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AMC is jumping on the “spin-off” bandwagon. With Breaking Bad ending, a Bob Odenkirk-headlined spinoff called “Better Call Saul” is in the works, although whether anyone will want to revisit the Breaking Bad world after last night’s devastating, bleak, and horrifying “Ozymandias” is anyone’s guess. How dark was “Ozymandias”? It makes The Walking Dead look like SHAUN OF THE DEAD.

Anyway, with zombies showing no signs of slowing their shamble to record ratings, AMC has announced a Walking Dead “companion series” based on the comics, and produced by Robert Kirkman, Gale Anne Hurd, and David Alpert. The target air date is 2015.

“Building on the success of the most popular show on television for adults 18-49 is literally a no-brainer,” AMC president and GM Charlie Collier said. “We look forward to working with Robert, Gale and Dave again as we develop an entirely new story and cast of characters. It’s a big world and we can’t wait to give fans another unforgettable view of the zombie apocalypse.”

“After 10 years of writing the comic book series and being so close to the debut of our fourth, and in my opinion, best season of the TV series, I couldn’t be more thrilled about getting the chance to create a new corner of The Walking Dead universe,” said Kirkman in a statement. “The opportunity to make a show that isn’t tethered by the events of the comic book, and is truly a blank page, has set my creativity racing.”

Kirkman’s speedy imagination aside, AMC has every reason to spin off the show: it’s a ratings juggernaut, with every season premiere setting a new record for ratings, and it’s currently cable’s #1 rated show. Even a spin-off chat fest, The Talking Dead, hosted by Chris Hardwick, has been a big ratings winner.

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It’s also a win for Kirkman, who shows signs of becoming a showbiz maven with Thief of Thieves, based on the comic published by his Skybound imprint, also set up at AMC, and another Skybound comic, CLONE, in development at Universal. Although a new TV show makes sense, interestingly, Kirkman has always resisted spinning off the comic into other titles, preferring to keep the comics brand simple. Reprints of the WALKING DEAD comics have sold more than 2 million copies thus far.

Will Image publish a comic to go along with the new show?

The Walking Dead’s fourth season, led by new showrunner Scott M. Gimple, kicks off on Oct. 13.

12 COMMENTS

  1. From what I read, the “Better Call Saul” spinoff will be a prequel to “Breaking Bad”. I can easily see them maybe bringing on a few characters (Huell?) and setting this series somewhere else (Los Angeles?) and have more of a comic feel than the obviously dour nature of BB.

  2. why would they set the series someplace else? The entire reason why Albuquerque became the setting, is because they have a big TV/Film scene and it won the production with incentives and was much more affordable than SoCal. The practicality of production influenced the story and made it special.

    Plus i think Saul established himself as a local at some point. Think the show could be fun, if they dived into some of Saul’s seedier clients.

  3. i’m excited to see what they do with a new series. I hope they create a new crop of interesting characters instead of going for the archetypes the show established. Maybe even bad guys as heroes.

  4. The Tweaking Dead, meth-head survivors in New Mexico
    The Drinking Dead, survivors in a New York ad agency
    The Flying Dead, superhero survivors
    The Running Dead, same as the parent show, but with faster moving plots

  5. Remember when Hill Street Blues spun off a lighter comedy series called “Beverly Hills Buntz” based on its’ Norman Buntz character portrayed by Dennis Franz?

    It was a epic fail.

    It didn’t work then, and it isn’t going to work for “Better Call Saul” now.

    ~

    Coat

  6. “Remember when Hill Street Blues spun off a lighter comedy series called “Beverly Hills Buntz” based on its’ Norman Buntz character portrayed by Dennis Franz?”
    It was a epic fail.”

    I can sum up why “Better Call Saul” will do WAY better than Dennis Franz’s (whom I share an alma mater with, ‘Go Salukis!”) show in two words:
    Bob Odenkirk

  7. The Walking Dead: Special Victims Unit
    The Walking Dead: Los Angeles
    The Walking Dead: Crime Scene Investigation
    The Walking Dead: Atlantis
    The Walking Dead: The Next Generation
    The Walking Dead: Deep Space Zombies

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