[esenpi]

The major problem is that The Walking Dead was everything but predictable. We had characters we loved, who had interactions between each others (love-hate-friendship). So when inner-conflict or death happened we were shocked.

Now, its B series writing. We dont care about anyone (200 or so characters fighting the war) because except with Gregory/Dwight there is absolutely no inner-confict. We didnt had the time to learn to hate or to learn to love most of these new characters. We cant build our own opinion on them.

It now feels like we cant decide by ourselves if a character is good or bad or if we hate him or hate him ('xcept Dwight), because all the other characters are too black or white. Plus theres nothing unpredictable. The only unpredictable events in the last 20's issues are Holly and Abraham´s deaths. Everything else was kinda easy to draw :

1- We have a new vilain
2- We have 3 good communities and one bad
3- There will be a war
4- Good against evil.
5- Everyone who dies are B and C list characters.
6- Kill the bad one at the end
7- Destroy the communities to send them back on the road.

Negan could have become one of the best villain ever. He was a manipulator, a crazy psycopath when we met him. Now? Hes a fuckin comedian/bully/lucky ass dodging bullets.

Kirkman need to wake the fuck up. It feels like The TV Governor story and it sucks (fight, retreat, fight. Retreat, fight, retreat...)

[esenpi]

This is what i call :

-Olivia sleeps with Jesus. Revealing hes bisexual.
-Shiva is not dead and will come back to save the day.

[8-Ball]

just finished 124 and i have to excited i'm excited to see what is in store for Eugene. His character has become so interesting and I can't believe Kirkman has made me go from thinking a character is the lowest pile of shit (other that Dwight) to now being the character i'm most excited to see in the issue. I feel like Eugene getting some blood on his hands could really take his character in some new and interesting directions.

 

Overall I enjoyed the issue. A little disappointed we didn't get any closure on whether or not it was a mucked up arrow or not, but Nicholas showed signs of turning very quickly and he was injured after Rick. I guess the virus effects everyone differently, but I'm thinking it might just be a flesh wound.

[DHeav60]

This is what i call :

-Olivia sleeps with Jesus. Revealing hes bisexual.
-Shiva is not dead and will come back to save the day.

 

One post ago you say that TWD is too predictable..... and those are your predictions?

[Cthulhu42]

As far as the nobody shooting Negan thing goes, I think the easiest way to avoid the issue would have been to just not have Negan lead the charge, with him instead hanging back out of the range of the Survivors' gunfire. I don't know why Kirkman felt he needed to be on the front lines.

[Kursk]

I second the Shiva prediction. Yea I like the tiger and maybe its foolish hope. I think it's weak to throw a badass tiger into the melee and get no epic payoff from that. A shocking return would do that. Moreover she sacrificed herself for Ezekiel, and Ezekiel has been pretty useless to the war effort. I mildly enjoyed the issue but it was mostly non eventful, predictable stuff. Teeing up the penultimate and ultimate chapters. We did get a few good scenes. Agree with the Negan Kevlar vest theory. Let's just go with that, at least its something. Adds a thin layer of believability why he never gets got. They've had how many gunfights? I'd have to go back and count.

[8-Ball]

I second the Shiva prediction. Yea I like the tiger and maybe its foolish hope. I think it's weak to throw a badass tiger into the melee and get no epic payoff from that. A shocking return would do that. Moreover she sacrificed herself for Ezekiel, and Ezekiel has been pretty useless to the war effort. I mildly enjoyed the issue but it was mostly non eventful, predictable stuff. Teeing up the penultimate and ultimate chapters. We did get a few good scenes. Agree with the Negan Kevlar vest theory. Let's just go with that, at least its something. Adds a thin layer of believability why he never gets got. They've had how many gunfights? I'd have to go back and count.

 

 

Shiva is dead, it's time to get over it. 

[DHeav60]

As far as the nobody shooting Negan thing goes, I think the easiest way to avoid the issue would have been to just not have Negan lead the charge, with him instead hanging back out of the range of the Survivors' gunfire. I don't know why Kirkman felt he needed to be on the front lines.

 

It's a flesh wound... the "sweat" on Rick in the early panel as well as on the cover is to imply that he may have been infected but I'm guessing he wasn't.  Doesn't mean he won't die in #126, but he's not going to die of Zombie infection.

[Kursk]

 

Shiva is dead, it's time to get over it. 

 

This is probably true. But there's still Shiva fans who thought she got a lame death. I'm over it but we still have 2 issues where they might pleasantly surprise us. Because of the sacrifice, good story writing tells us that Ezekiel needs to make a big play. or the tiger gets a big play.

[Cthulhu42]

It's a flesh wound... the "sweat" on Rick in the early panel as well as on the cover is to imply that he may have been infected but I'm guessing he wasn't. Doesn't mean he won't die in #126, but he's not going to die of Zombie infection.

Er, I think you quoted the wrong person. That doesn't really have anything to do with my post...

[8-Ball]

   

This is probably true. But there's still Shiva fans who thought she got a lame death. I'm over it but we still have 2 issues where they might pleasantly surprise us. Because of the sacrifice, good story writing tells us that Ezekiel needs to make a big play. or the tiger gets a big play.

 

Shiva saved zeke by sacrificing herself...I'd say she got a decent death for "character" with no lines.

[samus88]

Who doesn't steal ideas from other zombie books/comic? Everyone takes someone else's idea and implements it into their own story. It happens. I'm surprised it didn't happen sooner like it did in WWZ.

I was mocking that guy who claims Kirkman stole Negan's idea from another comic.

[TomTom]

Olivia's Banging Nicholas... We will see it now that hes infected any dying shes gona be all upset... 

['Rick' Duff]

Olivia's Banging Nicholas... We will see it now that hes infected any dying shes gona be all upset... 

 

What would Paula say?! 
 

Well, it's anyone's guess as it'll be her introductory line!

[HolySock]

I still think some people here can't handle long-form comic storytelling unless it's read in trades. Although there are a few legitimate complaints - like Negan's speech is a bit too similar to the one at the end of 120 (and kind of a longer version of his dialogue at the end of last issue). Personally Negan surviving gunfire doesn't bother me so much. It's unlikely, not unrealistic or impossible, but I think some people forget that Kirkman did the same thing with the Governor during the Made to Suffer arc.

 

A little bummed that Nicholas it biting the dust. I feel the Negan storyline could have used at least one more arc focusing more on our Alexandrians and some secondary characters from the other communities. Unfortunately a huge villain like Negan takes over the story and most readers seem to forget the Alexandrian character development prior to his introduction. There's been some but I guess too many characters mean the deaths don't sting like Axel's, Billy's, Alice's and Hershel's in the Prison arc.

 

I know some people have complained that Negan seems to have forgotten his goal during this war so I was glad they included his speech at the end believing things will go back to normal.

[Mr. NomNom]

I was mocking that guy who claims Kirkman stole Negan's idea from another comic.

Ah! Never heard about that. Lol

[HolySock]

Also, I don't think All Out War is going to end like we would expect. Rick defeats Negan, Negan defeats Rick, or Mutually Assured Destruction as what happened with the Governor vs the Prison.

 

Kirkman and Adlard have said it's rather unexpected so I don't think the finale is going to be as simple as either of these scenarios (although one obviously has to occur).

[JesusMonroe]

I'm really hoping AOW isn't riding solely on Rick's death

[Kursk]

Shiva saved zeke by sacrificing herself...I'd say she got a decent death for "character" with no lines.

 

It was a little decent death. Heroic sacrifice is always worth a few points. Still I think Zeke needs to justify that sacrifice by doing something useful. Probably before the AoW is over, but if he survives it through to the next one he'll have more chances to be relevant.

 

Prison 2.0 for the finish is too predictable. They say that "nobody is safe" I think they intend that equally for both show and book. And I believe them, nobody is safe, though some have better odds at longevity than others.

 

I'd figure Ricks odds of surviving AoW at about 60-lives 40-dies.

[Sgthewolverine]

Hi guys! First time poster, long time lurker. I've read and re-read TWD many, many times over the last few years and have held it to the highest esteem until AOW came along, and now I find myself less and less excited to pick up the book every release. A lot of people seem to be unable to put their finger on exactly what feels off about AOW, but I know what it is for me: the book has strayed too far from the core that made it work, and although I'm all for breaking new narrative ground in this series, I think AOW has literally blown the scale of the story up to the point where it's simply difficult to give so much of a shit anymore.

Violence always serves a purpose in The Walking Dead, but only if it's perpetrated by, or inflicted upon, characters we care about. I'm pretty sure I've seen this mentioned before, but Negan set a new precedent for violent acts in the book when he killed Glenn. Not only was it arguably the most visually arresting scene in the book to date, but it set an incredibly foreboding tone that has since been undermined. If you think about the dynamic of the scene, it was incredibly intimate - the symbolic metaphor for hope that had persisted throughout the entire series was smashed to pieces right in front of those he meant the most to, those he had a long, intricate history with. Basically, I think the book has suffered immensely as a result of his death - not because it was a badly portrayed or unnecessary death, but because Kirkman subsequently introduced so many moving parts to the story in reaction to his death that the tight, always potentially fragile and unspokenly intimate group dynamic of the survivors was diluted by all of additional characters and locations that simply weren't interesting or fleshed-out enough for us to care about before they all became involved in AOW. (Seriously, what was the point in introducing a pet tiger, only to kill it off ten issues later?) Now, AOW has expanded the conflict up to the point where we should be immensely excited because, on paper, it poses the biggest threat to the status quo of the survivors and the book as a whole thus far, because a war entails unavoidable death and destruction - but in reality, I just don't think Kirkman made us care enough about ANY of this before the war started. Before and during the war, we've seen Rick as a strategist, a commander and a beacon of hope for those united against Negan - but aside from a few characters like Jesus, we haven't actually seen him foster any sort of personal connection with ANYONE outside of his group. So why should we care when they die? TWD works best when it's an intimate examination of how people inevitably suffer in this world, and how they manage to overcome - or succumb to - the violence that is at times necessary to commit or endure to survive. The violence must be PERSONAL and have tangible effects on the mood and tone of not just the issue, but the arc that contains it and, further still, needs to do something interesting to the group of people we actually care about.
So far, both the saviors and the survivors have come into direct conflict multiple times and made numerous fuckups, but the only people who have suffered are redshirts and a few reasonably unimportant characters like Holly and Spencer. Additionally, my suspension of disbelief has been ruined more times during the saviors/AOW arcs than it was reading the ENTIRE book up to that point. Reading 124 reaffirmed this for me - Negan has simply dived out of the way of bullets too many times, and it's bullshit narrrative-serving tactics like this that've ruined potential of the arc reaching the same level of tension that, say, the prison arc did. Wars are planned with an end in sight. The prison war wasn't, and it felt organic, fresh and wholly unpredictable as a result, a feeling that complemented the thematic trajectory of the series as a whole very well. AOW simply feels like Kirkman working towards an endgame, which removes that palpable sense of urgency from reading it. It's simply not intimate anymore. I can honestly say I've been less affected by everything that's happened in AOW than the scene where Rick disembowels the rapist off-panel while Abraham and Carl watch, because that was terrifying. When the shit does hit the fan in AOW, we will have been waiting for so long and it will be carried out on such a grand scale that it will feel wholly underwhelming.


... Reading back over this I'm not sure I put my finger on it either. But dude, 124 pissed me off something fierce.

you sir should post more often. Very well put. You may not have put your finger on it, but I think you've come close to the heart of the matter. For better or worse I think we're in for a Hollywood ending and a fresh start after...

[moop420]

^^^

 

Hollywood. That is I fear this will end. Hollywood. That one word is the gist of the problem for me for AOW and the March to War and maybe even a bit before that.

 

Twice we've had Hilltop armies arrive out of the fucking blue to save Rick's ass. We've also of recent had Saviors suddenly become Annie Oakley's shooting guns out of peoples hands. We've had Andrea, my favorite character, somehow kill a guy she had no business killing. I don't read TWD to see Michael Bay hack shit like that, or to fucking Tigers. I read the TWD because Kirkman has taken genre and turned it into powerful literature. And, zombies aside, the story has also always been pretty realistic with how it deals with things. Things like Carl killing Shane, Rick watching his wife and daughter be gunned down, Billy/Ben, situations like that (and the zombies) are why I read the Walking Dead. Even when the comic stretched the realism in the past with parts of the Gov and No Way Out arcs it still all seemed plausible. That's my biggest complaint, my only complaint really, is that RK seems to have forsaken realism for Hollywood bullshit.

[JesusMonroe]

Hi guys! First time poster, long time lurker. I've read and re-read TWD many, many times over the last few years and have held it to the highest esteem until AOW came along, and now I find myself less and less excited to pick up the book every release. A lot of people seem to be unable to put their finger on exactly what feels off about AOW, but I know what it is for me: the book has strayed too far from the core that made it work, and although I'm all for breaking new narrative ground in this series, I think AOW has literally blown the scale of the story up to the point where it's simply difficult to give so much of a shit anymore.

 

Violence always serves a purpose in The Walking Dead, but only if it's perpetrated by, or inflicted upon, characters we care about. I'm pretty sure I've seen this mentioned before, but Negan set a new precedent for violent acts in the book when he killed Glenn. Not only was it arguably the most visually arresting scene in the book to date, but it set an incredibly foreboding tone that has since been undermined. If you think about the dynamic of the scene, it was incredibly intimate - the symbolic metaphor for hope that had persisted throughout the entire series was smashed to pieces right in front of those he meant the most to, those he had a long, intricate history with. Basically, I think the book has suffered immensely as a result of his death - not because it was a badly portrayed or unnecessary death, but because Kirkman subsequently introduced so many moving parts to the story in reaction to his death that the tight, always potentially fragile and unspokenly intimate group dynamic of the survivors was diluted by all of additional characters and locations that simply weren't interesting or fleshed-out enough for us to care about before they all became involved in AOW. (Seriously, what was the point in introducing a pet tiger, only to kill it off ten issues later?) Now, AOW has expanded the conflict up to the point where we should be immensely excited because, on paper, it poses the biggest threat to the status quo of the survivors and the book as a whole thus far, because a war entails unavoidable death and destruction - but in reality, I just don't think Kirkman made us care enough about ANY of this before the war started. Before and during the war, we've seen Rick as a strategist, a commander and a beacon of hope for those united against Negan - but aside from a few characters like Jesus, we haven't actually seen him foster any sort of personal connection with ANYONE outside of his group. So why should we care when they die? TWD works best when it's an intimate examination of how people inevitably suffer in this world, and how they manage to overcome - or succumb to - the violence that is at times necessary to commit or endure to survive. The violence must be PERSONAL and have tangible effects on the mood and tone of not just the issue, but the arc that contains it and, further still, needs to do something interesting to the group of people we actually care about.

So far, both the saviors and the survivors have come into direct conflict multiple times and made numerous fuckups, but the only people who have suffered are redshirts and a few reasonably unimportant characters like Holly and Spencer. Additionally, my suspension of disbelief has been ruined more times during the saviors/AOW arcs than it was reading the ENTIRE book up to that point. Reading 124 reaffirmed this for me - Negan has simply dived out of the way of bullets too many times, and it's bullshit narrrative-serving tactics like this that've ruined potential of the arc reaching the same level of tension that, say, the prison arc did. Wars are planned with an end in sight. The prison war wasn't, and it felt organic, fresh and wholly unpredictable as a result, a feeling that complemented the thematic trajectory of the series as a whole very well. AOW simply feels like Kirkman working towards an endgame, which removes that palpable sense of urgency from reading it. It's simply not intimate anymore. I can honestly say I've been less affected by everything that's happened in AOW than the scene where Rick disembowels the rapist off-panel while Abraham and Carl watch, because that was terrifying. When the shit does hit the fan in AOW, we will have been waiting for so long and it will be carried out on such a grand scale that it will feel wholly underwhelming.

 

 

... Reading back over this I'm not sure I put my finger on it either. But dude, 124 pissed me off something fierce.

Welcome and great first post! I've been enjoying the arc (part 1 more than part 2, though) but you seem to have hit the nail on the head

[Nick_FM]

I thought it was ok...I too am tired of the fight/retreat/"those fuckers are fucked" end speech thing. Also, can't Andrea just shoot Negan in the head already?

 

Hopefully 125 doesn't begin with Negan wanting to talk to Rick again...

[RicksRightHandMan]

I thought it was ok...I too am tired of the fight/retreat/"those fuckers are fucked" end speech thing. Also, can't Andrea just shoot Negan in the head already?

 

Hopefully 125 doesn't begin with Negan wanting to talk to Rick again...

I know they're comics, but it's become quite "comical".

 

Negan has become Dr. Claw from Inspector Gadget. Always looking to next time after his plans are foiled. 

 

Instead of "I'll get you next time, Gadget.." it's "Don't you see Dwight!? They're absolutely beyond a fucking reasonable doubt fucked beyond fuck!".

[JesusMonroe]

I know they're comics, but it's become quite "comical".

 

Negan has become Dr. Claw from Inspector Gadget. Always looking to next time after his plans are foiled. 

 

Instead of "I'll get you next time, Gadget.." it's "Don't you see Dwight!? They're absolutely beyond a fucking reasonable doubt fucked beyond fuck!".

Rick-Gadget

Carl-Penny

Andrea-Brain

Negan-Dr. Claw

Dwight-M.A.D. Cat