The ComicBook Nation Crew breaks down Marvel's ECHO trailer and asks the hard question: Can the MCU recover from the multiple disasters detailed in a new report? Is Loki Season 2 Episode 5 a hopeful indicator that the series will end strong and make this Multiverse Saga make sense?

PLUS: Amazon Prime Video's Gen V hits its finale just as Invincible Season 2 premieres - and we look back at It Follows ten years later as a sequel, They Follow, is announced!

Invincible Season 2 Part 1 Review

ComicBook Nation Guest-host Logan Moore had the following to say in his Invincible Season 2 review:

The first four episodes of Invincible Season 2 feel like they barely scratch the surface of where this series is heading. In fact, the long wait between Episode 4 and 5 is likely the biggest problem that I have with Season 2 so far, as I would have preferred to see all of these episodes release in one go. Despite this, Invincible continues to be one of the best and most unique superhero shows around and almost certainly won't disappoint those who have been counting down the days until its return.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

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[Spoiler alert for Sunday's "Iron Tiger" episode of Fear the Walking Dead.] Troy Otto had a bone to pick with Madison Clark when he handed over the skeletal remains of Alicia's arm and told Madison her daughter is dead. Troy claimed he killed Alicia, took her arm off her corpse, and left her to roam as a zombie as revenge for Madison bludgeoning him with a hammer and leaving him to die at a dam in Mexico back in season 3. "You took everything from me. I'm just doing the same for you," Troy told Madison in Sunday's "Iron Tiger" episode, where a captive Charlie took her own life rather than let Madison give up PADRE to save her.

That wasn't the only shocker. Troy blamed Madison for destroying his family's Broke Jaw Ranch and for the deaths of his brother Jake and his father Jeremiah, but it turned out that Troy wanted to take PADRE for another Otto: his young daughter, Tracy. But when Tracy went missing during Troy's standoff with Madison, a cryptic Troy told Madison the real reason for his revenge: "Her mother's dead because of you."

When Madison pressed Troy about why he killed Alicia and who he thinks she took from him, Troy revealed it was the woman who rescued him from the Gonzalez Dam. As Troy put it, "The woman who gave me a second chance."

The woman who saved Troy at the dam and Tracy's mother are one and the same. But could Alicia be Tracy's mother? Fans speculated as much after the final episodes trailer revealed a young girl who bears a resemblance to Alycia Debnam-Carey's Alicia Clark, and it's a theory that has been posted on social media following the revelation that Troy wants to take PADRE for his daughter.

I believe the child is his and Alicia's and he's lying about having killed her. Alicia may have learned Madison was alive and died while out looking for her and Troy blames Grandma.

-- Kim Downey (@Snerd2123) October 30, 2023

We asked showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg to weigh in on the Troy/Alicia theories, and the tight-lipped duo had this to say:

"Maybe, maybe not," Goldberg answered when asked if Tracy's mother is someone we've seen before on Fear the Walking Dead. "It's a great question, but it really is such a big one that we'd rather people experience the answer to that as the story unfolds." Chambliss added: "And we like it when people have crazy theories."

Is Tracy Alicia's daughter? Is Troy telling the truth about killing Alicia? Those are questions that will be answered before the two-episode series finale on November 19.

"Whether Troy is telling the truth is something that you're just going to have to watch the rest of the season to find out," Goldberg told ComicBook in a post-premiere interview. "We will definitely find out whether or not Troy's story is true," Chambliss teased, "and what actually went down between Troy and Alicia."

New episodes of Fear the Walking Dead premiere Sundays on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

[Spoiler alert for Sunday's "Iron Tiger" episode of Fear the Walking Dead.] "The truth matters. Even if it's just heard out loud. Even if it's just heard once." Those are words said during the "Good Out Here" season 4 episode of Fear the Walking Dead, which ended with a bang when 11-year-old Vulture spy Charlie (Alexa Nisenson) suddenly shot and killed Nick Clark (Frank Dillane). The truth was heard out loud on Sunday's "Iron Tiger" episode of season 8, which also ended with a shocking gunshot after Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) confronted the now young woman who murdered her son. And both times, it was Charlie pulling the trigger.

The episode showed a reunited Madison, Victor Strand (Colman Domingo), and Daniel Salazar (Rub?n Blades) learning that Luciana (Danay Garc?a) has spent the past seven years making gasoline for PADRE while using its supplies to continue trucker "Polar Bear" Clayton's mission of leaving help boxes with the message "take what you need, leave what you don't." Only Luciana's covert do-gooder operation has set up two dozen way stations across the country to help people, freighting fuel and provisions by way of a trucker with the CB handle "Iron Tiger."

"Iron Tiger" was revealed to be a 20-year-old Charlie, who Strand thought was dead because she was suffering from radiation poisoning and "weeks away from death" when they left irradiated Texas by raft. As it turned out, June Dorie (Jenna Elfman) was able to treat Charlie at PADRE, but her condition made her too dangerous to raise on the island with the other kids. Charlie was so guilt-ridden over Nick's death she helped Luciana build her way stations to "turn all that hurt and all the pain into something more."

A contrite Charlie then confessed to killing Nick and apologized to Madison. Ennis (Evan Gamble) unleashed the zombie horde that overran and destroyed the stadium and seemingly killed Madison, so Nick killed Ennis, and Charlie, in turn, killed Nick. To repent, Charlie agreed to infiltrate the hotel commandeered by Troy Otto (Daniel Sharman) and kill the man who claims he murdered Alicia, with Madison telling her: "You took the stadium from me. You took my son from me. This is the least you can do."

Madison had a last-minute change of heart when she discovered that Charlie helped Luciana exhume Nick's body and cremate his remains to bury him properly, but not before Troy took Charlie hostage to make Madison trade her life for PADRE's location. "I'm not gonna watch another place you built fall because of me," Charlie said, turning a gun on herself. "The place she's building, it's what Alicia wanted. And it's how Nick's death can mean something."

With that, Charlie took away Troy's leverage by taking her own life.

"It was a big decision, and it really came from this place of wanting to give Charlie a true sendoff. The last time we saw her, she was on that boat suffering from radiation sickness, and it felt like that might be her end. But as we got into the season, it felt to us like she deserved more than that," Andrew Chambliss, who serves as showrunner with Ian Goldberg, told ComicBook about Charlie's death. "In thinking about Madison's story and all the things that she'd have to grapple with this season, we really wanted to put Charlie and Madison together. Charlie served as the ultimate test for Madison about how much she actually had changed. Could she forgive the person who killed her son? Ultimately, she was able to do that, although it was very messy in this episode, and it put Charlie in this very precarious position. It seemed like, to give Charlie that forgiveness, and make up for essentially driving her to Troy, she would have to give up PADRE -- the thing that she was fighting for."

Chambliss continued, "I think from Charlie's point of view, she couldn't let Madison do that because Madison wouldn't be able to secure the thing that would allow Nick and Alicia's legacy to live on. That ultimately led to her decision to sacrifice herself. It felt fitting for Charlie to leave the show in that way. She came into the show lying about her past as a spy who ended up leading to the downfall of the settlement that Madison had built for her children. Now, here she is exiting the show, giving her life so that she could secure that very same thing for Madison going forward."

While Charlie's death meant something, it also meant Madison leaving Strand to keep his promise to Alicia and rebuild PADRE -- without her. But as has been said often this season: "Everyone deserves a second chance."

"Madison's obviously struggling with whether or not she can seek redemption, whether or not she can give all these people at PADRE the gift of family, a place where they can be safe, the things she always wanted for her own children," Chambliss explained. "Daniel's trying to have a second chance with Luciana, and then obviously losing Charlie comes a big blow to him that it feels like the family he's building is in danger. We'll see that theme resonate as we get into Dwight, Sherry, June's stories later in the season."

Chambliss added that the question of who deserves a second chance is "definitely a big part" of the final episodes. "It's a question that the finale of the series is really going to answer in a big way," Chambliss said of the two-episode series finale airing Sunday, November 19.

New episodes of Fear the Walking Dead premiere Sundays on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

"What are you even fighting for?" The question that Troy (Daniel Sharman) asked Madison (Kim Dickens) to end last week's Fear the Walking Dead premiere has an answer: "We take the fight to Troy." After learning that Troy is alive and her daughter Alicia is dead, Madison, Victor Strand (Colman Domingo), and Daniel Salazar (Rub?n Blades) have Hawk (Triston Dye) take them to where PADRE got their fuel supply. PADRE picked up tankers from the Lowcountry Landing gas station, but the tanks are empty -- and so is Madison's patience. She wants to finish what she started back at the Gonzalez Dam in Mexico.

"He took a daughter away from me too. I know what you're feeling," Daniel reminds Madison, referring to his daughter Ofelia, who succumbed to a walker's bite after Troy led a zombie herd to Broke Jaw Ranch. "But first, we do what we need to do to protect the island. Then we make Troy wish he died back at the dam." Madison confides in Strand: she regrets not trying to look for Alicia and learning too late that her daughter was alive. "If what Troy said is true, if she's still out there... I can't let her walk around like that forever. I need to put her to rest. I need to bury her. All of her."

The gas station is well-stocked with food, water, medical supplies, and what Strand calls a "relic of a bygone era": a familiar cardboard sign reading, "TAKE WHAT YOU NEED, LEAVE WHAT YOU DON'T."

Meanwhile, Madison draws the attention of a roaming walker missing its left arm. Strand realizes it's not Alicia just before the walkers clawing at the window smash through the glass into the store, only to be gunned down by... Luciana (Danay Garc?a). She's assumed the handle Polar Bear from Clayton and picked up where Morgan's group left off in season 5, helping people on the side while making gasoline for PADRE during the last seven years.

Madison reunites with Luciana, and Luci with Daniel, who has been looking for his mija for years. Luciana explains PADRE recognized her experience working the oil fields at the Tank Town quarry and had her working in the shadows, refining oil from PADRE's military reserves. They used Daniel against her: Luciana asked for his freedom in exchange for making gas, explaining why PADRE dumped Daniel in the swamp instead of killing him seven years ago.

The gas station is an outpost miles away from the refinery, which Luciana converted into a way station for travelers using supplies stolen from PADRE's shipping containers meant to seed new communities across the United States. As "Polar Bear," Luciana has been secretly operating 23 active locations and a network of roads running from Georgia through Arizona. Luciana agrees to give them gas for their fight against Troy's army under one condition: Troy doesn't figure out where the fuel is coming from. Luciana is concerned about protecting her operation and the people who run it, including a tanker truck driver with the handle "Iron Tiger."

Luciana attempts to hide Iron Tiger's identity... until Iron Tiger reveals herself as Charlie (Alexa Nisenson), now seven years older, and not dead from radiation poisoning. June Dorie (Jenna Elfman) didn't have what she needed at Strand's Tower to treat her radiation sickness, but PADRE did. Charlie wasn't sent to the island with the other kids because they didn't know whether Blue Jay's experimental radiotherapy treatments work, so she's spent the past seven years helping Luciana build up her network. Madison is confused: Why did Luciana try to hide Charlie? Because of what happened at the stadium?

"You haven't told her," Luciana realizes. "I didn't think there was a reason to," Strand says, because he thought Charlie was dead. Madison wants the truth, and it comes when Charlie confesses: "I shot Nick. I killed your son." A contrite Charlie apologizes, but she's whisked away by Daniel as Strand restrains Madison. She hammers out her anger as she thinks of Nick. Hugging her son. Nick on the bridge at the dam. Madison holding Nick in a hospital bed. Nick resting in a field of bluebonnets.

Strand has his own confession. He thought Charlie was dead, and he didn't think it mattered. "You didn't think it mattered that the girl I brought into the stadium killed my son?" Madison explodes, and then sobs. "If I hadn't brought her in the stadium, Nick might still be here! If I hit Troy harder, Alicia might be here! If I just did it differently... they both might be here." She rages again: How could they let Charlie in after what she did to Nick? "We gave her the same thing that everyone else wants," he explains. "A second chance." Strand then tells her that Alicia was the first to forgive Charlie, but no one is expecting her to forgive her son's killer. Least of all Charlie, who confronts Madison and apologizes for being an 11-year-old girl who was scared and being used by the Vultures.

"I really am sorry that I took Nick from you. I'm so sorry I took him from the world." Charlie has spent the past seven years taking that hurt and pain to "turn it into something more" by helping Luciana help people, telling Madison: "As bad as his death was, something good did come out of it, okay? And if there's anything I can do to help you see that good, just tell me. I'll do it." Charlie snuck into the stadium and fooled Madison, Alicia, Strand, and Nick -- and now she needs her to do the same with Troy. But Madison doesn't want Charlie to be a spy... she wants her to be an assassin and kill Troy. "You took the stadium from me. You took my son from me," she says with venom. "This is the least you can do."

Daniel is wary of sending Charlie into the viper's nest and offers to go in her place, but Madison says it has to be Charlie because Troy doesn't know her. "For years, I thought you and Luciana were dead. Now that I have found you, I don't want to risk losing either of you again," Daniel tells Charlie, only for her to assure him that he won't lose her. She wants to do this -- needs to do this. Charlie also tells Madison she's going to try to find out what happened to Alicia, because "she was the one that helped me see that I could start over," she says. "I know you don't believe me, but I really am sorry about everything. I wish I could take back what I did to Nick. He was like a brother to me." Madison spews hate: "Then you wouldn't have shot him!"

Daniel is right to fear for Charlie: her ruse fails, and she's captured by Troy. Strand is concerned about what they're doing to protect PADRE. "What's the point of saving it if we turn into the opposite of what Alicia wanted us to build?" Madison, not willing to let Troy take the island from her too, assures Strand: "If Charlie meant what she said about Nick, she's gonna show us by taking care of Troy." Madison has a change of heart when she sees Charlie left her a coffee can containing Nick's ashes. Luciana explains: some time during those seven years, they were clearing roads in North Texas when Charlie wanted to see where Nick was buried so she could apologize.

When Charlie found out why Nick was buried beneath a tree on the side of the road in Hill Country -- because of Alicia, Strand, and Luciana's ruse to get a weapons cache to kill the Vultures -- she said he deserved something better. So they exhumed Nick's body, cremated what was left of him, and brought him here. "It didn't mean anything to you?" Madison asks, heartbroken. "Charlie's right. He deserves better." That's what Luciana and Charlie want -- and Charlie thinks Madison knows best where she should lay her son to rest.

Madison radios Charlie with a message to come back to bury Nick -- "If you brought him all the way back from Texas for me, then you should be there when we say goodbye" -- but it's too late. Troy's soldiers have Charlie hostage at the commandeered Emissary Suites, which means Madison can finally take the fight to Troy. Back at the hotel, Troy's soldiers remove the left arms of caged walkers with orders to release them after he's finished with Charlie. She asks why he killed Alicia, but Troy doesn't answer. "Seeing as it sounds like I'm not the only person to have killed a Clark," he deflects, "is what Madison said true? Did you kill Nick? "He was a friend of mine. More like a brother, actually. Yeah, we were better suited to this world than the last one. At least that's what I thought until I heard what happened. So why is Madison trying to protect you?" The answer: she's giving Charlie a second chance.

Troy wants PADRE because they need a place "that people like Madison can't take from us," he says. They took the Emissary Suites in an afternoon, and no one is taking PADRE easily -- and taking PADRE from Madison is icing on the cake. Charlie doesn't know where PADRE is, but a map in the tanker truck lists all of PADRE's fuel drop sites. It would be a good tip... if the rigged-to-blow tanker didn't suddenly explode outside the hotel. As Troy's soldiers try to contain the blaze, Madison, Daniel, Strand, and Luciana race to the hotel to find the flaming wreck drawing walkers (many of them missing their left arms).

Over walkie-talkie, Madison warns Troy not to hurt Charlie. Troy taunts Madison about what Nick would think about her protecting her son's killer. "He'd get it. People change, Troy," she tells him. "They can do shitty things and come back from them." Charlie hears it. If Madison thinks that, she's going to have to give up PADRE to save Charlie's life. Daniel wants to make the trade. Charlie doesn't.

Outside the hotel, it's a standoff as Madison's army and Troy's army negotiate Charlie's return for PADRE's location. ("If you hurt her...," Madison threatens Troy, "I'm gonna make you wish I only took the other eye." If Troy hands over Charlie, she'll tell him where to find PADRE. Troy wants the location first -- then they get the girl Madison sent in there to die. There's a back-and-forth about getting Charlie or PADRE first, but Madison is willing to give up PADRE if it means Charlie lives. It's decided Strand will escort Troy's right-hand man, Russell (Randy Bernales), to PADRE so he can verify the location. And then, only then, will he release Charlie. "I really don't give a shit about the girl, Madison," he says as nonchalant as one can be when trading lives. "I just want a safe place to live."

When Madison asks why Troy cares so much about PADRE, he tells her: "You took everything from me. I'm just doing the same for you." The psycopath laughs it off when she asks if his vendetta is about his father, Jeremiah Otto, and the ranch. It's much more personal. But before Troy can tell Madison what she supposedly took from him, Strand wants assurance that the Germans who vacated the Emissary Suites for PADRE -- including his family, partner Frank (Isha Blaaker), and their son, Klaus (Julian Gray) -- won't be harmed. Troy says he wants the settlement, not the people, so it's a deal. But before Madison can hand over the map to PADRE, Charlie escapes her bonds, stabs a guard in the neck, and threatens to kill another. "I'm not gonna watch another place you built fall because of me," Charlie tells Madison over walkie-talkie, not letting Madison talk her down from her penance for killing Nick.

"It's not for her. The place she's building, it's what Alicia wanted. And it's how Nick's death can mean something," Charlie says, despite Madison's pleas. "On the rafts, when we left the Tower, Victor told me that's what Alicia said to him when she thought she was dying. 'Make it mean something.'" She knows that if Troy kills her, he doesn't get PADRE. "You won't have to give him PADRE if he doesn't have anything to trade."

Charlie puts a gun to her chin. Memories flicker through her brain: Nick and Charlie at the stadium. Madison. Daniel. Alicia's forgiveness. Nick smiling. Daniel. Alicia and Charlie. Closing her eyes. She thinks of the beach. Charlie always thought of the beach. And then --

BANG!

"She's dead," the guard reports. Daniel is destroyed. In his rage, he has to be pulled away from Troy lest he tear him apart with his bare hands. Troy wants Madison's map, but his priorities change when Russell reports that Tracy is missing. Madison is surprised to learn that Troy's people have kids in the hotel. "Why do you think we wanted PADRE?" he says, panicked. "The same reason as you!" Troy races after Tracy, wading into the walker-filled hazy smoke of the burning tanker truck. As the dead swarm the hotel, Madison figures out that Tracy is Troy's daughter. "Why didn't you tell us what you wanted instead of trying to take it?" Madison asks, exasperated. "What," Troy shoots back, "so you could just take my daughter from me, too?" Madison still doesn't know what -- or who -- she took from him, but Troy blames her for Tracy's mother's death.

Madison's anger boils over when she realizes it's Troy who has been cutting the arms off walkers, making her think Alicia is everywhere she looks. She attacks Troy, swinging her sledge hammer and interrogating him about Alicia: "Why did you kill her?! Who do you think I took from you?" Troy tells her, "The woman who rescued me from the dam. The woman who gave me a second chance. Please. I need to find my girl."

Everyone deserves a second chance... but not Troy. In her fury, she tells Troy that he's "gonna know what it's like to be wondering where your kid is." To that, he says, "Mine could still be alive." Strand tears Madison away to escape the area under threat from flames and infected, but it wouldn't be the first time Madison made it out alive. Troy takes off to find Tracy, leaving Madison, Strand, Daniel, and Luciana to deal with the fallout of Charlie's death.

The fallout: Luci gives Madison a ration of fuel and stern notice that's all she's getting. Luci is angry that Madison got Charlie killed and exposed her people to Troy. Daniel, not wanting to lose Luci like he lost Ofelia and Charlie, cuts ties with Madison. In Spanish, he says to Luci: "One time, I told you we were family, remember? Allow me to come with you. To help you and take care of you, as I have wanted for years." Daniel and Luci leave together with Charlie's body, their familia going from four to two as they leave Madison and Strand behind.

More fallout: Madison tells Strand she can't go back to PADRE. It's her fault Charlie is dead, and she can't ask anyone to follow her because of it. "We're not building PADRE for you. We're building PADRE for Alicia, for Nick, for Frank and Klaus," he reminds her. If Madison stays, PADRE doesn't happen. "You have to do it," she says, handing him the keys to the tanker. "You have to keep the promise you made to Alicia." He can't do it alone. "You're gonna have to." Madison, carrying Alicia's arm and Nick's ashes, walks off. Alone.

Iron Tiger out.

New episodes of Fear the Walking Dead premiere Sundays on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

"No one's gone until they're gone." Those are the last words that Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) imparted onto her children, Nick (Frank Dillane) and Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey). After the Vultures' assault on the Dell Diamond baseball stadium she hoped to turn into a thriving community, the Clark family matriarch made the ultimate sacrifice for her kids: Madison led a horde of infected into the overrun ballpark so the others could escape, locked herself inside, and seemingly died when the stadium was engulfed in flames. But no one's gone until they're gone. Madison survived... only to later be informed by Morgan Jones (Lennie James) that her children are gone gone.

"Nick got shot. Victor, Alicia, Luciana... we were all there when it happened. We buried him ourselves," Morgan told the mother who had "Nick" and "Alicia" tattooed on her wrists when she was a Collector for PADRE, which claimed it would reunite Madison with her own kids by having her separate children from their parents. She also learned that Alicia got bit by a walker and had to amputate her arm -- but not before infection set in. "She fought it for months, longer than anybody I know," Morgan informed Madison. "But the last time I talked to her... she was close to the end."

That was seven years ago. Morgan didn't tell Madison who killed Nick, and it took Troy Otto (Daniel Sharman) coming back from the dead to tell her what happened to Alicia. Madison's mission now is "about keeping something bigger alive" by rebuilding PADRE "into what it should have always been, for them": for Nick and Alicia. The Clark kids may be gone, but showrunners Ian Goldberg and Andrew Chambliss are keeping Fear a family affair for the final episodes.

"From the beginning of the series, everything for Madison has been about her family. It has been the drive for her from the beginning. Even when we learned about her in her darkest hour, and the things that she did while she was under PADRE's thumb, even that was ultimately motivated by her children," Goldberg told ComicBook. "I think as we get into the final episodes of the series, Madison's in this place where she no longer has her own children and she's wrestling with how she can honor them by this family at PADRE. Both the kids that are left behind in the wake of Madison taking over PADRE, but also the family that she has built along the way with all the characters that we all love. It really is just extrapolating her motivation for her kids and her family and applying it to this new family that she's created."

Remind yourself what happened to Nick and Alicia with this Fear the Walking Dead recap:

How Did Nick Die in Fear the Walking Dead?

After Nick and Madison brought 11-year-old orphaned Charlie (Alexa Nisenson) into the stadium, it turned out the young girl was a spy for Mel (Kevin Zegers) and the Vultures: scavengers who would wait for other groups of survivors to succumb to starvation or abandon their camps before picking them clean. When the Vulture Ennis (Evan Gamble) led the zombie attack that caused the fall of the stadium and Madison's apparent death, her vengeful son tracked down his nemesis and -- despite Morgan's attempt to impart his "all life is precious" philosophy and teach Nick the ways of The Art of Peace -- Nick killed Ennis.

Ennis was then avenged by Charlie, who shot Nick in the chest in the season 4 episode "Good Out Here." Nick died surrounded by Alicia, Strand (Colman Domingo), and Luciana (Danay Garc?a), with a bullet in his chest and a bluebonnet in his hand. During a past supply run with Madison, his mother told him to look for a sign of "something good" while outside the stadium. "Told you there was still good out here," Madison reminded Nick while in a field of bluebonnets. Alicia, Strand, and Luciana -- hardened after Madison and Nick's deaths -- intended Nick's grave to be the same hole where they dug up a weapons cache to kill the Vultures, but Morgan suggested they bury Nick beneath a tree.

Is Alicia Dead on Fear the Walking Dead?

Alicia's own search for PADRE ended with her amputating her zombie-bitten arm and -- after suffering from a fever that wouldn't break -- she seemingly succumbed to infection and collapsed. We last saw Alicia alive on the shores of Galveston, Texas, when she woke up and walked off into the radiactive fallout around Strand's Tower to help other survivors looking for PADRE. Only Troy claims to know what happened during the next seven years: Troy told Madison that he killed Alicia and left her to roam as a walker. Troy then handed over the skeletal remains of Alicia's severed arm as proof of Alicia's death.

"I took it off her corpse after I killed her," Troy taunted Madison. "I would've put her down, Madison. After all the wandering around I did in Mexico, I thought it was only right that Alicia should do the same. Maybe one day you'll find her. Or maybe she'll find you, or maybe not, and finish the job."

"Whether Troy is telling the truth is something that you're just going to have to watch the rest of the season to find out," Goldberg told ComicBook. Chambliss added: "We will definitely find out whether or not Troy's story is true, and what actually went down between Troy and Alicia."

Fear the Walking Dead next airs "Iron Tiger" October 29 on AMC. New episodes premiere Sundays at 9 p.m. on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

Troy Otto is alive... and Alicia Clark is dead?! During last Sunday's Fear the Walking Dead premiere, Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) -- who is also back from the dead -- reunited with Victor Strand (Colman Domingo), only to learn her old friend is now calling himself "Anton" and living among German tourists. Other revelations from the premiere: Troy Otto (Daniel Sharman) survived his seemingly fatal bludgeoning at Madison's hands hammer at a dam in Mexico in season 3, and he claims to have killed her daughter (Alycia Debnam-Carey), leaving the one-armed Alicia to roam as a walker as his revenge. Troy's proof: Alicia's severed skeletal arm.

There are just five episodes left of Fear the Walking Dead until the November 19 series finale, including Sunday's "Iron Tiger" episode. Below, find out when and where to watch the final episodes of Fear the Walking Dead and how to catch up on the first seven seasons.

Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 8 Release Date

Fear the Walking Dead season 8 episode 8, "Iron Tiger," premieres Sunday, October 29, at 9/8c on AMC. The episode is available to stream now on AMC+.

What Time Is Fear the Walking Dead on AMC and AMC+?

New episodes of Fear the Walking Dead season 8 premiere Sundays at 3 a.m. ET / 12 a.m. PT on AMC+, and 9/8c p.m. on the AMC channel through November 19.

Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 8 Runtime

"Iron Tiger" has a run time of 46 minutes and 50 seconds when watching on AMC+. The episode is scheduled to air from 9:00 p.m. -- 10:14 p.m. on AMC.

Where to Stream Fear the Walking Dead Online Without Cable

Cord-cutters can stream Fear the Walking Dead season 8 on AMC+. Prices start at $4.99/month for the new AMC+ with ads plan, while ad-free AMC+ is available for $6.99/month (when billed annually) or $8.99/month (when billed monthly). New customers can sign up for a 7-day free AMC Plus trial to watch Fear the Walking Dead's final episodes for free in their first week.

AMC+ is available as an app and via Apple TV, Amazon Prime Video Channels, The Roku Channel, Comcast Xfinity, Dish, DirecTV, Sling TV, and YouTube TV.

You can also watch episodes of Fear the Walking Dead season 8 on the AMC website by signing in with your television provider, or by purchasing the episodes ($2.99 for HD, $1.99 for SD) on retailers like Amazon Prime Video and Vudu.

Where Is Fear the Walking Dead Streaming?

Fear the Walking Dead season 8 is streaming on AMC+; the first seven seasons are currently available under the "AMC+ Picks on Max" hub on Max (formerly HBO Max) until October 31, 2023. If you already have an active Max subscription, you can watch Fear the Walking Dead and other select AMC/AMC+ content at no additional cost until Halloween.

Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episodes Recaps

Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 1 Recap: "Remember What They Took From You"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 2 Recap: "Blue Jay"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 3 Recap: "Odessa"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 4 Recap: "King County"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 5 Recap: "More Time Than You Know"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 6 Recap: "All I See Is Red"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 7 Recap: "Anton"

Fear the Walking Dead's final episodes premiere Sundays on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

The ComicBook Nation Crew is Reeling from that massive twist in Loki Season 2 Episode 4, and share their Favorite movies to watch during Halloween! There are also some juicy new Deadpool 3 updates from director Shawn Levy, a recap of Gen V's penultimate episode twists, reactions to Marvel's bold new take on Ultimate Spider-Man, and a review of the new scary(?) movie, Five Nights at Freddy's!

Five Nights at Freddy's Review

In her 2.5 (out of 5) star review of Five Nights at Freddy's, Megan Peters said the following:

Since the release of Five Nights at Freddy's nearly a decade ago, the franchise has become a giant with horror lovers. This means expectations for its movie adaptation were high, and sadly, Five Nights at Freddy's did not meet them. The film's sanitized scares strips the franchise of its legendary tension. When paired with its muddled story, the only thing that kept Five Nights at Freddy's afloat for me was its filmography and Easter eggs. Even with its flaws, the film will likely impress young fans who've yet to develop a tolerance for horror. But, as for older fans, well - they will have no problem surviving their visit to Freddy Fazbear's Pizza.

Rating: 2.5 out of 5

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Each episode has a deep dive into the current biggest discussion topics and debates within geek culture: movies, tv, comics, and video games are regular features, with genres like sci-fi, anime, and wrestling also featured regularly. The ONLY show covering ALL THINGS Geek Culture!

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Former The Walking Dead star Erik Jensen has revealed he is diagnosed with Stage IV colorectal cancer. A GoFundMe page was recently launched for Jensen's family, asking for help with covering upcoming medical expenses. The page has already been shared by The Walking Dead franchise CCO Scott Gimple, as well as co-star Jeffrey Dean Morgan. Jensen portrayed Dr. Steven Edwards in the fifth season of the hit AMC series. Outside of The Walking Dead, Jensen's filmography includes Mr. Robot, Mindhunter, and The Americans.

"Never had the chance to work with Erik," Morgan wrote. "[But] have heard many things about what a great guy he is. I do know he and his [family] could use some help."

"One of TWD's own could use a little help," Gimple added. "Erik Jensen, who played Dr. Steven Edwards in S5 was just diagnosed with cancer, and it's a time of great uncertainty for him and his family."

Never had the chance to work with Erik... until now anyway. Only have heard many things about what a great guy he is. I do know he and his could use some help.... Of any and all kind. xojd https://t.co/qFmI9J111k

-- Jeffrey Dean Morgan (@JDMorgan) October 24, 2023

One of TWD's own could use a little help. Erik Jensen, who played Dr. Steven Edwards in S5 was just diagnosed with cancer, and it's a time of great uncertainty for him and his family. If you want to send something his way: https://t.co/HU8bxlL2xA

-- Scott M. Gimple (@ScottMGimple) October 23, 2023

According to the fundraiser, Jensen survived a brain aneurysm a year and a half prior. He is continuing to work as a director and writer, even as he has now discovered that his cancer has metastasized to his liver. At the time of this writing, the GoFundMe has raised over $84,000, out of a goal of $300,000.

"Erik and Jess have devoted their lives to making art that hopes to make the world better in whatever way they can," the GoFundMe reads in part. "They are full-time freelance artists and live without the cushion that long-term commercial work can provide. Erik's aneurysm, the double strikes and now this diagnosis have put their family in an extremely precarious financial position and they need a lot of help to make it through the next year, pay for treatment to fight his cancer, keep their home, and maintain some sort of stability for Sadie."

"Erik wants to work through as much of his treatment as possible, but (particularly given the strikes) their family needs to plan to completely replace their household income for at least the next year. In addition, they are facing massive medical costs (co-pays, treatments not covered by insurance) and all the additional expenses associated with intensive treatment (parking or Uber for chemo, meals when Jess is unable to cook, etc). Erik and Jess are devoted to creating community and supporting that community, hopefully for years into the future- but this is a time when they need community support."

Jensen and his wife, Jessica Blank, have worked together on multiple plays, including Coal Country, The Line, The Exonerated, and Aftermath. Jensen's most recent onscreen role was as Dez O'Reilly in the ABC procedural For Life. He also starred alongside Paul Bettany in a stage production of The Collaboration, which wrapped earlier this year.

"Stage IV is not a death sentence, and Erik is working incredibly hard to stay positive and fight for the shot that his doctors say he has," the GoFundMe concludes.

[Spoiler alert for Sunday's "Anton" episode of Fear the Walking Dead.] No one's gone until they're gone... and Alicia Clark is gone. At least, that's according to Troy Otto (Daniel Sharman), who returned from the dead to hammer out an old grudge against Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) on Fear the Walking Dead. Sunday's midseason premiere of the final batch of Fear episodes ended with two shocking revelations for Madison: first, that she did not, in fact, kill Troy when she bludgeoned him with a hammer to the head back in season 3. And second, her daughter's devastating fate: that Troy got his revenge by killing Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey).

When we last saw Alicia, she walked off into radioactive fallout to find survivors looking for PADRE before what she thought was her inevitable end: succumbing to fever from an infectious zombie bite. At some point during the seven-year time jump, the twisted Troy apparently tracked down Alicia and murdered her. Troy then handed over proof of death: a prosthetic, which Victor Strand (Colman Domingo) and Daniel Salazar (Rub?n Blades) recognized as the skeletal remains of Alicia's amputated arm.

"I took it off her corpse after I killed her," Troy told Madison, claiming that he left the undead and one-armed Alicia to roam as a walker. "I would've put her down, Madison. After all the wandering around I did in Mexico, I thought it was only right that Alicia should do the same. Maybe one day you'll find her. Or maybe she'll find you, or maybe not, and finish the job."

What happened to Alicia? Is Alicia dead? Is Troy telling the truth? We asked these questions to showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg, with the duo confirming that all Alicia questions will be answered before Fear the Walking Dead ends with its Nov. 19 two-part series finale.

"Whether Troy is telling the truth is something that you're just going to have to watch the rest of the season to find out," Goldberg told ComicBook. Added Chambliss: "We will definitely find out whether or not Troy's story is true, and what actually went down between Troy and Alicia."

The episode ended with another question when Troy -- taunting the Clark matriarch about Nick and Alicia -- asked Madison: "What are you even fighting for?" Madison's mission to rebuild PADRE is "about keeping something bigger alive," she said. "My kids. I'm gonna build that place into what it should have always been, for them. For Alicia."

"From the beginning of the series, everything for Madison has been about her family. It has been the drive for her from the beginning. Even when we learned about her in her darkest hour, and the things that she did while she was under PADRE's thumb, even that was ultimately motivated by her children," Goldberg explained. "I think as we get into the final episodes of the series, Madison's in this place where she no longer has her own children and she's wrestling with how she can honor them by this family at PADRE. Both the kids that are left behind in the wake of Madison taking over PADRE, but also the family that she has built along the way with all the characters that we all love. It really is just extrapolating her motivation for her kids and her family and applying it to this new family that she's created."

Fear the Walking Dead airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

[Spoiler alert for Sunday's "Anton" episode of Fear the Walking Dead.] Troy Otto (Daniel Sharman) looked dead as a doornail when Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) bludgeoned him with a hammer to the head in the "Things Bad Begun" episode of Fear the Walking Dead. Then his body washed away when Nick Clark (Frank Dillane) triggered an explosion of the Gonzalez Dam to end season 3. As it turns out, Madison -- who also survived her own apparent death back in season 4 -- only left Troy for dead in Mexico. And as was revealed on Sunday's "Anton" midseason premiere, Troy spent the past seven years plotting his revenge against the woman who has been broadcasting her message over long-range radio:

"My name is Madison Clark. If you can hear this message, you are in the territory PADRE once patrolled. PADRE has fallen. They are no longer a threat to you or your children. If you lost a child, come to the following coordinates and send an SOS on this channel: 31 degrees, 51 minutes north. 81 degrees, 10 minutes west. We will find you. We will do our best to reunite you with your children. We'll make up for all the damage PADRE did to you."

Troy's soldiers tracked Madison to Savannah, Georgia, where she was taken in by Anton and a community of hospitable German tourists. Only "Anton" is the man she knew as Victor Strand (Colman Domingo), who had to decide Madison's fate: hide her, or hand her over to an armed posse loyal to a man who knows Madison "for who she really is." (Spoiler alert: it's Troy.) Ultimately, he saved Madison -- and nearly paid for it with his life when Troy threatened to drive a hammer into Anton/Victor's head unless Madison gave up PADRE's secret location.

It was Daniel Salazar (Rub?n Blades) and his army who saved Madison and Victor from Troy, but not before he revealed a scar and a discolored eye. "I know it's not very pretty to look at. Can happen, though. Take a bad hit to the head from, say, a hammer," Troy said over a flashback of Madison swinging her hammer into the side of Troy's head, sending him tumbling into the dirt. "Which is what she did to me before she just left me for dead in Mexico. And that's after she destroyed my family's ranch. Can you believe that? My brother, my father... I lost them all because of her."

Troy then told Madison what he's after: "The same thing I've wanted since you took it from me, Madison. Same thing I've been helping all these good people find since I pulled myself out of the rubble in Mexico. I'm just looking for a home, Madison. You see, you took mine from me, so I'm gonna take yours from you." He's already taken something from Madison: Troy told Madison that he killed Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey) and left her to roam as a walker, handing over the skeletal remains of Alicia's amputated arm prosthetic.

"Daniel Sharman's so fantastic in the role, and we were really interested in both revisiting the dynamic between him and Madison and where they left off at the end of season 3, and butting that up against the person that Madison is trying to become now: someone who's trying to redeem herself for all the sins of her past, and in particular her recent sins of what she did when she worked for PADRE," showrunner Ian Goldberg told ComicBook. "To us, bringing Troy back into the story was the perfect source of antagonism emotionally for her there because he is a reminder of her past and someone who's not going to let what she did -- or what he views that she did to his family -- lie buried in the past."

While Troy may claim that his vendetta is revenge for brother Jake (Sam Underwood), father Jeremiah (Dayton Callie), and the fall of the Broke Jaw Ranch, there's another reason behind this blood feud that will be revealed in episodes to come.

"What we will come to find out is that, in some ways, Madison and Troy are like two sides of the same coin," Goldberg said. "They're both driven for the same ultimate end goals, but their tactics are very different. Kim and Daniel are terrific together, and we were really excited to bring that character back."

Throughout "Anton," a theme emerges as Madison and Victor/Anton wrestle with what the Germans might call zweite chance: "Everyone deserves a second chance."

"It's very much the theme in the back half. This really is a moment for all these characters to have a stab at a second chance," added showrunner Andrew Chambliss. "We see Victor Strand having created an entirely new life for himself, and now he's going to have to grapple with the fact of whether or not he can integrate this new persona he's created with the man he used to be as his old life and new life come together. Madison's obviously struggling with whether or not she can seek redemption, whether or not she can give all these people at PADRE the gift of family, a place where they can be safe, the things she always wanted for her own children."

Chambliss continued: "We'll see that theme resonate as we get into Dwight, Sherry, June's stories later in the season. It is definitely a big part, and I think it's a question that the finale of the series is really going to answer in a big way."

Fear the Walking Dead airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

No one's gone until they're gone. But in Fear the Walking Dead's final midseason premiere, titled "Anton," Victor Strand (Colman Domingo) is gone. The once cunning conman is now a caring family man named Anton, partner to Frank (Isha Blaaker) and loving father to Frank's son, Klaus (Julian Grey). In the seven years since we last saw him, Strand/Anton has settled into domestic life at the Emissary Suites, a hotel resort converted into a community of German tourists stranded during the global Wildfire Virus outbreak of 2010. Inside the German tour group's Marsh Light Tours bus converted into a walker-proofed barricade, Anton, Frank, and Klaus welcome an elderly man (Kermit Rolison) to what Anton describes as "an oasis for the dispossessed, the desperate, the weary."

"We got a second chance," Klaus says, his father adding that their home is "about making sure other people get one, too." Adds Anton: "Everyone deserves a second chance." That includes Madison Clark (Kim Dickens), found half-conscious, out of oxygen -- and alive. It's a surprise for Anton, who thought Madison died when she saved him and her children, Nick and Alicia, when the Dell Diamond baseball stadium was overrun and destroyed.

She asks questions -- What are you doing here? Who are these people calling you Anton? Why are you speaking German? -- but the man she knew as Victor Strand has no answers. It's a tearful Victor who embraces his old friend Madison, back from the dead, but it's Anton who pushes the stranger away when Frank and Klaus why she's calling him "Victor." She must be mistaken, he lies. He's never heard of Victor Strand, and he's never seen her before in his life. Before Madison can press "Anton" for answers, she wheezes, inhales sharply, and collapses from lack oxygen. Later, Anton insists to the council -- and to his family -- that he doesn't know who she is or why she thinks he's Victor Strand, even when the familiar voice of Daniel Salazar (Rub?n Blades) comes over the walkie-talkie looking for Madison.

But "everyone deserves a second chance," so they're not giving up on helping this stranger. As Klaus tends to Madison, a bond forms: he reminds her of her children, who once nursed a bird back to health, and she reminds him of his mother, Frank's ex, who was in Germany when the world changed. Madison wants to know why Victor is lying and pretending to be someone he's not, but before she can get an explanation, unwelcome guests arrive at the hotel: the posse that ambushed Madison. Russell (Randy Bernales) and his motley crew of armed men heard Madison's broadcasts about rebuilding PADRE, and their leader "knows her for who she really is." Frank claims they have no one matching her description, but when Anton has to choose between handing her over or losing the hotel like he lost the Tower... he unilaterally decides to give up Madison.

Anton and Frank find Madison escaped with Klaus. Anton agrees to accompany Russell's men to track them down, but bails to avoid another reunion: with old "frenemy" Daniel, who is approaching the hotel by boat. With Daniel and his soldiers in pursuit of Russell's men, Anton and Frank split off to find their son. Frank is aware Anton is lying about his past: he knows what it is to "live a lie," referring to the years he was married to Klaus' mother. Anton conveniently finds a raft, and an even-more-convenient sword; for Frank, it's more evidence that there's something Anton hasn't told him. "Are you Victor Strand?"

Frank assures Anton that he could forgive him "if you are Victor Strand," just like Klaus' mother forgave him when he came clean to live his truth. " Whatever you did, I'm sure it's forgivable." And Anton assures him: "I'm not that man." They find Madison and Klaus at the Wymberley Jones De Renne Georgia Library on the appropriately-named Isle of Hope, and Anton just so happens to know where they can find an oxygen tank to save a fading Madison. The washed-up raft, the sword, the oxygen -- Frank figures out that they're the missing pieces of a puzzle he's tried to piece together ever since Madison arrived at their door. But there's no time to argue. With Russell's men closing in, Anton wants them to move, but Klaus refuses to abandon Madison.

"I defended you to her. Told her my dad would never hand her over to those people like that," Klaus says. "Maybe you're not who I thought you were." But as Madison told him: You don't know Victor. She was right. No -- she was wrong. "I am, Klaus. And I'm going to prove it to you." Anton tells Frank to take their son home. He'll be right behind them... after he helps her. "You took a chance on me when we first met. You both did. You saw the man I could be," Anton tells Frank and Klaus. "Let me prove to you I can still be that man."

Anton and Madison's second reunion goes worse than the first: she's angry at Victor for throwing her to the wolves, but as he reminds her, he's not Victor Strand. He's Anton, and he's here to save her. "I promised my son I would," he tells her. "You can either come with me and live, or stay here and die." Madison goes with Victor, seething that Victor traded her life back at the hotel. She says things like: "You scared sh-tless your little family is gonna find out who you really were? You were ready to let me die just to protect your secret. You gonna cut my throat with that sword, go back and tell your kid those people did it?"

"I'm not who you think," says Victor Anton. "I don't even know who the hell you are anymore!" Madison yells in response. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, and hell hath no fury like whoever it is that's after Madison. When Russell's gang tracks them to the isle, he cryptically asks Anton: "You have no idea how far back this goes, do you?" Madison doesn't know these men or what they want with her, and it doesn't matter. "Whoever you think she is," Anton says, "that's not her anymore. Believe me. I know." Russell's response is that they're the same, both "pretending to be something you're not." They want PADRE, and Madison is going to show them where it is.

Anton and Madison manage to escape, but with walkers swarming the isle, they won't make it to the boats. Their only option is to hole up inside the library, but it's breached by the horde. Their makeshift barricade of desks and chairs and everything else not nailed down will only last so long against the wall of walkers flooding into the library. Anton radios Frank and Klaus as the walkers advance. They're trapped.

And then the confession: Victor Strand is dead, killed by Victor Strand. "I had to leave that person behind," Anton tells Madison, explaining that he betrayed Alicia when he was the "ruthless" leader of the Tower. When the Tower fell, the survivors who escaped the radioactive fallout in Texas washed up on the shores of Savannah, Georgia, where they became separated. "Some were taken to PADRE. Others were struggling to survive out here. I tried to help them, but they wouldn't let me. They couldn't forgive me. I tried to help them find food, to make amends. When I came back," he says, facing the undead horde, "they were dead, just like them. I hated being Victor Strand. So I killed him. "As far as I was concerned, he died with everyone else that day."

Madison asks who he became. Who are you now? "The last time I saw Alicia... she told me that she loved me. I didn't think anyone could," Anton tearfully confesses. "I met Frank and Klaus, and it changed everything. I could be the person that Alicia thought I could be. But I could only do it as someone else. As Anton." He takes Madison's hand, and tells her that Alicia had the chance to let him die. "And after everything I did, I deserved it. But she didn't." Why didn't she? "Because her mother taught her that no one is gone until they're gone. That everyone deserves a second chance. No matter what."

Madison has her own amends to make. She tells Anton that she promised the kids she collected for PADRE that she would help them find their parents. She sent messages on long-range radio "just hoping that some parents would hear me," she says, but those same messages drew Russell's men to her. "And now I've put everyone else in danger because of it. That place, what I promised those kids... that's all I have left, Victor."

Finally, they're rescued... by Russell's soldiers. They gun down the walkers and capture Madison and Anton, along with the Germans. Back at the hotel, Madison, Anton, Klaus, Frank, and the rest of their community are strapped to chairs, guns to their heads. And then their shows himself: Troy Otto (Daniel Sharman), somehow still alive after Madison bludgeoned him with a hammer and left him for dead back at the Gonzalez Dam in Mexico. He didn't escape unscathed: he removes his sunglasses, revealing a dead, discolored eye.

"I'm gonna tell you the truth about who she is," Troy tells the people who took in Madison, blaming her for destroying his family's ranch. "My brother, my father, I lost them all because of her." And Victor Strand helped. Madison is surprised to learn Troy survived, but is less surprised he's after PADRE. "I'm just looking for a home, Madison," he says. "You see, you took mine from me, so I'm gonna take yours from you." Madison is confident Troy will never find PADRE. He's even more confident he will. "'Cause you're gonna tell me," Troy replies, taking a familiar hammer from his belt, "or I'm gonna do to him what you did to me."

Troy takes Anton by the throat, raises the hammer to his head... and Victor Strand dies. But he's not killed by a hammer. Or by Troy. This is a symbolic death: a selfless Anton truly kills the selfish Victor Strand with the truth. "Don't do it, Madison. Hold onto that place," he tells his old friend of PADRE. "It's what Alicia would've wanted." Frank and Klaus beg Madison to tell Troy how to find PADRE to save Anton like he saved her. Anton tells his truth: "My name is Victor Strand. I lied to you about so much. But what I felt for you was real. Ich liebe euch beide." Translation: "I love you both."

Before Troy can bring the hammer down, Daniel arrives with his army: June (Jenna Elfman), Sherry (Christine Evangelista), and enough soldiers to make this a fair fight with Troy's army. "Hate to do to you what I did to your daughter," says Troy, who is immediately recognized by Daniel. "Troy Otto. Next time, I'm gonna make sure you really die." Madison, now having the upper hand, tells Troy that the place she's building is about to expand. The Germans took her in when she needed help -- now she's doing the same for them.

"I won't pretend I haven't done things I regret. But the place I'm building, it's not about me," Madison says. "It's about keeping something bigger alive." It's about her kids. Nick and Alicia. "I'm gonna build that place into what it should have always been, for them. For Alicia." Troy warns her she's making a mistake... "'cause that's the same thinking that got her killed in the first place."

Madison, with fury, demands Troy tell her how he knows about Alicia's death. "'Cause I'm the one that killed her," he says nonchalantly, handing over a duffle bag for proof. Inside is what Anton and Daniel recognize as Alicia's arm prosthetic, the bones of her zombie-bitten arm still inside. "I took it off her corpse after I killed her." Madison sobs. Then she gets angry. She roars with a ferocity of a mourning mother and swings at Troy with the hammer -- and this time, she's going to KILL HIM. Except Anton holds her back, gently dragging Madison out of the room as Daniel's army holds off Troy's army.

"See, I would've put her down, Madison. After all the wandering around I did in Mexico, I thought it was only right that Alicia should do the same. Maybe one day you'll find her. Or maybe she'll find you, or maybe not, and finish the job. You want a fight, Madison? We'll give you that. We'll give you a fight." As Madison mourns Alicia's death, she has no answer to what Troy asks: "What are you even fighting for?" No one's gone until they're gone... but is Alicia gone?

New episodes of Fear the Walking Dead premiere Sundays on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

In 2018, Overkill's The Walking Dead released on PC, offering a first-person take on the world of the comics. While the title seemed promising initially, reviews for the game were nothing short of atrocious. In February 2019, just three months after the game was released, Skybound pulled the license from Starbreeze Publishing and Overkill Software, and cancelled the planned console versions. Four years later, a developer build of the game has surfaced on 4chan, including content that never made it to players! It's unclear exactly where this version came from, or how long it might remain online, but screens from the build were shared on Reddit and can be found right here.

While it doesn't seem like many fans are clamoring for a chance to replay Overkill's The Walking Dead, this is pretty interesting from a historical perspective! An unfortunate reality of the gaming industry is that a lot of media ends up lost to time, especially licensed material. Fans can get a glimpse into what might have been, including content that was apparently close to being released before the license was pulled. While Overkill's The Walking Dead will likely never get another official release, there are still plenty of other games based on the franchise on the way, including both multiplayer co-op, as well as single-player experiences.

The Walking Dead: Betrayal

Skybound's announcement that it pulled The Walking Dead license noted that the game "did not meet our standards nor is it the quality that we were promised." Since then, the company has worked with several other video game developers and publishers on The Walking Dead property. Last month saw the early access release of The Walking Dead: Betrayal, a "cooperation and social deception" game based on the property. That game is currently exclusive to PC.

The Walking Dead: Destinies

Next month will also see the release of The Walking Dead: Destinies, a game that will be arriving on basically every video game platform currently available, including Nintendo Switch, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. While games like Overkill's The Walking Dead and The Walking Dead: Betrayal have both focused on multiplayer approaches to the brand, Destinies is a single-player experience set in the world of the AMC TV series. Specifically, the game will let players relive moments based on the show's first four seasons, and they'll be able to recruit different characters to build a team. True to its title, the game will offer plenty of opportunities for players to alter the destinies of these characters, and go against what played out in the show. The game just recently got a release date, and will be arriving digitally on November 17th, with physical versions coming in December.

Did you play Overkill's The Walking Dead before it was pulled? Are you interested in seeing this never-released content? Share your thoughts with me directly on Twitter at @Marcdachamp or on Instagram at @Dachampgaming!

There are just six episodes left of Fear the Walking Dead. In January, AMC announced the eighth and final season of the first Walking Dead spinoff would consist of 12 episodes split into two parts: season 8A (May 14) and season 8B (October 22). After Morgan Jones (Lennie James) helped Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) retake PADRE, Morgan exited the series to go look for Rick Grimes. With Morgan clearing out, Madison sets out to rebuild PADRE when she runs afoul of an old enemy: Troy Otto (Daniel Sharman). It all leads to a conclusion in the two-episode series finale, moved up from Nov. 26 to Nov. 19.

Below, read on for everything you need to know about how to watch Fear the Walking Dead online without cable, when to tune in for new episodes, and how to catch up on the first seven seasons.

Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 7 Release Date

The Fear the Walking Dead midseason premiere, "Anton," airs tonight (Sunday, October 22) on AMC, and is available to stream now on AMC+ (more on that below).

What Time Does Fear the Walking Dead Come On?

New episodes of Fear the Walking Dead season 8 premiere Sundays at 9:00 p.m. ET/8c on AMC through November 19. If you have an AMC+ subscription, you can watch Fear the Walking Dead early: new episodes are available to stream on Sundays starting at 3 a.m. ET / 12 a.m. PT on AMC+.

Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 7 Runtime

"Anton" has a running time of 42 minutes and 14 seconds without commercials. On AMC, the episode is scheduled to air from 9:00 p.m. -- 10:08 p.m.

Where to Stream Fear the Walking Dead Online Without Cable

Cord-cutters can stream Fear the Walking Dead season 8 on AMC+. Prices start at $4.99/month for the new AMC+ with ads plan, while ad-free AMC+ is available for $6.99/month (when billed annually) or $8.99/month (when billed monthly).

AMC+ is available as an app and via Apple TV, Amazon Prime Video Channels, The Roku Channel, Comcast Xfinity, Dish, DirecTV, Sling TV, and YouTube TV.

You can also watch episodes of Fear the Walking Dead season 8 on the AMC website by signing in with your television provider.

Where Is Fear the Walking Dead Streaming?

All eight seasons of Fear the Walking Dead are available to stream on AMC+; the first seven seasons are currently available under the "AMC+ Picks on Max" hub on Max (formerly HBO Max) until October 31, 2023. If you already have an active Max subscription, you can watch Fear the Walking Dead and other select AMC/AMC+ content at no additional cost.

You can also watch Fear the Walking Dead: "Best of," AMC's curated collection of "best of" episodes, on the AMC website. There are 25 total episodes to watch for free from "Best of Madison," "Best of Alicia," "Best of Strand," and "Best of Troy."

Is Fear the Walking Dead on Hulu?

No. Fear the Walking Dead left Hulu in July when the first seven seasons went to AMC+.

Is There an AMC+ Free Trial?

To watch Fear the Walking Dead for free online, new customers can sign up for a 7-day free AMC Plus trial that will automatically renew unless cancelled. New episodes are added weekly on Sundays, joining the first seasons of The Walking Dead Universe spinoffs The Walking Dead: Dead City, The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, The Walking Dead: World Beyond, and Tales of the Walking Dead.

An AMC+ subscription also includes access to programming from AMC, BBC America, IFC, SundanceTV, Shudder, Sundance Now, and IFC Films Unlimited, including Greg Nicotero's Creepshow, Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice's Mayfair Witches, Dark Winds, Killing Eve, The Terror, A Discovery of Witches, and Mad Men.

Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Recaps

Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 1 Recap: "Remember What They Took From You"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 2 Recap: "Blue Jay"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 3 Recap: "Odessa"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 4 Recap: "King County"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 5 Recap: "More Time Than You Know"
Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 6 Recap: "All I See Is Red"

Fear the Walking Dead's final episodes premiere Sundays on AMC and AMC+.

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The ComicBook Nation Crew reviews the highly-anticipated Marvel's Spider-Man 2 video game, and recap the big twists of Loki Episode 3. We also discuss what Deadpool 3's delay means, Rick and Morty Season 7's new voice actors, Netflix's Fall of the House of Usher, the latest ep of Gen V, and some exciting new events in comics and tabletop gaming!

Spider-Man 2 Review

In his 4.5 (out of 5) star review of Marvel's Spider-Man 2, ComicBook Gaming expert Cade Onder said the following:

Ultimately, Marvel's Spider-Man 2 captures the essence of the character on a micro and macro level. We get big, epic set pieces infused with personal stakes, spectacular combat, the amazing web-swinging that every kid dreams of, and a story that tests Miles Morales and Peter Parker on both physical and mental levels. While it isn't without its flaws, Spider-Man 2 is a sensational follow-up to the previous games and yet another winner for PlayStation players.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

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When a Richonne romance blossomed between Andrew Lincoln's Rick Grimes and Danai Gurira's Michonne on The Walking Dead television show, it was a deviation from the comic books -- and the start of a love story that would spawn its own spinoff series. But as it turns out, writer and creator Robert Kirkman mulled over a Rick and Michonne romance years before it happened on "The Next World" episode of The Walking Dead season 6 (aired in February 2016). In fact, as Kirkman notes in the colorized reprint The Walking Dead Deluxe #74, his plans for the original issue -- first printed in July 2010, months before the show's pilot debuted on AMC -- included a germ of an idea.

"Michonne + Rick on patrol. Budding romance hinted [at]," reads Kirkman's handwritten notes in the latest edition of "The Cutting Room Floor with Robert Kirkman," included in The Walking Dead Deluxe #74.

"This is HUGE," Kirkman writes in his creator's commentary. "I'd forgotten I'd considered making Michonne and Rick an item. Years before it ended up happening in the TV show, here it was. Ultimately, (spoiler alert!) Rick ended up with Andrea, and I kept the Rick and Michonne relationship to a strong friendship, but it definitely almost happened."

The Walking Dead #74 sees Rick, a former police officer, and Michonne, a former lawyer, settling into their roles as constables for the Alexandria Safe-Zone. (In the TV show, Tovah Feldshuh's Deanna Monroe appoints Rick and Michonne as constables; in the comics, it's Douglas Monroe.) After Michonne hangs up her katana in issue #72, Rick tells her she'll get used to "protecting and serving."

When Rick asks if she's planning to move to a new house, Michonne says she doesn't want to take her sword off the mantel because it's symbolic. "Don't want to take it down unless I need to," Michonne admits. "You talk to Lori recently?" Michonne, who used to talk to her dead boyfriend Mike, overheard Rick talking to his dead wife after the first time she relinquished her katana: when she joined the Atlanta group at the prison.

"Should have known that's not something you'd want to talk about," Michonne tells Rick. "Sorry." Rick and Michonne's otherwise friendly encounter comes one issue after she calls her relationship with Morgan Jones "a mistake" because Morgan, still mourning his wife's death, feels guilty that "not enough time" has passed before sleeping with Michonne. It's around this time that Rick takes an interest in Jessie Anderson, but Rick's next serious relationship doesn't come until issue #90. In an intimate moment that inspired the first Richonne kiss on The Walking Dead, the issue ends with Rick and Andrea embracing on a couch.

Ultimately, Michonne and Rick's relationship in the comics remains platonic. Michonne eventually becomes involved with King Ezekiel, who dies a victim of the Whisperers; and Andrea, who succumbs to a walker's bite, is buried as "Andrea Grimes." But Richonne lives on in The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live, which reunites Rick and Michonne years after Rick was shuttled away aboard a CRM helicopter.

The official logline: "This series presents an epic love story of two characters changed by a changed world. Kept apart by distance. By an unstoppable power. By the ghosts of who they were. Rick and Michonne are thrown into another world, built on a war against the dead... And ultimately, a war against the living. Can they find each other and who they were in a place and situation unlike any they've ever known before? Are they enemies? Lovers? Victims? Victors? Without each other, are they even alive -- or will they find that they, too, are the Walking Dead?"

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live premieres in February 2024 on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

The countdown to the final episodes of Fear the Walking Dead has begun. Ahead of Sunday's midseason premiere, AMC announced Thursday that the last two episodes of Fear will air as a two-part series finale Sunday, November 19th, at 9 p.m. ET/8c on AMC. That means that episodes 811 and 812 will air back-to-back, ending the first Walking Dead spinoff after eight seasons and 113 episodes. (In January, AMC confirmed that Fear's shortened eighth and final season would be split into two six-episode parts, for a total of 12 episodes.)

Starting with "Anton" on October 22nd, new episodes of Fear the Walking Dead season 8 will premiere every Sunday through November 19th. Episodes will be available to stream at 12 a.m. PT/3 a.m. ET on Sundays for AMC+ subscribers before airing at 9 p.m. ET/8c on the AMC channel.

AMC describes the final episodes: "Now that Shrike (Maya Eshet) and her influence are gone, Madison (Kim Dickens) sets sights on transforming PADRE into the safe haven the old Stadium was meant to be. But in doing so the island becomes a target as well as a beacon as word of Madison and this land of resources spreads, attracting unwanted attention that puts PADRE back in peril and questions whether our heroes even deserve to save it."

"We knew at the end of season 7 that season 8 was going to be the final season. We were very grateful that we were able to go into the season knowing that because it meant we could plan the story to bring the show to a conclusion, to really bring these characters to the end of their journey on the show," executive producer Andrew Chambliss, who serves as showrunner with Ian Goldberg, told ComicBook for an exclusive preview of the last six episodes. "Starting from a place of building towards a conclusion made all the planning -- both on a practical level, and on a narrative level -- that much easier."

Chambliss continued, "I think it will result an ending that feels a lot more satisfying than if it was something that we found out halfway through the season. But it led to us having this thematic drive that guided us where Ian and I often said -- 'the end is in the beginning' -- and it meant looking back at all these characters to see where they started their journeys, take stock of how they've grown, and put them in places where that would be readily apparent both to them and to the audience."

After Morgan Jones (Lennie James) left the series to go look for Rick Grimes, Madison has been rebuilding PADRE with a promise to reunite the children she took as a Collector with their parents. But when an enemy she thought dead returns to take PADRE for their own, it threatens the futures of survivors Victor Strand (Colman Domingo), Daniel Salazar (Rub?n Blades), Luciana (Danay Garc?a), June Dorie (Jenna Elfman), and Dwight (Austin Amelio) and Sherry (Christine Evangelista).

"We ended the first half of the season with Madison in a place where she vowed to turn PADRE into the place it was always meant to be. We are going to see how that's going for her in some surprising ways," Goldberg added. "It's going to involve the return of some faces that we haven't seen in a while, both friend and foe. It's also going to involve a return to some places, literally, that we have seen elsewhere in The Walking Dead Universe. They're going to speak to our characters' states of mind, so it's going to be pretty epic."

Fear the Walking Dead Season 8B premieres Sunday, October 22nd, on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

Worlds collided for the first time in 2018 when The Walking Dead and Fear the Walking Dead crossover event spawned what AMC would dub The Walking Dead Universe. Morgan Jones (Lennie James) bridged the two formerly separate shows when he crossed over from the original flagship to the first Walking Dead spinoff, and cross pollination happened again when Dwight (Austin Amelio) and Sherry (Christine Evangelista) followed Morgan over to Fear. And then Jadis (Pollyanna McIntosh) landed on limited series The Walking Dead: World Beyond after disappearing with Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) aboard a helicopter piloted by the CRM -- the S.H.I.E.L.D.-like organization connecting the three shows.

During a Daryl Dixon panel at New York Comic Con, AMC's TWD television universe chief content officer Scott M. Gimple fielded questions about a potential season 12 revival of The Walking Dead and a three-show crossover in which The Walking Dead: Dead City, The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol, and The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live could converge into one.

"That isn't specifically planned. It would be good, though, to see," Gimple said of a three-way crossover. "The dream would be that these shows somehow converge in some way, narratively." On bringing The Walking Dead flagship back to life for a season 12, Gimple added: "I'm not against it."

In 2020, The Powers That Be at AMC announced the eleventh season of The Walking Dead would be its last; in January 2023, it confirmed Fear the Walking Dead will end after an eight-season run. With the recently-aired first seasons of Dead City and Daryl Dixon, the network launched what Dan McDermott, president of entertainment and AMC Studios, called phase two of The Walking Dead Universe.

"It's a truly exciting year for The Walking Dead Universe, as we conclude an epic journey on Fear the Walking Dead, which became one of the most successful shows in the history of cable television," McDermott said earlier this year. "And now we are set to bring forth the next iteration of the franchise - two new and anticipated series featuring the beloved characters of Maggie, Negan and Daryl. Along with that we begin production on the next chapter in Rick and Michonne's unforgettable love story, which we look forward to sharing next year."

The Walking Dead: Dead City season 1 followed Maggie (Lauren Cohan) and Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) into post-apocalyptic New York, while the first season of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon found Daryl (Norman Reedus) stranded overseas in France. In 2024, AMC will air a second season subtitled The Book of Carol, about Carol (Melissa McBride) tracking down Daryl, and The Ones Who Live, reuniting long-lost partners Michonne (Danai Gurira) and Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln).

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

No one's gone until they're gone -- but Victor Strand is gone. AMC already released the first clip from the final episodes of Fear the Walking Dead, in which the man formerly known as Victor Strand (Colman Domingo) learned that his old friend Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) did not, in fact, die back at the stadium in season 4. "I thought I'd lost you," Madison said during the tearful reunion, only to learn that that is not Victor Strand. "His name's not Anton," she told the two German men accompanying who they know as Anton. "It's Victor Strand."

"My name is Anton," he replied. "I've never heard of Victor Strand. You must be mistaken." Accused of lying about his past, Anton rebuffed her again: "I've never seen her before in my life." Before Madison could find out why Strand has assumed this new identity, she passed out from lack of oxygen.

ComicBook has another exclusive scene (above) revealing what happens next in Sunday's "Anton" midseason premiere. In the clip, a posse of armed men have come looking for a woman they heard is hiding in the area. "Her name is Madison," says Russell (Randy Bernales), identifying Madison as a former Collector for PADRE. As we saw in the midseason finale, she's been broadcasting her message that she's trying to rebuild PADRE -- and, apparently, these guys were listening.

"The people I'm with, the head of this little outfit? He knows her for who she really is," Russell tells Anton, who recognizes yet another familiar voice over the man's walkie-talkie: Daniel Salazar (Rub?n Blades). When Russell refuses to walk away, he gives them two options: let them in and hand her over peacefully, or they go in guns blazing. You'll have to tune in to find out what Anton/Strand decides.

Strand "may have the most drastic reinvention of any character on the show when we meet him," showrunner Ian Goldberg teased during Fear's final WonderCon panel. "Expect a big change from what we've seen before."

"Strand went down a very dark path in season 7 with who he became in that tower, and he's dug a deep hole for himself," Goldberg added of Strand's turn as the merciless leader of The Tower. But after a seven-year time jump -- and a new identity -- the question for Strand in the final episodes is "whether he can redeem himself for everything that he did."

Fear the Walking Dead returns with its final six episodes when "Anton" premieres Sunday, October 22nd, on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

When it comes to making Creepshow, visual effects legend Greg Nicotero says that one of the challenges of getting a new season made is finding the right directors to helm the episodes he isn't handling personally. Not that there aren't good directors out there -- having worked on The Walking Dead for so many years, he has met and worked with many -- but the issue is that good directors are always working, which leaves him either trying to work around their schedule or, in most cases, finding more obscure filmmakers and bringing them to a mainstream-ish audience for the first time.

The conversation started out when ComicBook.com's Chris Killian asked Nicotero about the decision-making process. As both the showrunner and a prolific director, how does he decide when it's his turn to take a project, versus when he hands it off to another talented director?

"The process is, we have people submit short stories," Nicotero told ComicBook.com. "Sometimes it's a paragraph and other times it's a fleshed-out one or two page outlines, and sometimes, it's a full script that people submit. I would say that the ones I chose to direct are the ones that, as soon as I read them, '...that goes on the Greg pile.' Definitely I remember 'Night of the Living Late Show' and probably 'Television of the Dead,' which were season two episodes. I read those and went, 'I want to do them.' Maybe because they had connections to movies that I had worked on because of the Romero or the Sam Raimi thing. And then I remember reading a short story for 'Shapeshifters Anonymous,' and it was a guy who doesn't know he's a werewolf goes to a support group of people who turn into different types of animals. And I remember reading that short story and thinking it was so unique and so different, and I'd never read anything like it. And I went, 'I Want to do this story because it's different,' and I ended up adapting it and writing the screenplay for that as well."

He admitted that there were some episodes he would have liked to have directed himself, but he can't do everything -- after all, when you're fresh off a manic 18 months wrapping up The Walking Dead, sometimes you need to take a breather. Plus, as showrunner, sometimes he had to run to the network and convince them that something is worth even making in the first place. And that's when he dug into the challenges of finding the right people to work on the episodes that aren't directed by Greg Nicotero.

"In most instances I'll pull the script out that I want to do and then in terms of interviewing the directors, it's a lot harder of a process than you would imagine because directors are hard to find," Nicotero admitted. "A lot of times you go out to the people that you've worked with, that you admire and you want to collaborate with, and they're always busy. A lot of the female directors that we had gone after, that I had worked with before, even though we had a lot of great directors on The Walking Dead, everybody's busy. It's hard to find directors. So for me, I had an opportunity to watch a lot of movies and meet a lot of new people. With the Spear Sisters, I had seen a lot of their shorts and they had done Scary Stories, they had done a couple of smaller things, so I thought they were really well-suited. And [Justin G. Dyck], who directed 'Grandmother's House' and 'Cheat Code,' I had seen his movie, which I really really liked. So in a lot of instances, it's going out and looking for new talent, just like The Walking Dead has had the opportunity to develop some young talent that a lot of people don't know about, I feel like I have the same obligation with Creepshow. And then I have John Esposito, who has written on Creepshow for all the seasons and has been a really dear friend of mine for a really long time, wrote 'Meet the Belaskos.' I would have loved to have written that story because I thought it had a lot of heart, and it had a lot to say about bigotry sort of put in the vein -- no pun intended -- of a genre setting. Having the opportunity to give him his first directing job and direct his own story made me happy. And then of course John Harrison is a Creepshow legend, so I could not have done the series without him. I think we had a really great stable of directors and a really great assortment of stories in this season."

Creepshow season four premiered on Shudder, AMC, and AMC+ last week. You can stream new episodes now.

The end is the beginning, but it's the beginning of the end for Fear the Walking Dead. When AMC announced in January that the first Walking Dead spinoff would end with an eighth and final season, showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg had already begun wrapping up the closing chapter in the first phase of the Walking Dead Universe. "We knew at the end of season 7 that season 8 was going to be the final season," Chambliss tells ComicBook ahead of the last six episodes ever of Fear, premiering October 22nd on AMC and AMC+. The penultimate season ended with Alycia Debnam-Carey's departure from the show after seven seasons -- just as Kim Dickens made her long-awaited return for what would be a shortened, 12-episode final season.

"We were very grateful that we were able to go into the season knowing that [it was the final season] because it meant we could plan the story to bring the show to a conclusion, to really bring these characters to the end of their journey on the show," Chambliss says of the saga that's spanned Los Angeles, Mexico, Texas, Georgia, and Virginia. "Starting from a place of building towards a conclusion made all the planning -- both on a practical level, and on a narrative level -- that much easier."

That meant the showrunners had enough runway to wrap up Lennie James' Morgan Jones, who came full circle to The Walking Dead pilot when he exited the series in the midseason 8 finale to go look for Rick Grimes. It also meant the duo could plan similar sendoffs for not just the original cast of characters -- including Madison Clark (Kim Dickens), Victor Strand (Colman Domingo), and Daniel Salazar (Rub?n Blades) -- but the show that premiered in 2015 as the #1 most-watched cable series premiere of all time.

"I think it will result an ending that feels a lot more satisfying than if it was something that we found out halfway through the season," Chambliss adds. "But it led to us having this thematic drive that guided us where Ian and I often said -- 'the end is in the beginning' -- and it meant looking back at all these characters to see where they started their journeys, take stock of how they've grown, and put them in places where that would be readily apparent both to them and to the audience."

In the mid-season finale, Madison promised the kids she took as a Collector for PADRE that they would find their parents, bring them to the island, and "make PADRE what it was meant to be in the first place." Madison then broadcast her hopeful message over long-range radio, unaware that the man she bludgeoned seemingly to death in season 3 was listening: Troy Otto (Daniel Sharman).

"We ended the first half of the season with Madison in a place where she vowed to turn PADRE into the place it was always meant to be. We are going to see how that's going for her in some surprising ways," Goldberg teases. "It's going to involve the return of some faces that we haven't seen in a while, both friend and foe. It's also going to involve a return to some places, literally, that we have seen elsewhere in The Walking Dead Universe. They're going to speak to our characters' states of mind, so it's going to be pretty epic."

Fear the Walking Dead returns with its final episodes Sunday, October 22nd, on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira aren't the only ones reuniting for The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live. Greg Nicotero -- the longtime Walking Dead director, executive producer, special effects makeup supervisor, and zombie designer who has been with the AMC franchise since the beginning -- has confirmed his role on the Walking Dead Rick and Michonne spinoff premiering in 2024. As Nicotero notes in an interview with ComicBook for season 4 of the horror anthology series Creepshow (streaming now on Shudder and AMC+), the director didn't step behind the camera for the six-episode series because he was in France shooting second unit on The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon.

"I've been in France while they were developing the Rick and Michonne show. I still supervised the makeup effects from a distance, but I did not [direct]," Nicotero told ComicBook of The Ones Who Live, which began production in New Jersey in February 2023. "I think if I hadn't been in Paris, I probably would have directed on Rick and Michonne, because I know Andy personally had asked me to come and work on the show. But I can't be in two places at once."

The TWD veteran may not be directing episodes of The Ones Who Live, but he did give fans their first taste of Rick and Michonne's returns in a final coda sequence that ended The Walking Dead series finale in 2022. Nicotero is credited as consulting producer on the spinoff series from showrunner Scott M. Gimple, who serves as executive producer alongside Lincoln, Gurira, Denise Huth (The Walking Dead) and Brian Bockrath (The Walking Dead: Dead City).

The Walking Dead's go-to director, also an EP on Daryl Dixon, additionally confirmed that he's officially back in the director's chair for The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol, which reunites Norman Reedus and Melissa McBride as series regulars.

"I did get a chance to direct a lot, actually, of season one of Daryl. I did the old, 'Hey guys, I'm here and I'm not directing in season 1. But if you need me, I'm available to do second unit or additional photography.' And they went, 'Oh, really? Well, that's funny, because we only have 24 days to shoot this episode and the schedule is 30. So those extra six days, you could go shoot those,'" Nicotero explained to ComicBook, adding that his directorial contributions included Daryl's trek across the French countryside in the "L'?me Perdue" series premiere, a zombie-filled action sequence set at the foot of the Eiffel Tower, and Daryl fending off underwater walkers in the sewers beneath Paris.

"I had a really good time shooting a lot of that footage. I thought it was really a better choice for the show to have different directors bring Daryl Dixon into the world because we wanted it to have a visually different style to it," Nicotero said of the spinoff set and filmed in France with directors Daniel Percival (the dystopian thriller series The Man in the High Castle) and Tim Southam (totalitarian sci-fi drama Colony). "I loved the directors that we had in season one. I did direct on [Daryl] season 2 because we've been filming already. That was a lot of fun for me."

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live premieres in February 2024 on AMC and AMC+, and will be followed by The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol later in 2024.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

"No one's gone until they're gone." What were once the last words of Clark family matriarch Madison (Kim Dickens) to her children, Nick (Frank Dillane) and Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey), have become the defining theme of the eighth and final season of Fear the Walking Dead. AMC's first Walking Dead spinoff returns with the second half of its shortened, 12-episode final season on October 22nd with "Anton," named after the new identity of a drastically reinvented Victor Strand (Colman Domingo). By finally reuniting Madison and Victor, the first hour of Fear's remaining six episodes establishes the oft-stated theme of the back half of Season 8: "Everyone deserves a second chance."

The first half of the season saw Lennie James' Morgan exit the series after passing the figurative torch of lead role back to Dickens, who returned in the Season 7 finale following the revelation that Madison survived a seemingly fatal heroic sacrifice midway through Season 4. With Dickens reinstated as series lead for the first time since 2018, Madison takes central focus as she sets out to rebuild PADRE into the sanctuary that the Clarks' Texas stadium was meant to be before it was overrun and destroyed.

"The place I'm building, it's not about me," Madison says. "It's about keeping something bigger alive." That "something bigger" is Nick and Alicia, her kids who were long gone even before the final season premiere jumped seven years into the future. But when Troy Otto (Daniel Sharman) -- who looked dead as a doornail when Madison twice bludgeoned him with a hammer to the head back in Season 3 -- returns with his one good eye on taking PADRE, it threatens not just the Clark family legacy, but the futures that Victor Strand, Daniel Salazar (Rub?n Blades), and the little-seen Luciana (Danay Garc?a) have built (frustratingly, off-screen) for the past seven years.

Following Fear's recent slew of foes ranging from forgettable ("Filthy Woman" Martha, Logan, PADRE's Shrike and Crane) to formidable (Virginia, the nuclear bomb-dropping Teddy, the CRM), resurrecting Troy Otto as the show's final existential threat is almost an admission that there's no better villain to end Fear with than a dead one -- retcons be damned. Sharman reprises his role as psychopathic fan-favorite Troy for the first time since 2017, and he's exceptionally effective as the final foil for Madison, bringing to Fear the same charismatic swagger that made Jeffrey Dean Morgan's Negan as magnetic as he was menacing. The drama heightens whenever Troy is on screen -- especially when he's needling Madison about Alicia and the reason why he has her daughter's prosthetic from her zombie-bitten, amputated arm.

Still, by bringing Troy and then a second once-thought-dead character back to life in the span of two episodes -- for a total of three resurrections, counting Madison -- death seems less consequential in a show where anyone could be killed off. Fear's biggest advantage over The Walking Dead was that it wasn't an adaptation of creator Robert Kirkman's comic book, which meant comic readers didn't have expectations about who might live or die (even if the flagship series often deviated from the source material). On one hand, AMC hasn't yet announced any Fear the Walking Dead spinoffs, thereby retaining the dramatic tension that was lost when viewers knew Daryl, Carol, Maggie, and Negan would make it out of The Walking Dead alive to return in spinoffs. On the other hand, Fear feels like a zombie soap opera based on the frequency with which characters return from the grave and then explain why they're not dead in expository dialogue.

Based on the first two of the final six episodes made available for review, there's a sense that Fear is a bit rushed. Characters who didn't appear at all in the first half of the season return with major roles to play in the back half, and so much happened during that seven-year time skip that even viewers who have been watching since the first season in 2015 might feel left out knowing that an entire show's worth of story happened between the Season 7 finale and the Season 8 premiere. Even with its smaller ensemble, the show would have benefited -- and certainly deserved -- more than 12 episodes to wrap things up. That's just half of the three-part, 24-episode final season that The Walking Dead had to deliver a satisfying conclusion.

Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 is at its best and its most compelling when it's providing Dickens, Domingo, Blades, and Sharman dramatic material to sink their teeth into. In the first two episodes, Dickens, Domingo, and Blades are serviced with emotionally powerful performances deserving of their long-surviving characters, and longtime fans will appreciate seeing Madison, Strand, Daniel, and Luciana all together for the first time since Season 3.

Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg, who have served as showrunners since the duo replaced series co-creator Dave Erickson in Season 4 onward, have almost reset Fear the Walking Dead to where Erickson left off when he killed Troy and blew up the Gonzalez Dam to end the acclaimed third season in 2017. While the new season naturally builds on some of the seismic shifts that occurred during the semi-rebooted fourth season that crossed over with The Walking Dead to bring Morgan to Fear, thematically, Chambliss and Goldberg circle back to Season 3 in such a way that it plays almost like a direct continuation of the Erickson era.

Tenured viewers might remember that Erickson envisioned a seven-season arc transforming Madison into a villain, and there are echoes of that as Madison's benevolence, inspired by her kids, is called into question when she reckons with vengeance, also inspired by her kids; mostly, Madison is a flawed anti-hero, who lived, died, and is living -- again -- for her kids.

"We're building PADRE for Alicia, for Nick," Strand says at one point, asking Madison: "What's the point of saving it if we turn into the opposite of what Alicia wanted us to build?" The Clarks are still the beating heart of the complex human drama churning the final episodes of Fear the Walking Dead, which is worth seeing through to the end. After all, everyone deserves a second chance.

Rating: 3 out of 5

The final episodes of Fear the Walking Dead Season 8 premiere Sunday, October 22nd, at 9 p.m. ET on AMC and AMC+.

To find home is to find each other in the next chapter of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon. Sunday's "Coming Home" season finale of the Walking Dead spin-off saw Carol Peletier (Melissa McBride) set off to find best friend Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus), who went missing after making a pit stop to gather fuel in Freeport, Maine. Carol tracked down Daryl's stolen motorcycle and, after stuffing its rider (Paul Zies) into the trunk of her Mustang at gunpoint, was pointed to the auto repair shop where Daryl disappeared when he got wrangled into wrangling walkers for the French doctor (Fran?ois Delaive) in the employ of France's Pouvoir Du Vivant leader Madame Genet (Anne Charrier). (Read the season finale recap here.)

"I don't know if this is the place I'm supposed to be. Thinking about all the people I left behind. Wondering if they're still thinking about me," Daryl says in the first The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon - The Book of Carol teaser trailer (above) that aired Sunday on AMC. Daryl left The Nest after delivering Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi) and Isabelle (Cl?mence Po?sy) to the Mont-Saint-Michel, but as revealed by the first footage from season 2, is drawn back into the Union of Hope's ongoing fight against Genet and her Guerrier.

Meanwhile, in America, Carol left Ohio's Commonwealth and has been tracking Daryl down the east coast. Her search brings her to Fuller's Auto Repair in Maine, where Jones (Gilbert Glenn Brown) trafficked Daryl and Juno (John Ales) to Dr. Lafleur -- who then put Daryl on the transatlantic vessel freighting zombie test subjects overseas. "The man that was here. Where is he?" asks a crossbow-wielding Carol at the auto shop, which has a French flag conspicuously placed out front. A stranger asks his own question: "Would you give up everything to look for somebody you haven't met?"

"If there was a hope of finding them alive," answers Carol as footage shows her trapped in an SUV surrounded by the dead, "yes."

During a panel at New York Comic Con ahead of the Daryl Dixon season finale, AMC announced McBride would reprise her fan-favorite role in the second season of the newly-retitled The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol in 2024. McBride last appeared in The Walking Dead series finale in 2022 and was set to star opposite Reedus in the untitled Daryl & Carol Walking Dead spin-off, but bowed out when relocating to Europe became "logistically untenable" at the time, according to an AMC statement.

"It was always the hope and the desire that we would get Melissa onto the show in season one, in whatever version she was ready to do. That was always what I wanted to do and what everybody wanted," showrunner David Zabel told ComicBook in a post-season Q&A. "Norman wanted it, [executive producer Scott M. Gimple] wanted it, we all wanted it. So it was just a matter of working out what the show was going to be and then seeing how we could include her. Because we love the character, and we love Melissa, and we love the dynamic of Daryl and Carol together. So from the point where I started participating on the show, that was always the conversation."

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol, starring Norman Reedus, Melissa McBride, and returning cast members Cl?mence Po?sy, Louis Puech Scigliuzzi, Laika Blanc Francard, Anne Charrier, Romain Levi, and Eriq Ebouaney, is scheduled to premiere in 2024 on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

[This story contains spoilers for The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season finale.] "You're going to drop this redneck in Paris?" Norman Reedus said of his reaction to AMC's latest Walking Dead spin-off that finds Daryl Dixon washing ashore in post-apocalyptic France. By way of "a bunch of bad decisions" revealed through a series of flashbacks, the six-episode first season answered fans' oft-asked question: "Why is Daryl Dixon in France?" As it turns out, that was also the question put to showrunner and executive producer David Zabel, the Humanitas Prize-winning ER veteran who was asked to pitch Scott M. Gimple, Chief Content Officer of AMC's Walking Dead Universe, on the long-living franchise's first international setting.

Plans for the Walking Dead spin-off started forming in 2018, with Gimple and then-showrunner Angela Kang developing a Daryl & Carol spin-off starring Reedus and Melissa McBride. Daryl and Carol "would take off and we'd come back and check in and we would take off," Reedus revealed in 2020, the same year that AMC announced The Walking Dead would end after 11 seasons.

Ultimately, Reedus and McBride remained with the flagship through the 2022 series finale, but plans changed again when McBride and Kang dropped out of the Europe-set spin-off in April 2022. Zabel, a first-time TWD showrunner, replaced Kang, who serves as executive producer on what became the #1 premiere of all time and the #1 most-viewed season of any show in the history of AMC+.

"I can't talk to the changes too much, because I wasn't there for any of that. When I came on, basically they said, 'Hey David, will you come in and tell us a story about Daryl Dixon in France?' And that's where I started," Zabel exclusively told ComicBook in an interview about the Oct. 15 "Coming Home" season finale. "So I wasn't there when they went through some of those conversations about other iterations that the show might have been or was expected to be. So it's a question outside of my wheelhouse in terms of knowing what the details were, and it was a long period of time that they were talking about it, I know, and I think things changed over the course of that period."

Zabel added, "I just know when I came on, it was like, 'They want you to sit down with Norman and tell him a story about Daryl Dixon in France.' And that's what I did. That was the first thing I did. And then a little bit later, we were all talking about -- even though there were circumstances making it a little bit difficult for Melissa -- we wanted to see if she would be willing to do some part of the show in season 1. And that's when I started talking to Melissa about the radio call in [episode] five and the scene in six that the audience saw."

McBride makes a cameo in a final coda sequence ending the first season of Daryl Dixon, which will open its next chapter as The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol in 2024 on AMC and AMC+. The second season, which filmed in Europe, sees Carol set off to track down Daryl after following his trail to Freeport, Maine, where Daryl disappeared after making a pit stop to gather fuel.

"It was always the hope and the desire that we would get Melissa onto the show in season one, in whatever version she was ready to do. That was always what I wanted to do and what everybody wanted," Zabel said. "Norman wanted it, Scott wanted it, we all wanted it. So it was just a matter of working out what the show was going to be and then seeing how we could include her. Because we love the character, and we love Melissa, and we love the dynamic of Daryl and Carol together. So from the point where I started participating on the show, that was always the conversation."

After spending six episodes trekking across zombie-plagued France to get home to America, "Coming Home" ends with Daryl seconds away from boarding a boat to England after delivering Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi) -- believed by the faithful members of Union de L'Espoir to be the new messiah who will lead the revival of humanity -- and his aunt Isabelle (Cl?mence Po?sy) to The Nest, a sanctuary at the Mont-Saint-Michel. But when Laurent follows him to the beach teeming with les affam?s ("the hungry ones"), episode director Daniel Percival ends on a shot of Daryl caught in the middle of returning to The Nest or returning home.

"Without spoiling anything on Daryl's side of the story, we leave him with this conundrum, this dilemma about a guy who's trying to get home to the family that he's always had back home -- with Judith and RJ and Carol and Connie -- but a guy who, in the meantime, has also formed this other family and bond in France that needs him and wants him there and where he has developed a certain sense of belonging. So we certainly continue that narrative. That dilemma that we set up at the end of [episode] six is a big part of the early going of when we come back. We don't just drop that and we don't skip it. We continue telling that story in various ways and we continue telling the story of the threat of the Ampers, the amped-up walkers that Genet is cultivating as an army."

Along with the br?lant -- or "burners," walkers with acidic blood -- Daryl Dixon unleashes the Ampers, super-strong walkers engineered by Dr. Lafleur (Fran?ois Delaive). These man-made mutant zombie variants are made possible through research funded by Madame Genet (Anne Charrier), the shadowy leader of Pouvoir des Vivants ("Power of the Living"), a French movement out to establish France's Sixth Republic. The Ampers, as Zabel officially labels them, continues a major story thread first put into motion in a final coda sequence ending The Walking Dead: World Beyond. That limited series, co-created and executive produced by Gimple, ended inside a French lab where graffiti reading "Les morts sont nes icl" (the dead are born here) could be seen with cryptic talk of the Primrose and Violet teams who "started this" and then "made it worse."

That's a thread left to pull in season 2. With McBride back on board as a series regular, The Book of Carol will also reveal the details about that mysterious exchange between Daryl and Carol in episode 5. Before losing connection, Carol told Daryl through radio static that "...came back," sparking theories that the long-missing Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) or Michonne (Danai Gurira), who will return in The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live in 2024, made it home to Alexandria.

"I think one way or another, what she meant on that radio call will be explored in our story. It will be addressed in our story, it will be clarified," Zabel confirmed. "But it is interesting to see all the theories. I've seen a lot of theories and it's amazing how that one little moment caught people's attention a lot. I think that's cool. It's cool about working in The Walking Dead Universe, is that something like that catches fire a little bit. So we're not going to drop it. It's not just thrown away, but we will address it in our show. And obviously, there's also the Rick and Michonne show coming up before we will be back."

Asked if Daryl Dixon might connect with The Ones Who Live or reunite Daryl with Rick and Michonne -- after all, Daryl did promise the Grimes children he would keep an eye out for their parents to bring them home -- Zabel said, "That is more of a Scott Gimple question. I mean, I know the fans would love that. I would love that, too. We haven't gotten into anything like that specifically. So I think that's a Gimple question."

For now, the last episode of Daryl Dixon's first season suggests a more imminent reunion: with Laurent, who makes the two-day trek following Daryl from Mont-Saint-Michel to the north coast after Daryl leaves The Nest. Daryl is seconds away from getting on the boat home when Laurent, standing on the shore teeming with walkers, calls out to him as U2's "Seconds" plays. ("It takes a second to say goodbye / say goodbye, oh, oh, oh, say bye bye / Where you going to now?") Asked what Daryl's decision looks like if Laurent doesn't follow him at the end, Zabel said, "I think he probably gets on the boat, to be honest with you."

"It takes that kid showing up and demonstrating the depth of his connection to Daryl, his need. I mean, that's what happens at the end is that kid needs Daryl and loves Daryl so much and needs that parental figure that Daryl has come to represent to him," Zabel explained. "He needs that so much that he follows Daryl to the beach all the way across, a couple days from where they started and tracks him down there. And I think Daryl sees that and has a reaction to that, and I think that's what causes the hesitation. I think if it wasn't for that, he would get on the boat."

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol, starring Norman Reedus and Melissa McBride as Daryl and Carol, is scheduled to premiere in 2024 on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

[Warning: This story contains spoilers for The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season finale.] "I'm looking for a friend of mine. Name's Daryl Dixon." So said Carol (Melissa McBride) on Sunday's first season finale of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, titled "Coming Home." Despite its title, the episode ended with Daryl (Norman Reedus) still stranded overseas after delivering Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi) and Isabelle (Cl?mence Po?sy) to The Nest, a sanctuary at the Mont-Saint-Michel in Normandy, France. But the episode was a homecoming for McBride, whose season-ending cameo as Carol will be followed by the longtime Walking Dead star rejoining Reedus as a series regular in a second season titled The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol.

McBride made a voice cameo in the penultimate episode of the season when Carol communicated with Daryl over long-range radio, reaching him long enough to tell him through static that someone or something "came back." In the flashback sequence, Daryl took a job wrangling walkers to trade them for fuel after his motorcycle broke down outside of Freeport, Maine, and Daryl promised Carol he would return to the Commonwealth in Ohio "in about a week." Daryl never made it home.

That's because Fuller's Auto Repair, where Daryl went missing, hired transients to collect zombie test subjects that Dr. Lafleur (Fran?ois Delaive) then shipped overseas for experiments he would conduct for Madame Genet (Anne Charrier). Daryl ended up in the brig aboard a French cargo ship and, during a prisoner mutiny, went overboard in the Gulf of C?diz before he washed ashore in France -- thousands of miles away from his rendezvous with Carol.

Daryl Dixon's season finale ended with Carol in hot pursuit of a rider (Paul Zies) racing down the road on Daryl's stolen bike. "I don't want any trouble. I'm looking for a friend of mine. Name's Daryl Dixon. That's his bike you're riding," Carol told the rider, who claimed he "found it."

She then told the rider she "came a long way trying to track him down," and stepped aside to let the shotgun-wielding man rummage through the trunk of her classic Mustang. But Carol had a trick up her sleeve: a concealed socket wrench. Carol knocked the rider unconscious, bound his hands, and stuffed him in the trunk. At gunpoint, Carol forced the rider to confess he traded "some dudes" camped a few miles down the road for the bike.

"If you're lying, I won't be back," said Carol, locking him in the trunk. In the final shot of the season, Carol rode Daryl's bike past a vandalized sign welcoming visitors to Freeport, Maine. "Population: DEAD."

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon's Carol Cameo Explained by Showrunner

"It was always the hope and the desire that we would get Melissa onto the show in season one, in whatever version she was ready to do. That was always what I wanted to do and what everybody wanted," showrunner David Zabel told ComicBook. "Norman wanted it, Scott [M. Gimple, executive producer] wanted it, we all wanted it. So it was just a matter of working out what the show was going to be and then seeing how we could include her. Because we love the character, and we love Melissa, and we love the dynamic of Daryl and Carol together. So from the point where I started participating on the show, that was always the conversation."

AMC announced an untitled Daryl & Carol Walking Dead spin-off in September 2020, which would follow the 11-season run of The Walking Dead. Then-showrunner Angela Kang and AMC's Walking Dead Universe chief content officer Gimple developed the spin-off, starring Reedus and McBride, as a "road show" set across the southwestern United States. However, in April 2022, McBride dropped out of the spin-off when the series relocated to Europe, which "became logistically untenable for Melissa at this time," according to AMC.

On Daryl & Carol's Change to Daryl Dixon in France

"Unfortunately, I can't talk to the changes too much because I wasn't there for any of that," Zabel said when asked about the original plans for Daryl & Carol. "When I came on, basically they said, 'Hey David, will you come in and tell us a story about Daryl Dixon in France?' And that's where I started. So I wasn't there when they went through some of those conversations about other iterations that the show might have been or was expected to be. So it's a question outside of my wheelhouse in terms of knowing what the details were, and it was a long period of time that they were talking about it, I know, and I think things changed over the course of that period."

Zabel continued, "I just know when I came on, it was like, 'They want you to sit down with Norman and tell him a story about Daryl Dixon in France.' And that's what I did. That was the first thing I did. And then a little bit later, we were all talking about -- even though there were circumstances making it a little bit difficult for Melissa -- we wanted to see if she would be willing to do some part of the show in season one. And that's when I started talking to Melissa about the radio call in [episode] five and the scene in [episode] six that the audience saw."

Melissa McBride's Next Chapter in The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol

Ahead of the first season finale, AMC announced at New York Comic Con that McBride would return as a series regular and executive producer for Daryl Dixon season 2. The network also revealed an official new title: The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol. Zabel previously confirmed with ComicBook that the second season of the spin-off, which is set and shot in Europe, will continue filming on October 20th after AMC secured an approved interim agreement with the Screen Actors Guild - American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) to resume production amid the actors' strike.

Asked about the Daryl-Carol reunion and McBride's role in season 2, Zabel teased that the Carol coda was just the first chapter in her search for Daryl.

"A lot of the details are still being worked out in script and in shooting of what season two will be. You have to tune in and watch season two to see how it develops, but we are not dropping the narrative of her search for Daryl," Zabel said. "All we know right now is that she's searching for Daryl in America. That's what we see in episode six, and we're super committed to her being a big part of the show as much as she's able to and as much as we can. But beyond that, any specifics, you have to wait and see."

McBride said of her return in a statement released by AMC: "I've known there was much more to be told of Carol's story as I felt her so unsettled when we last saw her, as she watched her best friend, Daryl, ride away. Apart or (hopefully!) together, their stories run deep, and I'm so excited to continue Carol's journey here. This team of storytellers have done amazing work to land these two established characters in an entirely new world to them, and I'm loving the discoveries!"

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol is scheduled to premiere in 2024 on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season finale begins on the beaches of Normandy. June 6, 1944. D-Day. An American soldier -- one of 2,501 -- dies fighting for the liberation of France. His dog tag reads: DIXON. "Dixon! Dixon! Today you die! For my brother!" In the present-day, Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus) hears the taunts of Codron (Romain Levi) and the cheers of the Pouvoir, who have come to watch the American battle the amped-up les affam?s, the hungry ones, engineered by Madame Genet (Anne Charrier). "Don't worry, Issa," Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi) assures his praying aunt, Isabelle (Cl?mence Po?sy). "Daryl will win."

Daryl fights the acidic-blooded br?lants, burners, in the arena that Genet has assembled for De Gaulle Day marking the rebirth and rise of France's Sixth Republic. He's chained at the wrist to Quinn (Adam Nagaitis), forcing the American and the Brit to fight side-by-side to survive their trial by walker. Genet's chief doctor (Fran?ois Delaive) injects the Pouvoir's zombie gladiators with a serum that amps up the hungry ones with blackened eyes and sharpened teeth. The Ampers are faster, stronger, and deadlier than the average les affam?s, but Genet's pets fail to kill Daryl and Quinn.

"The point was to win these people to our cause," Genet seethes as the crowd cheers for the American, holding a walker's head up to the blood-thirsty spectators. Before Genet's Guerrier can gun down Daryl, Fallou (Eriq Ebouaney), Sylvie (Laika Blanc Francard), and Emile (Tristan Zanchi) spark la r?volution, allowing Daryl and Quinn to escape in the chaos. "This American killed your brother?" Genet asks Codron. "You want your revenge? Go get it."

In the halls of the Maison M?re, Daryl notices a wound on Quinn's shoulder blade that he says was caused by the burning touch of the br?lant. Meanwhile, Genet imprisons Isabelle and Laurent, telling the boy: "God is not coming for you. The Messiah? I don't think so." Laurent questions if they've been abandoned by God, but Isabelle reminds him that "now is when we need faith the most." She reveals a pick-pocketed key, a trick she learned in another life. As Quinn succumbs to his wound, he repents for his treatment of Isabelle and using Laurent -- his son -- to try to get her back. Daryl says he can still buy him time to save Isabelle and Laurent. With that, Daryl uses a belt as a tourniquet and severs Quinn's cuffed hand with one clean cut. Quinn goes after the Guerrier, giving Daryl time to rendezvous with Fallou's fighters before finding Isabelle and Laurent trapped on the other side of a gate.

The zombified Quinn attacks Isabelle, who uses a pipe to fend him off. Handing Laurent his blade through the gate, Daryl tells him he can save her. "God will forgive you," Daryl tells the boy, who puts down his reanimated father. Later, Daryl, Isabelle, Laurent, and Sylvie head for Mont-Saint-Michel, Normandy: The Nest. When their truck breaks down outside a small village, Daryl tells Isabelle how his dad used to have him and his brother, Merle, take apart engines. If they couldn't put them back together, they didn't get dinner. It was hard "when he was around," Daryl says of his father, "which was hardly ever." Daryl's dad "grew up without a father. I guess history repeats itself if you're not careful." Daryl explains that his grandfather enlisted, left his pregnant wife back home, and died in France in World War II. When Isabelle remarks that grandpa Dixon "gave his life for France," Daryl is almost churlish in his response: "Yeah, while his family fell apart back home. Hardly seems worth it."

Isabelle admits that Laurent growing up without a father was "better than Quinn." And then she confesses another truth: that she recognized Daryl was dangerous when she found him in Lourdes after he washed ashore in France, and she knew that he was the one who could deliver Laurent to The Nest. She lied about the drawing of Daryl on the beach that she claimed was Laurent's premonition. But as she's said, everything happens for a reason. Just then, Codron and Genet's soldiers have taken Isabelle, Laurent, and Sylvie hostage. Daryl offers to trade his life for theirs, but Codron relays that "Madame said you all die today. The boy first." Isabelle is stabbed protecting Laurent from a Guerrier, who hands Codron a gun so he can avenge his brother and let Laurent's death be "the last thing the American sees."

Daryl is at Codron's mercy. "God loves you," Laurent tells Codron, who finally pulls the trigger... and guns down the Guerrier. "Not today, Dixon. Next time." He tells the travelers that Mont-Saint-Michel is a day's walk north, and to burn the truck because it's easy to track. With that, Codron walks off to face his fate back at Maison M?re. Codron tells Genet that the Guerrier were ambushed, and he is the only survivor. "A man cannot give more to a cause than his own life. Yet you return without a scratch." Codron's face is tattooed for the cause, but it's his eyes that give him away. Codron confesses he couldn't bring himself to the kill the boy, who has become the "hope" for l'Union de I'Espoir.

"The Union offers fairy tales. Every person who joins them makes us weaker. That's why they must be snuffed out," Genet explains. "Because we're building the future. Not for ourselves. But for those that come after. We have to do the hard, unspeakable things, so that they won't have to." Genet tells him to give up the location of The Nest, but Codron refuses. "It's only going to get more painful," says Genet, ordering her men to take Codron away.

At The Nest, the people of l'Union welcome Laurent like the messiah they believe him to be. Daryl meets with their leader, the Buddhist monk Losang (Joel De La Fuente), a Hoboken-born Paris transplant who traveled to Europe as a student in the '90s. Daryl warns Losang that Genet will be coming for The Nest. "We'll pray not, but if the day comes," he says confidently, "we'll be prepared."

In a montage, Daryl teaches the Nesters weapons training as Laurent learns from Losang. Daryl raises a toast -- Sant? -- to l'Union. Isabelle has healed from her knife wound. Daryl tries his hand at Laurent's Rubik's cube. The nun, who treated Daryl's wounds when he first came to France, now asks him to help her with what Daryl jokes is "a pretty impressive battle wound for a nun." "I think you said 'killer nun,'" she replies. Daryl admits The Nest isn't what he expected: "Bunch of Amish people running around. Straw hats, people churning butter, bonnets." It hurts to laugh, but she does it anyway. "I like it here," she tells Daryl. "Feels like home."
I Feels like home.

Later, Losang tells Daryl that he was skeptical when P?re Jean (Hugo Dillon), the priest from the Abbey of Saint Bernadette, first sent word of the boy. While making the 500-mile pilgrim's camino to Santiago, Losang stopped at Abbey de Bernadette to meet Laurent -- and that's when he knew Laurent is the boy prophesied to "lead the revival of humanity." Losang then reveals that l'Union has held up their end of the deal: for delivering Laurent to The Nest, Losang secured Daryl passage home. A fisherman from Dover will bring Daryl to England, where they know of boats that can get him as far as Newfoundland. Daryl will have to manage from there. Daryl has two days to walk to the north coast and take his boat home.

"I got family waiting for me back home," Daryl says to Losang's offer to stay at The Nest. "Well," the monk counters, "you've got people here who hope you'll stay." Daryl says it's not so easy, and the Pouvoir isn't his fight. Losang has faith Daryl will make his way home -- wherever that may be. "Who knows what tomorrow will bring? And an ocean away, the world being what it is. But we need you -- here, now. Maybe the fight's not the reason you're torn. Sometimes, when a person leaves home, he comes to find he belongs someplace else."

Daryl quietly packs his belongings -- his angel wings vest, a map -- when his no-goodbye goodbye is interrupted by Isabelle. "I made a promise to them, just like I made to you," Daryl says of his people back home. Isabelle, recalling how Daryl told her he left the Commonwealth to see what was left in the world, found something. "Maybe not what you were looking for, but--"

Daryl doesn't want to say goodbye to Laurent. "Are you gonna abandon him, like your father did to you? I think you care about him," Isabelle says. "And I think it scares you. You think you're escaping history by doing this, but you are not. You're repeating it." To that, Daryl says: "You believe what you believe, and I respect you for that. And this place feels like home to you, and I truly hope it is for both of you. But I have my own home to get back to." Daryl's leaving, and there's no changing his mind. "I'm glad we met," Isabelle says. "Godspeed on your journey." Daryl leaves the Rubik's cube on the bed of a sleeping Laurent, leaving without a word. After one last look back, Daryl leaves The Nest and makes the trek across Normandy.

His journey brings him to a weathered American flag at a graveyard for the freedom fighters who died on the shores of France. Scouring the tombstones, Daryl finds it: WILLIAM T. DIXON. PVT. 490 INF 23 DIV. GEORGIA. JUNE 6, 1944. Daryl is overcome with emotion. And then he sees it: the boat home. He waves it down, receiving a reflective signal in response. Daryl Dixon is going home. As he makes his way across the beach, fighting through the walkers that have risen from the sand to see him off, Daryl is seconds away from getting off the shore when he hears it. "Daryl! Daryl!" It's Laurent, calling out to him from the walker-plagued beach. U2's "Seconds" plays as Daryl looks to the approaching boat home, then back to Laurent. "It takes a second to say goodbye. Say goodbye. Oh, oh, oh, say bye bye. Where you going to now?"

America. Daryl's motorcycle races down the road in Freeport, Maine. America. The rider is... someone we don't know. In hot pursuit is a classic mustang, its driver stepping out with their hands up. It's Carol (Melissa McBride). "I'm looking for a friend of mine," Carol says. "Name's Daryl Dixon. That's his bike you're riding." The rider says he found it. "Sure about that? I've come a long way trying to track him down," Carol says, disarming the man when he goes to help himself to her trunk. Carol shoves him inside the trunk and forces a confession: he swears to God, he traded "some dudes" for it camped down the road a few miles outside an old gas station. "If you're lying, I won't be back." Carol shuts the trunk and rides off on Daryl's bike past a sign reading: "Welcome to Freeport, Maine. Population: DEAD."

So begins the first chapter in The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

Daryl Dixon may be far from home in France, but the first season of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon has a home on streaming. All six episodes of the Walking Dead spin-off starring Norman Reedus are now available to stream on AMC+, including Sunday's "Coming Home" season finale. Since the newest series in AMC's Walking Dead Universe premiered in September, Daryl Dixon surpassed The Walking Dead: Dead City as the #1 premiere of all time and the #1 most-viewed season of any show in the history of AMC+. The network has already started production on a second season, set to premiere in 2024, with Melissa McBride reprising her role as Carol for The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol.

Keep reading below to find out all of the ways to watch The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon with or without cable.

TWD: Daryl Dixon Episode 6 Release Date and Time

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season finale, "Coming Home," premiered Sunday, October 15th, at 3 a.m. ET/12 a.m. PT on AMC+ and will air at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT on the AMC channel.

Daryl Dixon Episode 6 Run Time

The Daryl Dixon finale has a runtime of 53 minutes and 40 seconds without commercials, and is scheduled to air from 9:00 p.m. -- 11:20 p.m. on AMC.

How to Watch The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Season 1 Online Without Cable

To stream all episodes of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon online without cable, you'll need an AMC+ subscription. Prices start at $4.99/month for the new AMC+ with ads plan, while ad-free AMC+ is available for $6.99/month (when billed annually) or $8.99/month (when billed monthly).

AMC+ is available as an app and via Apple TV, Amazon Prime Video Channels, The Roku Channel, Comcast Xfinity, Dish, DirecTV, Sling TV, and YouTube TV.

Is There an AMC+ Free Trial?

To watch The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon for free online, new customers can sign up for a 7-day free AMC Plus trial that will automatically renew unless cancelled. All six episodes of Daryl Dixon are available to stream online on AMC+, along with the first seasons of TWDU spin-offs The Walking Dead: Dead City and Tales of the Walking Dead, plus episodes of Fear the Walking Dead.

You can also watch Daryl Dixon on the AMC website by signing in with your TV provider.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon episodes 1 ("L'?me Perdue"), episode 2 ("Alouette"), episode 3 ("Paris Sera Toujours Paris"), episode 4 ("La Dame de Fer"), episode 5 ("Deux Amours"), and episode 6 ("Coming Home") are currently available to stream online on AMC+.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Recaps

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Episode 1 Recap: "L'?me Perdue" (The Lost Soul)
The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Episode 2 Recap: "Alouette" (Lark)
The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Episode 3 Recap: "Paris Sera Toujours Paris" (Paris Will Always Be Paris)
The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Episode 4 Recap: "La Dame de Fer" (The Iron Lady)
The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Episode 5 Recap: "Deux Amours" (Two Loves)
The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Episode 6 Recap: "Coming Home"

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[Warning: This story contains a spoiler for Sunday's The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season finale]. "It's not like we're never gonna see each other again," Daryl told Carol during their goodbye on The Walking Dead series finale. But it's not like fans were never going to see Carol again: AMC announced today that Melissa McBride will star opposite Norman Reedus as a series regular in the second season of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon. With McBride returning to the fan-favorite role she played on all 11 seasons of the original series, the Walking Dead spin-off has a new title for season 2: The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol.

Spoiler alert: AMC also announced that McBride's Carol makes an appearance in the "Coming Home" season finale of Daryl Dixon, premiering Sunday, October 15th, at 9 p.m. ET/PT on AMC and AMC+. The news comes after the network screened the episode during its TWD Universe panel at New York Comic Con.

"I've known there was much more to be told of Carol's story as I felt her so unsettled when we last saw her, as she watched her best friend, Daryl, ride away," McBride said in a statement. "Apart or (hopefully!) together, their stories run deep, and I'm so excited to continue Carol's journey here. This team of storytellers have done amazing work to land these two established characters in an entirely new world to them, and I'm loving the discoveries!"

"My good friend, the talented, beautiful Melissa McBride, will be a series regular for season 2," Reedus said at NYCC. "We couldn't be more thrilled."

McBride made a surprise voice cameo in the penultimate episode of Daryl Dixon and will appear -- in the flesh -- in a season finale coda sequence that will serve as the unofficial first chapter in The Book of Carol.

In 2020, AMC announced Reedus and McBride would reprise their roles in an untitled Walking Dead: Daryl & Carol spin-off developed by TWD Universe Chief Content Officer Scott M. Gimple and then-showrunner Angela Kang. McBride bowed out of the series in April 2022, with an AMC spokesperson explaining that relocating to Europe, where Daryl Dixon is set and filmed, became "logistically untenable" for McBride "at this time." The AMC spokesperson added: "We know fans will be disappointed by this news, but The Walking Dead Universe continues to grow and expand in interesting ways and we very much hope to see Carol again in the near future."

The near future is 2024. As ComicBook exclusively reported, The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season 2 will resume production October 20th in France. Zabel confirmed that the AMC Studios series signed an interim agreement with SAG-AFTRA for approval to film amid the ongoing actors' strike.

McBride joins an ensemble that includes returning Daryl Dixon cast members Cl?mence Po?sy as Isabelle, Louis Puech Scigliuzzi as Laurent, Laika Blanc Francard as Sylvie, Anne Charrier as Madame Genet, Romain Levi as Codron, and Eriq Ebouaney as Fallou. McBride also serves as an executive producer on The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol alongside Reedus, series creator and showrunner David Zabel, and EPs Scott M. Gimple, Greg Nicotero, Angela Kang, Brian Bockrath, Daniel Percival, Jason Richman, and Steve Squillante.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon -- The Book of Carol, starring Norman Reedus and Melissa McBride, is set to premiere in 2024 on AMC and AMC+.

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Terry O'Quinn is going from The Island to the Civic Republic. The Emmy-winning actor, who played fan-favorite John Locke on Lost, has been cast in the Rick and Michonne Walking Dead spin-off series starring Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira. AMC announced at New York Comic Con on Thursday that O'Quinn will play Major General Beale -- until now the unseen, shadowy leader of the Civic Republic Military -- in The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live. The network also confirmed that Pollyanna McIntosh, who previously reprised her Walking Dead role on limited series The Walking Dead: World Beyond, will return as CRM Warrant Officer Jadis Stokes.

Alongside Lincoln and Gurira, reprising their iconic roles as Rick Grimes and Michonne, the new series also stars TWD Universe newcomers Lesley-Ann Brandt (Lucifer) as Pearl and Matt Jeffries as Nat. See the just-revealed first-look images below, and watch the new teaser trailer here.

Beale was first mentioned on The Walking Dead: World Beyond, ordering the "tactical military operation" that wiped out Nebraska's Omaha Safe-Zone and the satellite Campus Colony -- killing more than 110,000 people -- as part of a plot that threatened another 87,000 survivors from Portland, part of the Civic Republic-aligned Alliance of the Three. That series also revealed that Beale, along with CRM Lieutenant Colonel Elizabeth Kublek (Julia Ormond), founded Project Votus, which involves human and zombie test subjects labeled as either an "A" or "B."

The CRM is the mysterious group that Jadis called to shuttle Rick away aboard a helicopter on season 9 of The Walking Dead. More than six years have passed since Rick disappeared and was presumed killed in a bridge explosion, but World Beyond revealed that Jadis trafficked Rick to the CRM in exchange for entry into the Civic Republic, a secret civilization of 200,000 people in fortified Philadelphia. Designated "Consignee Grimes," Rick repeatedly tried -- and failed -- to escape the CRM. Rick has been put to work at a Civic Republic Cull Facility, decontamination centers where CR military personnel perform mass zombie cullings as part of the CRM's efforts to clear entire states of the undead.

Beale was also referenced on The Walking Dead coda when a CRM helicopter pilot told an escaping Rick: "Come on, Rick. It's like he told you: there's no escape for the living."

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live "presents an epic love story of two characters changed by a changed world," per AMC's description. "Kept apart by distance. By an unstoppable power. By the ghosts of who they were. Rick and Michonne are thrown into another world, built on a war against the dead... And ultimately, a war against the living. Can they find each other and who they were in a place and situation unlike any they've ever known before? Are they enemies? Lovers? Victims? Victors? Without each other, are they even alive -- or will they find that they, too, are the Walking Dead?"

Scott M. Gimple, Chief Content Officer of AMC's The Walking Dead Universe, serves as showrunner and executive producer alongside Lincoln, Gurira, Denise Huth (The Walking Dead) and Brian Bockrath (The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon). The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live premieres February 2024 on AMC and AMC+.

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"We're the ones who live." With those words, Rick Grimes and Michonne returned for a final coda ending The Walking Dead series finale in 2022. The partners and parents are "kept apart by distance and an unstoppable power," per the logline, but not for much longer: Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira are reuniting for their new Walking Dead spin-off. The six-episode series, titled The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live, will premiere in February 2024 on AMC and AMC+. The network released a new teaser trailer for the Rick and Michonne spin-off during AMC's TWD Universe New York Comic Con panel, previewing the next chapter in Rick and Michonne's "epic love story."

"I tried to get away. Please know I tried. I tried, but I failed," a bloodied, walker-killing Rick Grimes says in the new trailer, which you can watch below. As Rick looks at the engraved cell phone that Michonne would eventually find on a boat on Bloodsworth Island, Michonne's katana slices through the dead somewhere else. Rick says in voiceover: "Just know... I love you."

"This series presents an epic love story of two characters changed by a changed world. Kept apart by distance. By an unstoppable power. By the ghosts of who they were," reads the official synopsis. "Rick and Michonne are thrown into another world, built on a war against the dead... And ultimately, a war against the living. Can they find each other and who they were in a place and situation unlike any they've ever known before? Are they enemies? Lovers? Victims? Victors? Without each other, are they even alive -- or will they find that they, too, are the Walking Dead?"

After Rick blew up a bridge to save his family and friends from a zombie horde in The Walking Dead season 9, Anne/Jadis (Pollyanna McIntosh) called a CRM helicopter to airlift the gravely wounded Rick to safety. The Walking Dead: World Beyond revealed that Jadis traded Rick to the Civic Republic Military for entry to the Civic Republic in Philadelphia, where Rick has spent years at a CRM zombie-culling facility as "Consignee Grimes."

Years later, in season 10 of The Walking Dead, Michonne set off to find Rick and bring him home to their children, Judith (Cailey Fleming) and Rick "RJ" Grimes Jr. (Antony Azor), after she discovered evidence that suggested Rick was alive.

"These are two people that have been separated for a very long time. They've lived whole other existences and they have to find themselves again, let alone each other. And it's hopefully going to be mind-blowing," showrunner Scott M. Gimple has said of the series originally developed as a Rick Grimes movie trilogy. "We see this incredible power couple, but we also see that Red Machete Rick. We see that Michonne who taught a thing or two to the Governor. [The series] kind of goes coast to coast that way between the intimate and the epic and the insane."

Gimple, Chief Content Officer of AMC's The Walking Dead television universe, serves as showrunner and executive produces alongside Lincoln, Gurira, Denise Huth (The Walking Dead), and Brian Bockrath (The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon). TWDU veterans Michael E. Satrazemis (Fear the Walking Dead) and Channing Powell (Tales of the Walking Dead) are co-executive producers, and franchise statesman Greg Nicotero -- who directed the Rick & Michonne coda and The Walking Dead series finale -- is consulting producer.

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live premieres in 2024 on AMC and AMC+.

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The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season 2 is set to resume production next week amid the actors' strike, ComicBook has exclusively learned. In August, AMC Networks secured an interim agreement with the Screen Actors Guild - American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) to resume filming on three series: two Walking Dead spin-offs, Daryl Dixon and The Ones Who Live, and Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire. Per the striking actors' union's official list of Productions Approved and Signed to Interim Agreements, the cast and crew are permitted to return to work on these productions without being in violation of the strike order in place since July 14th.

"We're prepping. We're getting ready to shoot," The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon showrunner David Zabel told ComicBook ahead of the first season finale (airing Sunday, October 15th, at 9 p.m. ET/PT on AMC and AMC+). In an interview conducted the day after members of the Writers Guild of America ratified its contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers to end the 148-day writers' strike, Zabel confirmed that the series, which is set and filmed in France, resumes production on October 20th.

"We've got a bunch to film, but we're in pretty good shape," Zabel said of the upcoming second season, which AMC ordered in July. Some of Daryl Dixon season 2 filmed earlier this year in Europe before a planned hiatus that coincided with the actors' strike.

AMC Networks, which produces the series via Stalwart Films and AMC Studios, is an "authorized company" but is not a member of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers representing the major Hollywood studios and streamers. Daryl Dixon is among more than 300 "independent" projects granted the waiver with an agreement to abide by the terms the AMPTP eventually reaches with SAG-AFTRA.

The interim agreement "hopefully won't be relevant because I'm hoping that SAG will get what they need and be able to end their action soon," the former ER showrunner added. "But in the meantime, with the writers able to work, and me able to work, we're able to fully produce the show as always. And so that resumes on October 20th and continues from then."

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon premiered September 10th as the #1 most-viewed premiere of all time and the most-viewed season of any show in the three-year history of streaming service AMC+. Norman Reedus leads a cast that includes Cl?mence Po?sy, Adam Nagaitis, Anne Charrier, Eriq Ebouaney, Laika Blanc Francard, Romain Levi, and Louis Puech Scigliuzzi. Zabel serves as executive producer alongside Reedus, Scott M. Gimple, Greg Nicotero, Angela Kang, Brian Bockrath, Jason Richman, and Daniel Percival.

Daryl Dixon's first season finale premieres Sunday, October 15th on AMC and AMC+.

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[This story contains spoilers for The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon episode 5.] "How did you end up here, so far from home?" asked Azlan (Hassam Ghancy) in Sunday's "Deux Amours" penultimate episode of Daryl Dixon. The first episode of the Walking Dead spin-off started with Daryl (Norman Reedus) adrift at sea and washing ashore in France, somehow thousands of miles from his home at the Commonwealth in Ohio. As Daryl trekked the French countryside from Marseille to Lourdes, it wasn't until the premiere's final scene -- set in a port at La Havre, northern France -- that we received clues about "the American" who went overboard in the Gulf of C?diz.

We saw the ship's captain (Gr?gory Kristoforoff) report to Madame Genet (Anne Charrier) that its prisoners escaped during a mutiny. We heard a French doctor (Fran?ois Delaive) reveal the ship was transporting zombie test subjects. And we learned that the doctor's research was "largely destroyed." Who was it that destroyed a ship that took three years to make seaworthy? "He was named... Dixon," the captain answered. But why was Daryl on a transatlantic vessel freighting zombie test subjects overseas?

That was answered in "Deux Amours" when Azlan, a member of Union de L'Espoir (Union of Hope), shepherded Daryl and Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi) to The Nest up north. As they made the 124-mile trip toward Mont-Saint-Michel, Normandy, flashbacks revealed that Daryl was in Freeport, Maine, when his bike ran out of fuel. A camo-clad man named Jones (Gilbert Glenn Brown) happened across Daryl and brought him to an auto repair shop, where he laid out the ground rules for a motley crew of strays: no fighting, no stealing, no sexual deviancy of any kind. "No children will be accepted, nor elderly or shorties. Five foot, four inches is the cut-off." It's one pint of ethanol per head, or a quart for "fresh ones."

"What do you want 'em for, anyway?" asked Juno (John Ales), only to be told "this is not your concern." As it turned out, Jones was working with the French doctor who has been conducting experiments on zombie test subjects for Genet. After contacting Carol (Melissa McBride) and promising to return to the Commonwealth within the week, Daryl set out with his crossbow and ropes to wrangle walkers and turn them in for enough fuel to get home. But when Daryl deduced that Juno murdered an inexperienced younger guy named TJ (Martin Martinez) to exchange his freshly-turned trophy for an extra quart of gas, a fight broke out and landed Daryl and Juno in the brig of a cargo ship. The French doctor was aboard conducting experiments on walkers, some caged with a warning sign reading "fast ne pas nourir": FAST DO NOT FEED.

The cargo: shipping containers filled with walkers. After watching French guards manning the ship throw a man to the les affam?s -- the hungry ones -- to be eaten alive, Daryl and Juno plotted an escape and mutinied against the guards. Daryl unleashed the caged hungry ones on the crew before freeing the other prisoners, racing for a lifeboat as the zombies flooded the ship. During the chaos, the French doctor's experiments got loose. A super-strong variant walker ripped free from its restraints, ran up stairs, and tore Juno apart with its bare hands, sending the lifeboat plunging into the ocean. Daryl went overboard just as the ship exploded, strapped himself to the overturned lifeboat, and drifted through the Mediterranean Sea until he washed ashore in Marseille.

There are rumors of active ships going in and out of La Havre, but the port is controlled by Genet and her Guerrier (warriors). If Daryl hopes to make it home, he'll need to deliver Laurent to The Nest at Mont-Saint-Michel so that Union de L'Espoir's leader -- the Buddhist monk Losang -- can secure him passage back to America.

New episodes of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon premiere Sundays on AMC and AMC+. Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

[This story contains spoilers for The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon episode 5.] "Who came back?" That was the question Daryl (Norman Reedus) asked Carol (guest star Melissa McBride) over the radio in Sunday's "Deux Amours" episode of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon. The penultimate episode of the first season took a detour to Freeport, Maine, for a back-and-forth flashback sequence revealing how Daryl wound up on a zombie-freighting French cargo ship, only to go overboard in the Gulf of C?diz before washing ashore in France. And while we got answers about the "what," "when," "where," and "why" of it all, the "who" question remains: WHO CAME BACK?

The Walking Dead series finale ended with Daryl leaving Carol and the Grimes children at the Commonwealth community in Ohio with a promise: "While I'm out there, if I hear anything, see anything, I'll find them both. I'll bring them home." Daryl then rode off on his bike to go find Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) and Michonne (Danai Gurira), who will return in their 2024 spin-off series titled The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live.

Daryl's solo travels brought him to the coastal town of Freeport, Maine, about a week's trip out from the Commonwealth. After his bike ran out of fuel, Daryl happened across Jones (Gilbert Glenn Brown) and a French doctor (Fran?ois Delaive) trading ethanol for "live" walkers: no children, no elderly, none shorter than five feet, four inches, and extra fuel for the freshly turned. As it turned out, these walkers would be shipped overseas as the zombie test subjects of French Pouvoir des Vivants leader Madame Genet (Anne Charrier).

Before a hoodwinked Daryl ended up in the ship's brig and shipped across the Atlantic Ocean, he made radio contact with Carol. The connection was weak, but lasted long enough for Daryl and Carol to say the following through radio static:

Carol: Hello. Are you there? ?
Daryl: Hello! Hey! It's me!
Carol: Daryl. Are you okay?
Daryl: Yeah, well, I have a radio here. I thought, what the hell? How you doing?
Carol: Where's there?
Daryl: I'm in Maine, by the coast. Everything good there? ?
Carol: Yeah, you know, pretty quiet here.
Daryl: Quiet's good. You okay?
Carol: Yeah. Just takes some getting used to, that's all.
[A beat.]
Daryl: You sure you're okay?
Carol: You never have to worry about me, Daryl. How is it out there?
Daryl: I'll tell you all about it when I see you. I'm just gathering up some fuel. I'll be there in about a week. I promise.
Carol: Copy that. Hey, Daryl.
Daryl: Yeah.
Carol: [Static, transmission breaking up] ...came back.
Daryl: Who came back?
[Static]
Daryl: Carol. Who came back? Carol?

So, who came back?

Rick Grimes

Daryl watched as Rick sacrificed himself by blowing up a bridge to stop a walker horde, then spent the next six years looking for a body. Only Jadis (Pollyanna McIntosh) knows what happened next: she flew away with the gravely wounded Rick aboard a CRM helicopter and trafficked him to the Civic Republic. Jadis then became a high-ranking official in the Civic Republic Military as Rick repeatedly tried to escape his fate as a walker-clearing worker at a Civic Republic Cull Facility in Philadelphia.

Michonne

When Michonne followed a stranger named Virgil (Kevin Carroll) to Bloodsworth Island in Maryland, it was for weapons to help the Alexandrians win the Whisperer War. What Michonne found instead was evidence that Rick survived -- and then set off to find her husband and bring him home. Daryl eventually found out the truth about Michonne's mission when Judith Grimes (Cailey Fleming) revealed her secret, confessing Michonne believes Rick is alive. Michonne was heading north with a massive caravan of survivors before continuing her search as a lone, katana-wielding samurai in The Ones Who Live.

Morgan Jones

Spoiler alert for Fear the Walking Dead season 8. After a seven-year time jump, Morgan Jones' (Lennie James) story on Fear the Walking Dead came full circle with the pilot episode of The Walking Dead when Morgan radioed Rick Grimes. "I'm gonna come and look for you, whether you're at Alexandria or not," Morgan said into the dead air of a walkie-talkie. "I will leave this message every morning at dawn, and I'll leave the walkie on for a few minutes after. Who knows? Maybe you might even be listening."

We last saw Morgan at Eastman's cemetery in Georgia, far from Rick's home in Alexandria, Virginia. But it's a trek that Morgan made before when he tracked Rick's group from Georgia to Virginia back in season 5 of The Walking Dead, only to later leave Virginia for Texas. If Morgan made his way back to Alexandria, he'd find some of its residents relocated to the Commonwealth in Ohio.

Dwight

"You go, and you keep going. Don't you ever come back here again. If I ever see your face around here again, I'll kill you." Those are the last words that Daryl said to ex-Savior Dwight (Austin Amelio) on the "Wrath" episode of The Walking Dead season 8. More than seven years after Daryl banished Dwight from Virginia, he'll return to old haunts with his wife Sherry (Christine Evangelista) in the final episodes of Fear the Walking Dead: Dwight and Sherry can be seen visiting their old house and Negan's (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) long-abandoned Sanctuary.

Heath

Heath (Corey Hawkins) has been MIA since disappearing during season 7 of The Walking Dead, but the former supply runner for the Alexandria Safe-Zone is unlikely to merit a mention in that conversation between Daryl and Carol. Years have passed at this point, and Heath's fate -- Jadis secretly trafficked him to the CRM, leaving behind a mysterious card with the letters "PPP" -- remains a loose end.

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"Vers elle s'en va tout mon espoir. J'ai deux amours. Mon pays et Paris. (Towards her goes all my hope. I have two loves: my country and Paris)." Josephine Baker's "J'ai Deux Amours" ("I Have Two Loves") plays as Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus) and Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi) drift down the river on a boat steered by Azlan (Hassam Ghancy). Their destination is The Nest: "A special place," Azlan assures Daryl. "A home for the soul." Daryl washed ashore in France as l'?me perdue, a lost soul, far from his home in America.

Azlan asks if Daryl is Christian. Daryl answers honestly: no, and he was kicked out of Sunday school. "In the Bible, Abram becomes a pilgrim after the Lord tells him, 'Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house, to the land that I will show you,'" Azlan responds, quoting Genesis 12:1. To that, Daryl quips: "I'm guessing Abram didn't end up in France." Azlan asks another question, causing Daryl's mind to drift: "How did you end up here, so far from home?"

THEN. America. Maine. Daryl walks his bike down a road and grips his knife when a camouflage-clad man named Jones (Gilbert Glenn Brown) stops his truck behind him. Daryl is as curt as he is cautious. Need help, friend? "Nah, I'm good." Where you headed? "Headed home." On a bike with no fuel, huh? "You got some to spare?" Well, depends. You any good with that thing?

Jones escorts Daryl to an auto repair shop. Inside is a motley crew of blue collar types -- who don't seem the type to speak the language coming over the shop's radio. French. The haggard Juno (John Ales) ribs a younger guy, TJ (Martin Martinez), over a picture of his girl back home. Jones rounds up the men and lays down the ground rules: no fighting, no stealing, no sexual deviancy of any kind. "No children will be accepted, nor elderly or shorties," Jones explains. "Five foot, four inches is the cut-off." Juno asks what they want 'em for, but a French doctor (Fran?ois Delaive) -- the same man from the French cargo ship at La Havre -- tells him it's "not your concern." All they need to know, according to Jones, is their pay is one pint of ethanol per head. Juno protests: they were told a quart. The French doctor guarantees "a quart for the fresh ones." TJ figures their chances are better in numbers, but nobody wants to take the green-looking kid up on his offer.

Daryl hunts walkers in the woods, bounding them with ropes two at a time. At the auto shop, Juno's gang leads muzzled walkers linked by chains toward the "party room": a flashing strobe light inside a trailer. The French doctor supervises as Juno hands over his trophies -- five in all, including a fresh one that can't be more than a few months turned. Daryl leads his six-walker haul back to the shop and collects his gas canister, with more to come tomorrow. TJ laments coming up empty-handed. Daryl sympathizes with the kid's tough break, but his only pointer? "Go home to your girl." He's trying, but he needs fuel. TJ asks Daryl if he needs a partner -- you know, for a cut of the gas. "Do I look like I need help?"

NOW. Azlan ties the boat to a tree and leads Daryl to their camp for the night: a hideout with a stash of noise-making cans to alert them of any les affam?s (hungry ones). As Azlan goes to pray, Daryl shows Laurent how to gut and cook a fish. He misses Isabelle, who stayed behind in Paris so that Daryl and Laurent could escape the city. When Daryl says they all have people they miss, Laurent gets him to open up about his friends back home: "There's Judith and RJ. They're kids, like you. There's Connie, Ezekiel. There's a lady named Carol." Laurent says Daryl's friends sound nice -- and he can tell Daryl misses Issa, too. "Not to worry," Laurent assures him. "We'll all be together again."

Meanwhile, Isabelle (Cl?mence Po?sy) wakes up in an opulent room next to Les N?nuphars: The Water Lilies. Issa, like the painting, is the latest addition to Quinn's (Adam Nagaitis) well-guarded mansion. Quinn reports that he's just met with the Pouvoir, who told him that Laurent made it out of Paris and is headed north with her American friend. He asks how long it's going to take for her to see him different. "Everything happens for a reason," he says. "Isn't that what God's all about?" When Issa says that God loves the sinner, Quinn responds: "So there's hope for me, then." Quinn leaves her to pray, which she does in private: "God, forgive me for what I'm about to do." In her hands, a makeshift shiv.

Back at the camp, Laurent says a prayer for Judith, RJ, Carol, Connie, and Ezekiel in America "'cause Daryl doesn't know how to pray." Daryl notices Azlan's pocket watch, which he says saved his life. He then asks about the rumors of La Havre being "the only place you can find something still floating." The port is controlled by Madame Genet and her Guerrier, Azlan explains, but the Union de L'Espoir's leader, the Buddhist monk Losang, will help Daryl secure a boat home to America. "A lone wolf who only wants to get back to his pack," Azlan points out.

Daryl says he made a promise. To that, Azlan tells him, "There are times when even a man's promise gets overwhelmed by a connection other people or a larger cause." Daryl admits causes were never his thing. "When a man dies in someone else's war, it's his kids that suffer," Daryl says. "That gets passed down to their kids. After a while, no one even remembers what 'the cause' was." Azlan explains how the watch saved his life: when he arrived at The Nest, he had just lost his wife and son and wished to die. Losang asked him to fix the pocketwatch -- so he worked on it, day and night, for months. "When I finally got it running, he told me he didn't want it anymore. Because I had found a reason to live." Daryl overhears Laurent pray, this time for himself: to be strong like Daryl is strong.

THEN. Daryl fills his bike's gas tank and overhears Drew (Tercelin Kirtley) laughing off TJ's offer to partner up. Juno tells the kid they'll consider letting him tag along if he chops firewood and stokes their fire over night, so Daryl teaches him how to chop wood. TJ says he's from just outside Freeport, a couple miles up the road. He promised his girl he'd take her far away from her father, so he can't go back without any fuel. Their destination is California. "I hear it's better there." Or, at least, "It's gotta be better than this, right?"

NOW. As the Demimonde's Anna (Lukerya Ilyashenko) arrives at Quinn's mansion, he attempts to repair their toxic relationship from 12 years ago. He can be a better man for her. With that, Isabelle takes his head, leads him to the bed, seduces him, grips her shiv... "After all, Abraham sacrificed his only son. But Isaac was saved. And in the end, Abraham was redeemed. I believe in redemption," Quinn says. "And I know you do, too." Ultimately, she doesn't exact her plan, and Quinn leaves the room to see a drunkened Anna angrily storm away. At the camp, Daryl's thoughts again drift back to Maine.

THEN. A radio operator (Avant Strangel) connects Daryl with a friend from home, but warns the connection only lasts a few minutes. Through static comes the voice of Carol (Melissa McBride), calling from the Commonwealth in Ohio. He's in Maine, near the coast. They catch up. "Pretty quiet here," she reports. Daryl responds, "Quiet's good. You okay?" She says it takes some getting used to, that's all -- helping lead the Commonwealth, being away from her best friend. He notices something is off. "You sure you're okay?"

"You never have to worry about me, Daryl. How is it out there?" He'll tell her about it when he sees her next. He's gathering fuel, and he'll be back at the Commonwealth in about a week. "I promise." Through the static, Carol copies. "Hey, Daryl..." The transmission breaks up and returns, just in time for Daryl to hear the end of Carol's message: "...came back." Who came back? Carol? Static. Who came back? Carol?

NOW. A hungry one wanders into camp. Daryl and Laurent find Azlan pinned to a tree -- impaled. He slipped fighting off the hungry ones. He's covered in blood and can't move. "All those years of training," he says weakly, "and I'm done in by a telephone pole." Daryl can only call it a "tough break." Azlan musters enough strength to chuckle: "At least we know God has a sense of humor. My father worked for the phone company all his life. Just get the boy to The Nest." Azlan hands Daryl his watch, which contains an image of Mont-Saint-Michel, Normandy. "Follow the river. You'll find it. And beware of telephone poles. I'm at peace, Monsieur Dixon. The boy is in good hands. And I'm facing east. Here. Use my knife to do it." Daryl accepts. "Truly to Him we shall return." With that, Azlan dies and is buried by Daryl. Laurent lays prayer beads on his grave.

At the river, Daryl finds the rope tied to the tree has been severed and their boat gone. The culprit: Laurent. Daryl tears into the boy, demanding an explanation as he yells curses like "you stupid little shit!" and "worthless!" He wants to know why. Why?! "Everyone I care about is gone," a tearful Laurent confesses. "When we get to The Nest, you'll go, too. I don't want to be alone." Daryl softens. And he holds the boy close.

Back at Quinn's, a maid delivers fresh eggs with a side of secret message. In the woods, Daryl assures Laurent that there are good people at The Nest. Laurent wants to come with Daryl, but he can't. Daryl told Isabelle he would deliver Laurent to The Nest, and she'll come looking for him there. Laurent begs to let him come -- he'll do as he's told, and he'll only have to learn things once. "It ain't about that," Daryl says. What's it about? Before Daryl can answer, the sound of Guerrier trucks force them to flee into the woods, leaving Laurent's belongings behind.

THEN. Juno returns to the auto shop with freshly-reanimated walkers -- including a zombified TJ. Juno claims they found the kid out there already turned, but Daryl notices rope burns on TJ's neck. "A quart's a quart, you prick," Juno scoffs. "You snooze, you lose." Daryl punches Juno in the face. Jones breaks up the fight: no fighting. A pissed Daryl yells "he killed him" as he's forced out with Juno.

NOW. Daryl hands over his knife and instructs Laurent to follow the river until he finds the place in Azlan's watch. He'll be right behind him. As Laurent takes off into the woods, the Guerrier find Laurent's things: his books and Rubik's cube. Daryl is captured and forced to his knees. "No comprende," he tells a French-speaking warrior. They want to know where the boy is. Daryl plays dumb, so they hit him in the face and threaten to take his eyes if he doesn't give up Laurent. "F-- you," Daryl spits back. As the Guerrier go to remove Daryl's left eye, Laurent gives himself up.

In Paris, Quinn gifts Isabelle a diamond necklace. Madame Genet has invited him to a gathering at the Maison M?re hotel for De Gaulle Day, named in honor of Free France leader Charles De Gaulle, architect of France's Fifth Republic. Genet, leader of the Pouvoir des Vivants, "needs people like me that can get their hands on things," Quinn explains. Arriving at Maison M?re, Isabelle spots Sylvie (La?ka Blanc-Francard) and Fallou (Eriq Ebouaney) with Emile (Tristan Zanchi) and Nadine (Chrystal Boursin) in the crowd. Inside, Madame Genet (Anne Charrier) receives Isabelle and Quinn as her forces torture a man in a nearby room -- one of her Guerriers charged with securing the city accepted a bribe "to allow people out we wanted to keep in." The sight of Anna and the soldier Codron (Romain Levi) means she sold Quinn out to Genet.

Isabelle spots Daryl locked inside a cell. "You've got no idea what you've done," Quinn tells Anna. She kisses him goodbye and leaves him to his fate without another word. Quinn attempts to explain himself to Genet, but she has him imprisoned alongside Daryl. Genet then reunites Isabelle with Laurent, admitting that she sees now "why people fall for it."

"A special child, born from the curse. Life from death, Mother Mary, Phoenix from the ashes. It hits all the notes, doesn't it?" Genet says of Laurent's miracle birth to a zombified mother. Finally, it's revealed why Genet is after Laurent: she wants the boy to make an appearance at her De Gaulle Day rally. "Some people think that the l'Union de I'Espoir is against me," she explains to Isabelle. "We must show them the truth. That we are all one French people. I've been trying to make that clear to him." Isabelle instructs Laurent to do as she asks and not anger Genet further. "You are not angry," he tells Genet. "Your heart is broken." In their cell, Quinn complains about holding up his end of the deal and scolds Daryl for not doing his part.

THEN. Daryl and Juno are rounded up and brought aboard a cargo ship in chains when Daryl spots a lifeboat. They're marched past a room where walker experiments are being conducted by the French doctor. A warning sign reads: "Fast ne pas nourir." FAST DO NOT FEED. Shipping containers are filled with caged walkers -- and a container filled with living prisoners. Juno protests being put inside the feeding pen, but gets no answers as he demands the French guards tell them where the ship is headed. "WHERE ARE YOU TAKING US?!" The ship sets sail and is somewhere in the Gulf of C?diz when the guards open the cell, club a man, drag him toward the caged walkers... and throw him inside to be eaten alive by the hungry ones.

NOW. A guard fetches Daryl from the cell, cuffs him, and says it's "lunch time." Genet explains to Laurent what will happen: there will be a speech, then a show of sorts, and then he'll make his appearance. Above a gladiator-style arena, Genet addresses the French people assembled for De Gaulle Day. In French, she thanks the "brave" who have traveled -- from Saint Denis to the Rive Guache, Montmartre, to la Chapelle -- to celebrate their rebirth and the rise of the 6th Republic. "Today, and ever after, we will be free, and strong, and unafraid! We have all felt lost at times, far from the life we knew. Deprived of the people we loved. In a hopeless world, it would have been so easy to give up. But we did not give up. In the name of all those we loved. In the name of all those we lost. We kept going. Living. As we must continue to do. Not for ourselves. But for the future. Years from now, you will tell your grandchildren you were here. Now. The day we ushered in a new France! A France free of the tyranny of the elite, that welcomes in all friends. With hope for a future. Because, yes, the world is simple now. There are friends. And there are enemies. The enemies want to go back to the way things were, when the few controlled the many."

THEN. Daryl coughs up blood as a panicked Juno alerts the guards. "He's puking blood! If he dies in here, he's gonna turn!" The guard hauls Daryl toward the feeding cage, forcing him to his knees to face a dozen walkers. Daryl fights back, throwing one guard into the pit before shooting another dead and choking out the feeder until his neck breaks. Daryl frees Juno and the rest of the prisoners, unleashing the caged walkers onto the ship's crew. The two Americans head for the lifeboats as walkers flood the ship. Zombie mutiny!

NOW. Genet's guards march Daryl down a hall toward the arena. Genet's speech continues: "They took everything, bringing pain and suffering down on those who could least bear it, profiting all the while. Finally, out of greed and hubris, they unleashed this plague on the world. They made us pay for being poor, vulnerable, meek. But remember what the Bible says about the meek. We're not meek anymore! The world is ours, now. So today, we will make our enemies pay! We have all felt the anguish. We have all suffered loss. Loss binds us! Loss gives us our power! They gave us this disease! But I want you to see today the power our future holds. Because their disease can also be our cure. Power to the Living!" The crowd chants, "Pouvoir!"

Daryl is thrown into the arena. Above him, Genet's audience looks down at the American and yell: VIVE LA FRANCE! LONG LIVE FRANCE!

THEN. Daryl and Juno cut the lifeboat loose, but in the chaos of the mutiny, the French doctor's zombie experiments are set free. A variant walker bursts free from its restraints and RUNS. The walker climbs stairs and attacks Juno, knocking him into a red button and sending the lifeboat plunging into the ocean. The strong walker rips Juno apart with inhuman strength.

NOW. Pouvoir guards drop a halberd into the arena and march out Daryl's opponent: a muzzled hungry one. As Genet and Codron look on, a guard fires a dart into the walker's neck, injecting it with a serum.

THEN. Daryl bludgeons the super-strong walker, but it doesn't die. With a burst of speed, the walker charges Daryl... who jumps over the rail just as an explosion rocks the ship.

NOW. The muzzled walker convulses as the serum infects its blood stream. Veins bulge. Its blackened eyes turn red. The walker breaks free from its chains, and free from its muzzle, snarls. "Dixon! Dixon," Codron yells out. "Today, you die... for my brother!" Vive la Dixon?

New episodes of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon air Sundays on AMC and AMC+.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

There are just two episodes left of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon. After Isabelle (Cl?mence Po?sy) stayed behind with Quinn (Adam Nagaitis) so that Daryl (Norman Reedus) and Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi) could escape Paris, Madame Genet (Anne Charrier) and her Guerrier ("Warriors") enact their plan. Sunday's penultimate episode, titled "Deux Amours" ("Two Loves"), sees Daryl and Laurent travel north with Azlan (Hassam Ghancy) to The Nest, the base of l'Union de l'Espoir ("Union of Hope"). It's there that Daryl must complete his season-long journey of delivering Laurent, who is destined to take his place as the new messiah.

Below, read on to find out how to watch The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon episode 5 online with or without cable.

TWD: Daryl Dixon Episode 5 Release Date and Time

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon episode 5, "Deux Amours," premiered Sunday, October 8th, at 3 a.m. ET/12 a.m. PT on AMC+ and airs at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT on the AMC channel.

Daryl Dixon Episode 5 Run Time

"Deux Amours" has a running time of 56 minutes and 53 seconds without commercials, and is scheduled to air from 9:00 p.m. -- 10:23 p.m. ET/PT on AMC.

How to Watch Daryl Dixon Episode 5 Without Cable

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon episode 1 ("L'?me Perdue"), episode 2 ("Alouette"), episode 3 ("Paris Sera Toujours Paris"), episode 4 ("La Dame de Fer"), and episode 5 ("Deux Amours") are currently streaming on AMC+. New episodes release Sundays at 3 a.m. ET/12 a.m. PT. To watch, you'll need an AMC+ subscription or a 7-day free trial to AMC+. Prices start at $4.99/month for the new AMC+ with ads plan, while ad-free AMC+ is available for $6.99/month (when billed annually) or $8.99/month (when billed monthly).

AMC+ is available as an app and via Apple TV, Amazon Prime Video Channels, The Roku Channel, Comcast Xfinity, Dish, DirecTV, Sling TV, and YouTube TV.

Daryl Dixon Episode 4 Recap

In "La Dame de Fer," Genet's Guerrier hunted the American and the boy... but Quinn, Laurent's father, found him first at the Eiffel Tower and brought him to the Demimonde. As Daryl and Isabelle plotted to save Laurent, Quinn negotiated a trade: he'll hand over Daryl in exchange for a Monet. Meanwhile, with Genet after Laurent -- who is the "hope" of the Union of Hope -- Quinn revealed his own plan for his son: use him to bait Daryl to the Demimonde, and get Isabelle back.

Daryl infiltrated the underground club and escaped with Laurent to Pont de la Tournelle, where Azlan was to transport them to The Nest. But with the Guerrier guards blocking off the city limits, leaving them no way out of Paris, Isabelle decided to stay behind to give Quinn what he wants: her. In exchange, he would ensure Daryl and Laurent safe passage out of the city. "This isn't about you. It's not about me," she told Daryl. "It's about Laurent. "I know this isn't your fight. I know you should be on your way home by now. But there's no one else who can take him to The Nest safely." With that, Isabelle bid goodbye to Laurent and Daryl with a promise she would do everything in her power to get back to them.

Stay tuned to ComicBook/TWD (and find us on Facebook) and follow @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for more TWD Universe coverage.

The latest entry in The Walking Dead franchise is proving to be very successful for AMC+. The series premiere of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon is now the biggest premiere in AMC+'s history, overtaking another Walking Dead spinoff, The Walking Dead: Dead City, which debuted back in June. Daryl Dixon, which debuted in September, is also on track to become the most-viewed season of any show in the streamer's history to date. According to Variety, The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon continues to hit new ratings highs, with the fourth episode of the series hitting 1.1 million viewers.

"What a thrill to have this most recent installment in 'The Walking Dead' Universe arrive to set records on AMC+ and deliver steady viewership growth over its first four weeks on AMC," Dan McDermott, president of entertainment and AMC Studios for AMC Networks said. "Thanks to Norman Reedus for bringing his 'bad decisions' to France, to David Zabel, Scott M. Gimple, Cl?mence Po?sy and the rest of the outstanding cast and to the most passionate and committed fans in entertainment. There is so much more and so many great surprises to come for this show and across this expanding universe."

What is The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon About?

In The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, Daryl (Norman Reedus) washes ashore in France and struggles to piece together how he got there and why. The series tracks his journey across a broken but resilient France as he hopes to find a way back home. As he makes the journey, though, the connections he forms along the way complicate his ultimate plan.

In addition to Reedus, the series stars Cl?mence Po?sy, Adam Nagaitis, Anne Charrier, Eriq Ebouaney, Laika Blanc Francard, Romain Levi and Louis Puech Scigliuzzi. The show is executive produced by Scott M. Gimple, showrunner David Zabel, Reedus, Greg Nicotero, Angela Kang, Brian Bockrath, Jason Richman and Daniel Percival.

Will There Be a Second Season of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon

AMC has already renewed The Walking Dead; Daryl Dixon for a second season. It was announced at San Diego Comic-Con in July. The Walking Dead: Dead City has also been renewed for a second season.

"This next chapter in the Walking Dead Universe continues to thrive with a terrific inaugural season for Dead City and highly anticipated new journey for fan-favorite character Daryl Dixon coming in September," Dan McDermott, president of entertainment and AMC Studios for AMC Networks, said when renewing both series for second seasons over the summer. "We can't wait to bring Dead City fans back to the epicenter of Manhattan for more zip-lining action with Maggie and Negan. And, ahead of its debut, we're thrilled to double down on Daryl as we bring the apocalypse to France, transforming Notre Dame, Pont du Gard and other iconic locales into an apocalyptic landscape unlike anything we've seen before."

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon airs Sunday at 3 a.m. ET/12 a.m. PT on AMC+ and at 9 p.m. on AMC.

In this episode, the ComicBook Nation Crew reviews new horror films The Exorcist: Believer and Pet Sematary: Bloodlines as well as the much-anticipated premiere of Marvel's Loki Season 2. PLUS: Reactions to Gen V Episode 4, a full preview of WWE's Fastlane event, and the newest comics!

The Exorcist: Believer Review

In his 2-star review of Exorcist: Believer, ComicBook Nation host Kofi Outlaw said the following:

Exorcist: Believer captures the "legacy" of the original in name only - even after dragging the original film star Ellen Burstyn back into the franchise... an unbalanced mess of a story, that doesn't ever seem to know where to put its focus... The Exorcist: Believer feels like it will go down as an odd and misguided attempt at a direct sequel - one that fails to provide any new soul to the franchise...

Loki Season 2 Review

In her Loki Season 2 review, ComicBook.com's Nicole Drum said the following:

Loki may be one of the MCU's most innovative and significant offerings, and Season 2 of the series certainly maintains the spirit of the first season and pushes not only Loki's story but the future of the MCU forward. But like the Sacred Timeline itself, Loki Season 2 shows signs of coming apart in places with little bits that could stand refinement, reconsideration, or even just a strong bit of editing. Season 2 definitely doesn't suffer from some of the pitfalls that would make people continue to question if superhero fatigue is real or not, but through characterizations, pacing, and too much self-awareness, it definitely feels like a very different show. It's by no means bad, but it certainly feels like most of the fun will be in digesting each episode after the fact, rather than taking it in for what it is just while watching.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

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