The Walking Dead universe is thriving.
After alienating most of its fans with Glenn Rhee’s death, the series chugged along for several more years.
But the franchise’s strength has been shown in spinoffs The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon and The Walking Dead: Dead City, which featured movie-like visuals and thrilling storylines reminiscent of the original show in its prime.
Next up, we have TWD: The Ones Who Live, which is the next entry, and it’s hands down some of the most anticipated content from this sprawling zombie franchise in years.
The reason?
Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira will reprise their fan-favorite roles after stepping away from the main series before its 2022 finale.
Let’s dive into everything we know about the series because AMC has delivered plenty of exciting announcements before its premiere.
The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live premiere date revealed
Andrew Lincoln’s return as Rick Grimes was announced in November 2018 when news broke that he would headline a trilogy of movies charting Rick’s next moves after saving his friends and loved ones and disappearing on a helicopter with Jadis.
But radio silence crept in, and fans asked questions for years about when the movies would see the light of day.
AMC surprised fans in 2022 at San Diego Comic-Con with Lincoln appearing alongside Gurira and the pair, revealing the movies would become a six-episode spinoff series.
It was news longtime fans had been waiting years for, and now, we can reveal when this exciting new chapter will get underway.
TWD: The Ones Who Live will touch down on AMC on Sunday, February 25, 2024, at 9/8c.
The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live will pick up with Rick and Michonne apart
Since the series was announced, we’ve known that the show would follow Michonne’s journey to find her husband and to reunite him with kids Judith and RJ.
Gurira left during The Walking Dead Season 10 and set out to find Rick after coming across his belongings on an abandoned boat.
She found his boots and cell phone (no, it didn’t work, but it had a cute drawing of his family).
Rick donned his boots throughout his nine-season run so he wouldn’t willingly leave them behind with his other belongings.
Michonne knew something had to have happened to him. Still, it was also confirmation that he survived blowing up the bridge with dynamite that saved Alexandria and other communities from a zombie attack.
During her final scene, Michonne’s quest took her to a field with many CRM soldiers.
Thankfully, she got another scene as an epilogue years later in the series finale, which found her writing in Rick’s diary. Rick was seen doing the same thing from a drastically different location and time period.
Ultimately, Michonne was caught up in a horde of walkers, but her fearless nature shone through as she battled with them.
We saw Rick throwing his belongings onto the abandoned ship as he was hunted by a CRM helicopter in what looked like Philadelphia.
The series will focus on Michonne’s journey to find Rick as her husband comes up against a force unlike any he’s faced before.
Will they be able to reunite, take down the CRM, and return to their loved ones? We hope so, but you never know what’s around the corner with this franchise, so we’ll have to tune in to find out.
The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live: Who’s on the cast?
If you’ve read this far, you know Lincoln and Gurira are returning, but there are some other returning faces thrown in for good measure.
Pollyanna McIntosh, who played Jadis, will return as a CRM soldier. The character and actress have the rare distinction of appearing in three TWD-universe shows.
That’s pretty cool, right? We delved into what happened to Jadis after she took a badly wounded Rick to the CRM.
Jadis was high up in the CRM the last time we saw her, so we should probably expect her to have been rewarded for bringing someone as smart as Rick in.
She was a straight-up villain on TWD: World Beyond, which found her doing everything and anything to take down the heroes at the heart of that story under General Beale’s orders.
We heard so much about Beale in that series and even got to meet his son, and now, we can finally put a face to the name.
Lost’s Terry O’Quinn will take on the role on TWD: The Ones Who Live. O’Quinn can play a villain very well, so we can’t wait to see him take on this chilling role.
Lucifer scene-stealer Lesley-Ann Brandt will take on the role of Pearl Thorne, who will serve as Beale’s right hand and a villain in the spinoff.
The only other confirmed cast member is Matthew August Jeffers as Nat.
We should probably expect some cameos from the more expansive TWD universe, but they won’t be in the first episodes because we have about ten years of Rick and Michonne’s journey to catch up on.
The main show loved time jumps, and now, the creatives are forced to give fans all of this information across six episodes.
Will TWD: The Ones Who Live get a second season?
There’s been a great deal of debate over this one.
When it was initially announced, it was framed as a replacement for the trilogy of movies, so six episodes would fill that.
However, the word since is that AMC is taking a wait-and-see approach. TWD: Daryl Dixon and TWD: Dead City performed well enough to earn sophomore seasons.
This series has far more hype because the characters have been off the air for over five years, so this should do far better.
Then again, it’s also possible that this will be the end of Rick and Michonne’s story, and if that is the case, we’ll just be happy to get a conclusive ending for them.
The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live trailer is sheer insanity
We delved into the CRM in the main series and more extensively in The Walking Dead: World Beyond, but the trailer gives us plenty to chew on as we await the premiere.
Michonne has always been resourceful with walkers, so it’s pretty darn exciting seeing her having a walker carrying her belongings through the wasteland.
She also has an excellent new weapon of choice for battling that pesky horde we saw her battle in the series finale.
We see her trying to evade some gas that the CRM throws down on a city. Are they hunting her or merely decimating other cities, as evidenced by TWD: World Beyond?
Another big talking point: The trailer strongly implies the CRM destroyed Atlanta. The original series kicked off in Atlanta, and we were told that the military called everyone into the city to help them, only for them to lay down missiles to bring it down.
The assumption then was that it was the military, but knowing how the CRM views big cities as threats, there’s a high chance this plan for them to take over the remnants of the world had been in the works for a long time.
Then there’s Rick, who’s forced to work for the CRM and bide his time until he can escape.
It’s a neat trailer showing that the show has a big budget. Things explode, zombies look incredibly detailed, and the sets look much better.
We can’t wait for this one!
The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live premieres on Sunday, February 25 at 9/8c on AMC.