren’t attached enough to this new blood to care what happened to them. Overall, this made Tales of the Walking Dead feel like a passing amusement that faded into the background quite quickly as the larger storyline came back into focus.

4. The Walking Dead: Dead City

Maggie and Negan’s long-running beef over the murder of Maggie’s husband, Glenn, continues in this lively Walking Dead spinoff, which takes the action to New York and shows how Negan’s mentorship and leadership style have corrupted things there, too.

We’re thrown into a scenario where Maggie’s son Hershel has been taken by The Croat, one of Negan’s old Saviors, so Maggie reluctantly teams up with Negan to rescue him. Negan’s knowledge of The Croat proves useful as he and Maggie run into rival New York factions, and the city’s crumbling skyscraper setting makes everything feel more claustrophobic.

The show paints a tragic portrait of two of The Walking Dead’s most beloved characters. Since the mainline series wrapped up, they’ve both tried to move on, with Negan starting a family but unable to properly care for them, and Maggie trying (and failing) to connect with Hershel while still consumed by vengeance. It’s also quite a visually impactful show, offering a daunting snapshot of Manhattan’s dense urban environment left to fall apart. New York is a dangerous city for Negan and Maggie to be roaming around in, and there are more threats around every corner than ever before, so the tension is always high.

Though the first two seasons of this post-Walking Dead show didn’t reach the philosophical highs of Daryl Dixon or the excitement of bringing back Rick Grimes in The Ones Who Live, it’s still a watchable zombie romp that explores some fascinating themes of redemption and love in this post-apocalyptic world.

3. The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live

Years after he disappeared in the mothership show, Michonne finally locates Rick Grimes in this “one and done” spinoff that gives us a long-awaited conclusion to Rick’s storyline. It turns out that Rick has been trapped with the Civic Republic Military for a long time, and we get a really emotional reunion between him and his wife before she also realizes that escaping the CRM will prove tricky.

Boasting higher production values than the main series and a more focused story, The Ones Who Live is a satisfying end to Rick and Michonne’s onscreen romance and offers a truly cinematic look behind the curtain at the long-feared CRM baddies. It’s lacking some of the intricate world-building that something like Daryl Dixon manages to pull off, yet it’s still a great watch for anyone who made it through The Walking Dead but really missed Rick after Andrew Lincoln was written out of the show.

The Ones Who Live certainly isn’t a spinoff for newcomers, and the limited nature of the series makes it feel a little rushed at times, which is why it didn’t rank any higher on this list. Despite that, it’s a solid adventure in the Walking Dead universe for OG fans.

2. Fear the Walking Dead

Developed as a companion series to the mothership show, Fear the Walking Dead eventually ran for eight seasons alongside it. Though the first seasons were considered rocky, depicting the start of the zombie apocalypse through the eyes of a new group of survivors, the show got a significant boost after a post-season 3 soft reboot that added a Morgan Jones (Lennie James) casting crossover.

Honestly, we quite liked the vibe of those first seasons. It was interesting to see how ordinary people reacted to the outbreak when it first began. We often heard stories about those events in other characters’ lives, told through their memories, but seeing them play out visually was a real treat. Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) also proved to be a fascinating lead character, initially depicted as a woman trying to save her family, yet evolving into someone more morally grey and complex.

Fear the Walking Dead’s main problems mirrored those that can affect many long-running shows. As the series progressed, the start of the apocalypse slipped into the rearview mirror, and conflicts between rival groups overshadowed the initial struggles. While some episodes were action-packed and fantastic, others slowed the pace to focus on deeper character development instead of moving the story forward, while the show also threw the characters into some entirely unrealistic situations to make things exciting again. The Walking Dead had some of those by that point, but many felt that having two shows set in the same universe on the air with similar pacing and story problems was too much.

Nevertheless, Fear the Walking Dead avoided becoming too repetitive by moving the action from Los Angeles to Mexico and Texas, giving our characters fresh challenges. The Abigail yacht escape and the conflicts on the Mexican ranch particularly stand out as great, memorable scenarios in the series’ tenure and definitely add to the spinoff’s rewatchability.

1. The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon

At the time of writing, Daryl Dixon hasn’t finished its run, but it’s still the best Walking Dead spinoff by a long chalk. Any future series set in this universe is going to have to pull out a lot of stops to beat it!

After years of stories set in the U.S., the show finally moves the zombie action to France and beyond, and these unfamiliar locations and new pockets of survivors (who Daryl often struggles to understand) make the Walking Dead world feel instantly bigger and more daunting.

The show also flaunts visuals that match its ambition. In the first season alone, we’re treated to sweeping shots of the French countryside, medieval castles, old cathedrals, and ruined cities, and the show uses them to build genuinely great moods and tension – the kind that the mothership series was starting to really lack in its later seasons.

Of course, the spinoff’s central character is a big draw. Norman Reedus has long been one of the franchise’s most popular actors, but this series gives his character room to grow in ways that weren’t always possible in a large ensemble, and Reedus opens up different sides of his character lost in European danger zones while still staying true to the person he’s always been. Later in the show, Carol shows up as well, and the pair’s enduring friendship proves to be never anything less than fantastic.

Daryl Dixon also refreshes the horror elements that made The Walking Dead so fun and scary early on. Its faster, stronger, weirder walkers are truly unsettling, bringing a real sense of unpredictability back to the zombie universe. But ultimately, Daryl Dixon is the best of the spinoffs because it has delivered something fresh and (so far) utterly unique.

The post Ranking Every Spinoff of The Walking Dead appeared first on Den of Geek.

When 12,000 fans, press, and professionals stuff themselves into Anaheim’s Honda Center you can expect electricity. And on a sweaty Southern California Friday night Disney hoped to channel that energy into another win — building on the momentum of the record breaking opening of Spider-Man: Brand New Day — on the opening night of their […]

The post Marvel Announces New X-Men Cast: Adam Driver On Board as Unexpected Villain appeared first on Den of Geek.

When 12,000 fans, press, and professionals stuff themselves into Anaheim’s Honda Center you can expect electricity. And on a sweaty Southern California Friday night Disney hoped to channel that energy into another win — building on the momentum of the record breaking opening of Spider-Man: Brand New Day — on the opening night of their “Ultimate Fan Event” D23. 

After a slew of huge announcements across the Disney spectrum, Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige came on stage and intro’d a new teaser for VisionQuest — which was very Wandavision coded — before bringing on Sadie Sink as Jean Grey. Of course, they weren’t here to talk about Spider-Man but instead the X-Men. Calling out director Jake Schreier and revealing the X-logo on screen for the first time the crowd went absolutely wild before they began introducing exactly what we’d all been waiting for…

Heartstopper‘s Kit Connor started us off as the blue eyed boy scout Scott Summers a.k.a. Cyclops, Chris Abbott as Charles Xavier followed, the previously announced genre legend Samara Weaving as Emma Frost was next, then it was the highly anticipated reveal of Storm, who is not being played by Sinners‘ star Jayme Lawson as was highly rumored but instead theater actress Maya Boyd is taking on the biggest and brightest of Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters. Highlighting the new batch of X-actors was Obsession standout Inde Navaratte as Rogue. Naravette had pitched herself for the role several times in the wake of Obsession‘s success so remember, kids: don’t let your memes stay dreams.

If that wasn’t enough, then we got a video from Adam Driver who is currently on set at Pinewood Studios. There was a fun fake out in which the Kylo Ren actor pretended he was playing Magneto, but instead revealing he’s Nathanial Millbury — one of Mister Sinister’s many alias’ — so Den of Geek got to have fun informing everyone just who he was playing and why we should be excited for his arrival as a new live-action foe for the iconic team.

The X-Men reveal at D23 caps what has been a remarkable turnaround summer for Marvel’s merry band of mutants. More than seven years after the Walt Disney Company absorbed the studio formerly known as 20th Century Fox, the Mouse House and Marvel Studios are at last showing a major desire to move beyond the Fox era of X-Men films, which ran from 2000 until 2019—or even this year if you count Marvel making the deeply nostalgic Deadpool & Wolverine in 2023 and this December’s hotly anticipated Avengers: Doomsday.

This publicly began in the same weekend that Samara Weaving was announced to be playing Emma Frost and that Sadie Sink was revealed to be playing Jean Grey in Spider-Man: Brand New Day. The one-two punch seemed designed to set the literal stage for D23 and a collective casting announcement that, along with Brand New Day, has given a much needed bolt of energy to the MCU as it heads into one of the most important films on its slate this decade: Doomsday.

Whilst that first half of a two-film event seems to offer yet one more swan song for the “Fox-Verse” era of X-Men—complete with the first time we’ve seen James Marsden as Cyclops in 12 years, and Rebecca Romjin as Mystique and Alan Cumming as Nightcrawler since the 2000s—Sink’s strikingly different interpretation on a teenage Jean Grey signals a brand new for the X-Men themselves.

Now that we’ve seen the full cast, that has become far clearer. Whereas the Fox films began in 2000 with many of the most popular characters in the comics and on the Fox Saturday morning cartoon—Wolverine, Cyclops, Jean, and Storm—Marvel seems keen on mixing familiar favorites like Jean and Rogue with what will be deeper cuts for those who only know the Fox films. For example, Weaving’s Emma Frost technically appeared as a villain briefly in 2011’s X-Men: First Class (where she was played by January Jones), but the complexity of a psychic who started as a villain but became one of the strongest personalities at Charles Xavier’s for Gifted Youngsters in the comics has never been seen. It will indeed be curious to see how the film handles her, erm, strange relationship with Scott Summers and Jean Grey given the age differences in the cast.

Furthermore, it seems as though Marvel is already seeding for a direct and compelling vision for after the divisive “Multiverse Saga” that came to define Phases Four and Five in the MCU. We have technically only met one of these cast members in character so far, but her take on Jean was scared, combative, and intensely modern for a younger generation whose idea of being socially isolated and alone looks a lot different in the world of Gen-Z social media.

This cast indicates the next “saga” will likely be younger, mutant-driven, and quite probably a lot more exciting than dealing with TVA variants.

But that’s just our speculation. Who’s your favorite casting of the new X-Team?

The post Marvel Announces New X-Men Cast: Adam Driver On Board as Unexpected Villain appeared first on Den of Geek.

How AI Is Changing Trust, Content, and Customer Relationships written by Alex McQueen read more at Duct Tape Marketing

Catch the Full Episode: Overview In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, Sara Nay sits in for John Jantsch and talks with Heidi Ellsworth, president of Roofers Coffee Shop, about how small businesses build trust with customers. Ellsworth has spent more than 30 years in roofing, much of it helping tradespeople and small […]

How AI Is Changing Trust, Content, and Customer Relationships written by Alex McQueen read more at Duct Tape Marketing

Catch the Full Episode:

Overview

In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, Sara Nay sits in for John Jantsch and talks with Heidi Ellsworth, president of Roofers Coffee Shop, about how small businesses build trust with customers. Ellsworth has spent more than 30 years in roofing, much of it helping tradespeople and small business owners tell their stories online. She and Nay talk about why online communities, directories, networking, and content still work together, and how that combination matters more now that AI shapes how people find and judge a business.

Ellsworth breaks down how she builds content: record your conversations, turn them into transcripts, then let AI help with the first draft. She and Nay also talk about what happens after the sale, where staying in touch with customers pays off, and why the best referral programs start with genuinely strong service.

This episode is for small business owners, marketing agencies, and consultants who want a grounded take on combining offline relationship-building with online content and AI tools without losing the trust that got them there.

Guest Bio

Heidi Ellsworth is president of Roofers Coffee Shop, an award-winning media and community platform serving the roofing, coatings, metal, and outdoor living industries. Ellsworth is a nationally recognized leader in the roofing industry and has helped shape how the industry connects and communicates online, she helped launch Roofers Coffee Shop with business partner Vicky Sharples in 2002, joining the company full-time in 2015. She also leads Ask A Roofer, connecting homeowners and business owners with roofing contractors.

Key Takeaways

• Recorded conversations and phone videos are raw material for content. Turn them into transcripts, then build articles, posts, and case studies from there.
• AI can speed up content creation, but it’s a drafting tool. Skipping the edit and read-through step is where AI-generated content goes wrong.
• Combining online directories, articles, and podcasts with offline efforts like community involvement and networking builds the kind of consistency that earns trust, from both people and AI search tools.
• It’s fine to talk publicly about the good work you do in your community. Sharing it amplifies the impact and supports your marketing.
• Referral programs only work when the underlying service is excellent. Incentives do not make up for a weak customer experience.

Great Moments (Timestamps)

• [00:59] – Heidi shares how watching her father, a general contractor, inspired her mission to help small businesses tell their stories.
• [03:34] – Why the combination of online communities, directories, networking, and content works so well for small businesses.
• [06:08] – How AI has raised the stakes for consistent, authentic online content.
• [09:45] – Heidi’s case for why “transcripts are gold,” and how to use AI as a tool without losing your voice.
• [14:50] – The overlooked importance of nurturing customers after the sale.
• [18:54] – Heidi’s closing advice on getting to know your online resources.

Memorable Quotes

• “It’s easier than it’s ever been [to produce content]. Transcripts are gold. If you’re looking for gold out there, transcripts are gold. So taking your phone and recording your thoughts, recording conversations, thought leadership conversations.” — Heidi Ellsworth
• “We always say people do business with people, right? They want to know who they’re doing business with, and they want to feel good about buying from you and trust.” — Heidi Ellsworth
• “You gotta think about yourself as a customer. As a customer, what do I want and what do I wanna do? And if I have a great experience, how many people am I gonna tell?” — Heidi Ellsworth
• “Do those good deeds, but it’s okay to talk about it. It’s okay because other people, other small businesses will see what you’re doing and they will follow. So it amplifies the good deed, and it also helps your marketing.” — Heidi Ellsworth

Resources

• Roofers Coffee Shop
• Ask A Roofer