Daaaaaaaaamn that’s genius. They should’ve split the two deaths. End season 6 with Negan killing Abraham. This makes comic fans get a false sense of relief, thinking that Glen is safe. Then open season 7 with Daryl punching Negan and then Glen getting killed. Would’ve blown so many people’s minds and not make fans feel like it was a cheap cliff hanger
Yes omg I actually liked him too!! He was so badass. His character development was amazing to watch. The only thing Abraham did that truly pissed me off was when he left Rosita for Sasha. I was so hurt the way he left Rosita in their house after she said tell me why 😭 😩
Yeah it's a real shame, and its kinda ironic that some people think Negan ruined the show or just that his introduction and Glenn's death marked the death of the show because people stopped watching around that point, either because of that or other reasons, but for those who kept watching, Negan became their favourite character and their main reason for continuing to watch 😂
100% agree, Negan was amazing it should've been a good season but they ruined it with uninteresting story lines that no one cared about and bloated fillers. It made the whole season so slow and pointless since half the story lines they tried to feed us we didn't want to see it, it was boring.
@Schizo_Rez but also I disliked Negan as a villain, at first he was intimidating as fuck and struck fear into the characters and audience, his introduction was terrifying, but also entertaining because he was so charismatic, his swagger, his menacing nature. But then he just became too comic booky, but at the same time ironically not enough like his comic character. Graphic novels are a different medium to television, I get some things wouldn't translate well to screen, like King Ezekiel and his tiger, idk how people felt about this more eccentric larger than life characters in the comics, but in the show it just did not work and was unbelievable. The show got slower, more boring and also more weird, but the quirkiness didn't make it more interesting. The dragged out the conflict so long, giving us all these new communities and characters and showing how each one was struggling with life under Savior rule, and building up the courage and manpower to fight back. This isn't necessarily a bad thing to focus the story on, although seeing the characters broken and grieving and powerless isn't fun to watch, it is true to the brutality of the world and what humans can do to eachother, and this time not just for survival but just because they could, and how one man could exploit the apocalypse for his own gain and create this structure and order in the chaos. It's an interesting premise, but it just failed, because of bad pacing, boring unnecessary filler and bottle episodes, characters making dumb reckless decisions (and you can argue their mental state and trauma drove them into poor decision making and emotional responses, but that doesn't make it any less dumb or frustating to watch), all the overly philosophical Gimpleogue speeches, Negan just coming across as a corny cartoonish comedic villain with all his excessive leaning back and dick jokes, while not being able to say a single swear word. I think the only reason people prefer season 8 over season 7 is because it finally feels like it's getting somewhere and the action, even though it has even worse writing and is laughably illogical. Tbh idk why people thought a whole season of war was ever going to work in a survival horror drama
@@bishbosh4815 I liked Negan I can see why some people didn't but I always thought his over the top cocky attitude was just for show since he was actually broken and it was a mask to hide behind. Also showed he could push the limits and no one said anything out of fear. That season killed the show for me, Ezekiel and his stupid CGI tiger completely killed it for me. They tried to build story lines but honestly I couldn't care less about them and the kingdom in general. Seeing your favourite characters powerless isn't necessarily a bad thing, we saw it in season 3 and 4 with The Governor especially after the prison fell they had nothing, they were just trying to survive. I personally would've liked to see Negan earlier in the show, after the prison fell and for the show to have ended with 5 or 6 seasons.
season 7 feels cheap and unfinished. The editing and structure make no sense at all, most of the season is small bottle episodes with 3-5 characters in small cheap sets. We go to sanctuary and focus on a few characters then bounce to Oceanside to watch a few characters, then over to the kingdom, then an episode focused on trash people… it’s all so separate and incomplete feeling.
It felt as though they were trying to connect all of these communities together throughout the storyline but as others have mentioned, it felt disjointed and clunky while also cramming in new characters who didn’t get a proper set up. Not to mention we barely had the group together.
For the season 6 cliffhanger, they could've shown Abraham's death, and then opened the next episode the exact same way they did, and then surprised us with Glenn's death in the premiere. I feel like that could've at least been a bit better
This is the exact same thing I've said when talking to people about the 7 premiere since it aired. Doing it the way you said would've also gave both deaths room to breathe. The way the episode goes Abraham's death gets overshadowed pretty quickly by Glenn's.
It would have better to kill off Abraham his comic death 2 episodes before the season 6 finale then just end season 6 with Glenn being killed by Negan at the lineup.
I'm actually doing this! I'm currently on a rewatch and watching with new viewers, (who I've told about there being small changes but didn't tell them what I changed) but I edited the ending of the season 6 to be the "You are it" moment and then cut to black. I'm really interested to see what the reaction is.
I grew tired of the show even back in S5 back in the day when it was airing, but recently started rewatching it - I get what they say about S7, while anything with Negan is fun it really drags even by the standards set in earlier seasons. I just started S8, and I gotta say it's been a blast so far - still plenty of silly moments but it's been a lot more entertaining in the first 3 episodes than twice the amount in S7 was.
Thank you. Season 8 is awful. Like season 7 is boring and first time I watched I really did not like it, but after rewatching it, I appreciate some moments of the season which were good. I would give season 7 a 6/10. Slightly above average Season 8 on the other is straight garbage 🤮 3/10
Season 7 is a season that has sprinkles of good scenes and episodes throughout but it constantly drags its feet in so many ways. It simply took too long to reach The All Out War we wanted to see while also jumping around way too much. So many episodes and story arcs felt unnecessary or lasted way too long. As a fan of the Comics, it’s such a shame that what could have been the peak of the show ended up being its lowest point of the TV franchise. (Edit): I want to add that slow paced storytelling is not inherently bad thing, it actually works really well if done correctly like any form of pacing in media. The issue with Season 7 and 8 is that they took an arc from the comics that was very snappy with its pacing and turned it into an arc that almost felt like progress was manufactured, not earned. Adding new material to the original source can work and the earlier seasons are proof that adding new material can actually work, Season 2 is probably the best example for me personally. But like 80-90% of the new content in seasons 7 and 8 fells like they wanted to add stuff for the sake of “adding to the source material” rather than processing how to integrate it into the story.
@@brandellsarver9365 it also didn't help the dialogue was really bad around this time and the writing was beginning to drop in quality around season 6.
@@dimitrescu182 it might be. The Junkyard people and the Reapers are genuinely terrible. The Reapers could've been good if done right, but the Junkyard group never was a good idea to begin with
Season 7 just felt miserable to me. Everything moved so slowly, so it felt like the first half was just the main characters being beat down. I agree that Negan and Ezekiel were high points, and getting a look inside Sanctuary was nice. The smaller characters also got a chance to breathe, but idk. It had some good spots, but it's mu least favorite, especially after re-watching the series recently. Also, we already found out what happened to Heath. He ended up on a ship with Dracula.
I've always said it would've been a great cliff hanger if we had to wait a week to see what happens next but having to wait months to find out what happened was a terrible idea
So that’s the general consensus. People don’t have any patience anymore and require instant gratification. The things people these days whine about is frankly revolting. Between the channels that all think they went to film school and are nobodies critics combined with crybaby fans just shows the degradation of society.
I don't think Rick was ever trembling afraid of Negan in the comic, he held his tongue but he was always looking for an opportunity. They made Rick in season 7 genuinely afraid, terrified, and it was... weird.
@@alexanderthered5603 i haven't seen Season 7 yet so my input might be mute on this but if I had to guess when Glenn died and got killed Rick wasn't just scared of Negan but something in Rick snapped not in the crazy kind of way but in the I can't do this anymore everyone i love keeps dying and now one of my best friends one of the first who saved me when I woke up to the apocalypse is now gone and I couldn't save him so maybe Rick wasn't just not fighting Negan because he was afraid of him but maybe because he didn't wanna try or test Negan in case Negan decided to take another one of Rick's love ones
I stand by that that's what caused most to drop off. An entire season of the main characters being subservient to the man who killed Glenn was a terrible idea.
I think we can all agree Jeffrey Dean Morgan was the PERFECT casting of Negan, if it wasn't for him - this season, and many after, would've felt even WORSE for pacing and poor writing choices. Season 7 was a very mixed bag, certain aspects were cool, I was fine with the pacing change because it needed to happen to establish how much the group had truly lost from their poor judgement and bad decision-making. However, majority was dull and uninteresting, I only really cared for the Negan and Rick scenes which sadly took up about 30% of the entire season. The cliff-hanger was cool, but considering how the All-Out War goes down in the next season - it's a little disappointing to look back on. Overall I'd give it a 6/10, definitely the weakest of the entire show (although Season 8 is very close behind as well, just felt like more happened).
While season 8 (understandably) gets hate for making one of the show's most fatal errors in taking out Carl and other aspects like the dialogue and production value (seriously what was up with the muffled sound effects), it becomes very evident on rewatch that season 7 actually make a LOT more smaller mistakes that ultimately harmed the show for good. Some of the ones that bug me the most are: 1. The boomerang storytelling at its ABSOLUTE worst. I think it made a decent amount of sense when used frequently in 4B (since everybody was heading to one place but was separated), but having it done throughout ALL of season 7 was insane. No hate to her, but the fact that ROSITA appears in more episodes of this season than Rick is insane 😆 2. There are way TOO MANY new communities and characters are introduced this season. Instead of just the Kingdom and Saviors, they decide to introduce Oceanside early and give them WAY more screentime than the comics did (they only appeared in FOUR ISSUES of the comic and basically only existed to show their world expanding) and also introduce the awful "Scavengers" aka the Trash People, purely for the sake of unnecessarily adding another antagonistic group to the story instead of just...letting the Saviors be the main threat. Almost every character among Oceanside and the Trash People just...doesn't really hit at all, except Jadis (Cyndie showed potential but her actress was clearly too busy for this show lol). And speaking of the characters, this is where they stop feeling like a big family to me since they all start to divide themselves into the multitude of new groups 💔 That plus losing both Glenn and Abe (two more lighthearted characters) really weakened the cast for me, which only continued across the next two seasons losing Carl, Rick, and Michonne 😅 3. The pacing is all over the place, mostly too slow. While I understand wanting some build up for them as villains, 7A is just so BLEAK up till the midseason finale where Rick gets his mojo back. In the comics, right after Negan's Alexandria visit we find out that Rick was just mostly putting up a front and is already thinking of how they can fight back, while TV rick is just...drained. It makes sense, but still doesn't make it much easier to watch our main character and most of his friends depressed for multiple episodes. I do think 7x04 was an episode critical to keeping the audience attention. With Rick and co just getting bullied the entire episode, I genuinely think that if they went the comic route of showing that Rick is already plotting against Negan at that end of THAT episode...more people would've stayed wanting to see the getback! Also, I didn't fully learn it till watching Korotos Mystery Shack's videos (then reading it myself), but 7x08 and 7x16 are back to back events in the comics, while in the show they are separated by 8 episodes of arguably MOSTLY filler content led by the Trash People (all of which, again, are mostly irrelevant minus Jadis since they all get smoked next season)...crazy. 💀 If the What Comes After and March to War arcs were handled better, this season could've been SO good 😭
Youre the first person ive seen to actually point out the muffled sound effects. It is awful. When they stab walkers in the head it sounded like a thud rather than the usual knife noise. And the guns sound like theyre being shot underwater. It seems like they just stopped caring after season 7's lack of viewership
Completely agree! I definitely feel like the production suffered in this season, i didn't like the tone and feel of everything, it felt very cheap, the music was awful like synthesised wet farts, they made Negan way too comedic and nowhere near as intimidating as his comic counterpart after his introduction, the handling of Abraham and Glenn's deaths, overall bad writing, slow pacing, poor structure, too many needless communities and characters introduced, rampant Gimpleogue, the list goes on, on top of characters being written like idiots and making reckless decisions that compromise things
I hated season 7 except for the finale but I like season 8 or at least season 8 beginning because we got no action for an entire season and then we get fighting but the rest of season 8 was kinda mid and boring at times
It was great because I was kinda getting bored of the show and that rick was the always one who wins. But when negan came that guy gave me chills, I never thought that he will kill Abraham and glenn. It was a total shock for me, and that negan was literally terrifying and that he showed rick his place.
@@nick_4972 tbh for me Season 10b through 11 are the series low points. There's only a handful of episodes I like from that era. The story felt messy and the plot armor got to ridiculous length
It's crazy to me that when this show was at it's peak i was just in middle school, growing up with the walking dead and being a huge fan from the start really affected how i saw this episode, i was just 13 when Glenn died and it took me weeks to continue watching the show again, then Rick left in 2018 when i just started highschool barely being almost 16 ( yeah, the school system works differently in my country ), i only got to experience the prime of TWD as a young kid really, and i gotta agree that Season 7 was too slow, it almost made me quit, that's when i actually started to read the comics, i am glad Season 9 picked things back up.
I think killing Maggie instead of Glen would have been awesome story wise. I know it wouldnt have been able to happen on TV but can you imagine how Glenn could have gone crazy knowing that his kid and wife were killed by negan?
I don’t know, that seems like the definition of fridging to me. To sacrifice Maggie just to push forward Glenn’s character arc or give him something to do - it doesn’t sit right.
@@rainbow_doglover8301 Isn't that what they tried to do with Maggie though? Killing Glenn to push forward Maggie's character... although not executed very well since Maggie becomes progressively more unlikable after Glenn's death imo.
@@frostmusicofficialbut at least Glenn’s character arc was finished. I mean after S6, the only path they could have taken him was a “dark” Glenn path and by that point everybody was dark af. The whole point of Glenn’s character by the end, was that he was the one whose light persisted despite all the horrific things they had endured. So sniffing out the “light” per se, does make things look hopeless for the group. I think that has more of an impact for the entire group, rather than Maggie dying, where up until that point she was only Glenn’s girlfriend. Her death would have an even lesser impact than Abraham, whom he at least was like a fortress to the group. I mean her character grew stale and barely interacted with major characters significantly. She only appeared when Glenn was involved somehow.
Season 7 actually has some really good moments, Jeffrey Dean Morgan crushes it in every scene he’s in, it just drags too much. Season 8 is basically unwatchable
Your 100 percent correct on the cliffhanger. I remember it made me like wth.. to. And slowly fell off the show afterwards just didn't hit the same anymore.
I think the cliffhanger would have worked better if a) Glenn fake out never happened and b) the cliffhanger was between episode 15 and 16 Wouldn’t have fixed it completely but it would have been way better than waiting months and months
Also let's not forget episode 15 also had a cliffhanger with Dwight shooting Daryl from behind and blood stupidly splashing the screen, which made it seem like he died. They became so obsessed with cheap gimmicks this season because they thought they needed them to keep the viewers watching and it had the complete opposite effect.
Ever since the beginning of Season 7 I always say that they had a way better cliffhanger which was Negan Dragging Rick into the RV and drive off, because that moment both Comic readers and show viewers would’ve been in the same boat and had no idea what would happen next and instead of spending the summer wondering who Negan killed which everyone basically knew because it got leaked, we could’ve spent the summer wondering where Negan had taken Rick. Also this was around the time that Daryl fans truly got on my nerves because they tried defending his actions that led to Glenn’s death even though if it was the other way around, Glenn or anyone else punched Negan and he decides to kill Daryl in retaliation, all the Daryl fans would’ve hated that character and probably sent hate messages to the actor like what happened to Eugene in season 8
As much as I hated Eugene (especially in the beginning) and desperately wanted his character to be killed off, I never once thought to go and harass the actual actor because of his character. People are so fucking unhinged and delulu that they went and harassed a man who was just playing a character in a show. I remember when he spoke out about that years ago. All that tells me is he did his fucking job and killed his characters portrayal. I absolutely loveeee the person Eugene went on to be. One of the best character arks I’ve ever seen. Him and Gabriel’s character really made me change my mind once they became useful members of our beloved Survivor group.
Lol it's definitely true what you said in the beginning about the premier feeling like a 2 parter. Me and my girlfriend recently binged the whole show start to finish and when we got to the end of the season 6 DVD and I got up to put in the next DVD (S7) and while I was doing so I was like "believe it or not you're lucky you got into the show this late because we had to wait almost a year to see what happens next and you have no idea what that was like, it practically pisses off the whole world" lol
I think Rick’s speech at the end of season 7 when he’s talking to Negan is probably my favorite part bc at that point he dosent care, he just wants Negan dead
The “you got no guts” scene and Negan just interacting with Judith and Carl in this season made it a 6.5/10 for me. The line goes so hard. Plus the Kingdom adds some whimsy into the show, even if it’s messed up, but still adds some new fun into the mix. Though, the choreography was lacking at times and did move too slow, I think Negan really carries the season - and almost all of the show from this point onward.
Season 7 Characters: Rick Carl Daryl Carol Glenn Maggie Michonne Sasha Judith Tara Abraham Rosita Eugene Gabriel Aaron Eric Spencer Olivia Barbara Bruce Tobin Francine Enid Morgan Heath Scott Dwight Sherry Jesus Gregory Bertie Carson Kal Eduardo Negan Simon Daniel Ezekiel Jerry Nabila Richard Henry Benjamin Alvaro Dianne Laura Arat Gavin Jared Gary Cyndie Kathy Beatrice Rachel Natania Oscar Frankie Jadis
Fan favs being killed off and too many storylines which went nowhere and added nothing to the series. Instead of 16 episodes, could have been 10...several good/great moments, but all-in-all not the best quality after the prior 3 high-quality seasons.
Who else remembers the abundance of "Who got Lucilled?" theories here on YT back in the day. Man... those were the days. It's funny how other cope when they theorist pick their character lmao
Seasons 4-11 are unwatchable in my opinion loved the first 3 seasons it's was my favorite show just as good as breaking bad then gimple became showrunner in season 4
@@111horror Season 4-6 are at least manageable and consistent with the prior seasons but the seasons after 6 are just awful intangible and unconnected.
Season 11 doesn't get the hate it deservers. It's absolutely terrible, long, boring, makes no sense. One of the worst seasons of TV ever. New characters all suck. Somehow Gabriel became one of the best chracter on the show, because everyone else sucks.
@@JarinCOD Agreed! The way they did Gage was so wrong,Lance and Carver were the only good things for me that entire season. It's terribly mid and sleep inducing. I had a better time watching Season 8 than 11 because at least the characters had a soul and mattered. Plot for 11 was so cheesy and bland. BLAND! I almost fell into a coma from how sleepy it made me. I've never had this feeling of "Wow can this episode end" in a long time since Lost(good show though bad ending). I made a mistake watching this live instead of waiting for all the episodes to drop on netflix. Worst mistake of my life next to rejecting my highschool crush!
When you have a hit TV show you never overstay your welcome. Prime example breaking bad and avatar The last Airbender but The walking Dead didn't get the memo and went on longer than It needed to
I don't know why I never thought of it but yeah your version of it where Abraham dies and then you see Glenn die in the premiere would have worked so much better why did they not do that oh my gosh
Say What You Want But At Least (In My Opinion) One Of The Biggest Reasons Why This Season Was So Bad Is Because We Had To Wait Every Single Week For Sunday Just To See A Episode That Was Slow Asf & Kinda Boring And See An Episode or Episodes Without The Main Cast Members, But Yeah I’d Say Season 8 Is A lot Better Than Season 7 But Season 7 Is Still The #1 Worst Season With S8 Being The Second.
I disagree. The show had already gotten stale, and scrolling these comments shows it. People are saying season 7 and 8 are the worst or almost the worst. Seasons 9 - 11 are garbage. Etc. The show should have ended with the finale of season 5. Many people say it should have ended in 'No way out' during season 6, but even season 6 was pretty poor.
Honestly think your rating is still too generous 😆 Season 7 was an absolute slog.. the beginning of the Sharp decline was almost immediate from S7E1 being pretty damn good to E2 onwards completely downhill.
You can thank showrunner Scott Gimple for why seasons 7-8 were so bad. He did such a bad job that he was moved to Fear the Walking Dead for season 4 which is why that show tanked and felt off right after a fantastic season 3.
I was a “hardcore fan. Watched every week religiously.” The Talking Dead, too. I dropped out and never watched another episode midway through this season.
The slow pacing doubly hurt this because unlike previous seasons where the group had setbacks, but were ultimately moving forward and victorious, this became a relentless slog of misery. The whole season, how many wins do they get? There's moments of hope like the agreement to team up, but actual WINS? Say they have a double agent and stop some of Negan's plans while remaining undiscovered, they manage to hide a load of resources and make strong alliances under his nose. Not with him away, but while he's there, just behind his back so there's the excitement of if they'll get caught. The longest arc before was The Governor, and that was a season and a half and they got a big win in the middle of it, the war with Negan took longer with less happening.
I tell people all the time that negan realize this was a manufactured bullet because a normally or "properly" manufactured bullet would have went clean through Lucille and this bullet is extremely underpowered so somebody tried to make one. This is Eugene's first ever bullet after all
The writing from the Season 6 cliffhanger to the Season 7 opening was just strange. It was detailed as hell making it difficult to know who exactly dies, but also convoluted. Many other ways they could've done it like killing Abraham to have his death portrayed correctly without being almost instantly overshadowed by Glenn's death or ending by Negan opening the door with his line. The one they went with is awkward.
The Negan cliffhanger killed the shows momentum and lost so many viewers. This video puts it perfectly "turned hardcore viewers into casuals" yep 100% They betrayed their audience with that cliffhanger and the deaths were spoiled anyway when the actors who played Glenn and Abraham were seen in other parts of the world during season 7 filiming. It was a mess and changed TWD forever. It took years for it to regain so of its old form and but it never fully recovered
Haven't mentioned this in previous videos, but I'm sorta doing the same as you. I decided to rewatch the entire show 1 season per month, and its been a lot of fun going down memory lane! ... Up until this season. Even when I was younger and less critical of a show's writing, I still felt a decline from this slow season. 18:02 "Ah, the trash people" I felt this exact way seeing their introduction again, and I'm more frustrated now than before, knowing how pointless and dumb they are.
The bullet was modified to fit the projectile. Crimmped to be to size, usually with reloading you heat the end of the casing to shorten the diameter and tightly hold the projectile in place.
They were just trying to trick the audience by not giving Glenn a goodbye episode. For some reason they thought shocking the audience was the best option. It was all misdirect. Even the fakeout death. They gave Abraham the goodbye episode in order to make it seem like Glenn was safe.
@@MistahJay7 that's honestly a good way of describing it. Yeah the whispers killed Jesus and the pike thing happened, but in the show they felt too goofy, whereas in the comics they felt a lot scarier. Season 11 especially is when the plot armor really got ridiculous
I just wanna mention that the production of these videos are fantastic. Especially with the ending music at the end of the videos. I don’t remember which episode the track came from (probably a season 5 episode), but I just feel something every time you summarize the video with this track in the background.
Season 7 was amazing and probably one of my favorite seasons. I understand and agree with the criticism of the cliffhanger and such, but my view is that the show finally put some bigger stakes than ever seen before. The Governor did pull up on a tank, yes, but that was a scorched earth plan. Negan downright had the crew on lockdown, trapped in the paradise they thought they secured. We saw Rick finally break down, which fueled the idea of the crew being the underdog for the first time.
STRONGLY agree that it's so much less gruelling when you can binge it. I remember watching this shit week to week and it felt like SUCH a fucking chore. I genuinely considered just waiting for them all to air then binging it back in the day. It's a much more bearable season when you can just keep watching. For us back in the day though, it's no surprise why so many stopped watching.
No, you're completely right the bullet thing is dumb in every way. One: the casing she took was shot from desert Eagle taking a different round entirely not even the same in diameter. Two: The odds, its completely unbelievable. What do you want from me that's incalculable. Three: It's kinda a anti character moment, no one would reasonably do that.
I actually really like Season 7. Was it slower and more drawn out than necessary? Yes, but it also contained many of my favorite moments from the show. The premiere is my favorite episode of the entire series, I loved the world building with the Saviors and the Kingdom and every episode with Negan was a big highlight for me, such as when he first shows up at Alexandria, when he shows Carl around the Sanctuary and when he guts Spencer like a fish. I also loved the episode where Morgan slips back into instability over Benjamin's death and think the finale is one of the show's best with building tension throughout leading to a fantastic action sequence at the end where our heroes finally come out on top after being under Negan's boot throughout the entire season. This season also contains one of the best action sequences of the entire show when Rick and Michonne run down that horde of zombies on the highway with cars and barbed wire. Also, while people like to say that Season 7 was when the viewership really declined, it still pulled in around 10-12 million viewers per episode and actually has a higher viewership average than Season 3. The notion that "most" people quit watching around this season just isn't true. In fairness, Season 7 is certainly flawed with some slow and unnecessary episodes/plotlines such as the Scavengers and that incredibly boring episode where Rick and Michonne search for guns and supplies at a carnival, but I've always thought the good this season outweighed the bad. Season 8 on the other hand is much harder to defend. While it did have highlights like the occasionally thrilling action sequence and the entire Negan vs. Simon subplot, the season just drags on with mostly repetitive action and story beats, dull filler like dedicating an entire episode to Eugene's "struggle" at the Sanctuary just to leave him in the exact same position by the end and of course, the absolutely moronic decision to kill off Carl. I'd say Season 8 is when the show truly began to decline in both quality and viewership as this was the first time since Season 2 the ratings dropped all the way to the six million mark (which would still be a high achievement for any TV show, but not The Walking Dead). This was the point where people really began dropping the show in droves and it's a shame because I and a lot of the people who continued watching thought that Seasons 9-11 were really good.
i just want to say i love this monthly review of each season that you’ve been doing this year. i have strong and mixed feelings for wach season of twd, and it’s interesting to hear your views/opinions/alternate ideas for the seasons
Omg that whole Rosita shooting Negans bat was sooo dumb, let's assume she did hit the bat, even if she did the bullet would've pierced the bat and went into negan in pieces like with Carl, I mean a METAL car door can't even stop a bullet, so wood stopping it is beyond stupid
The whole thing took way to long!! I did not like Rick like this. That is also a reason The Ones Who Live was not that exciting for me. A beat down rick is no fun to watch.
I too thought season seven was empty and had terrible pacing. However, what if they wanted it to feel empty and make you realize the gapping hole that Abraham and Glenn. No one to unite the group or ground them in confidence against the Saviors. By the way the idea of splitting up the deaths between S6 and S7 is genius!
Certainly the strangest season. Strong villain, huge stakes, one of the best comic arcs, etc. Yet, too many lame stories, writing was whack, and certain characters just didn’t feel like themselves.
Honestly what killed this season for me was the god awful pacing of Season 7 and by extension Season 8. What should have been just one season depicting life under Negan, Rising Up against Negan, and then All out War gets dragged into two seasons and it clearly shows. And this comes down to Scott Gimples obsessive need to have boomerang story telling in his seasons of The Walking Dead I don’t think the premier episode of The Walking Dead killed the show. I don’t think it’s a bad episode. In fact I’m someone that considers “The Day Will Come when you Won’t be” to be a masterclass in edge of your seat horror storytelling and one of the best episodes in The Walking Dead. The same goes for “Last Day on Earth”, but to a lesser degree. From a filmmaking and screenwriting perspective there’s very little I would change to how each individual episode told its story. The only massive change I would make is instead of having “The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be” as the premier of Season 7. I would have made that episode the Finally for Season 6 and have “Last Day on Earth” be the penultimate episode for Season 6. It’s telling that the people that really enjoy these episodes like myself are the ones who didn’t have to wait for months to get a resolution to the cliffhanger that was presented in “Last Day on Earth”. We were just able to move to the next episode after the previous one finished. These episode feel like they should have been released under the same season and not as a Final/Premiere episode. But these are my thoughts. What do you guys think?
As someone who was watching week to week, I personally loved the cliffhanger. Not everyone will agree, but I'll try to defend my stance: The cliffhanger had such a huge mystery with so many possible outcomes. There were a bunch of teasers and 'leaks' and people analysing every possible detail from whose story looked 'finished' to rocks on the ground to voice lines. Every day for the entire season break, there were new articles and videos and it was by far the most active the fanbase has ever been. I even picked up the comics at this time and refused to read up to the negan arc to not spoil the show for myself.
Speaking as a new viewer of The Walking Dead. I personally understand everyone’s annoyance with the decisions that were made with Season 7. But I honestly don’t think it’s a bad season. And I completely understand how people strongly dislike the Season 6 cliffhanger. To me, it’s better as a finished product, but if they decided to make so they showed Abraham’s death than in the next episode show Glenn’s it would have been better. Since it would allow Abraham to not get completely overshadowed, and it could have avoided many other issues. I feel that the branding should have been focused more about how will the group recover from this, rather than just “Who’s getting it?” Since that creates interest only for 1 episode. But I’d argue the worst decision in the show was killing Carl.
Season 7 & 8 were no doubt bad , and in my opinion, the start of the fall of walking dead , but the worst season, hands down, was 11 . Followed closely by 10 .
@dale3797 chill with the one liners bro you're good, the early seasons are just undoubtedly better than the last couple the writing the directing how they handled characters just everything is better
As someone who sat and watched every episode live on Sunday night's religiously from the pilot to 7x1 I can't exactly explain why but I dropped the show entirely after 7x1, well I attempted to watch 7x2 but quit midway through it and have never returned to the series since. Like I said I can't really explain why but its interesting to know I'm not the only one who has done that.
Great video, loved to hear your thoughts and S7 can be a very passionate subject for some people. It’s personally my least favourite season of the show too but I do believe that 7x07 is one of the greatest episodes of TV, it was at that moment I stopped really hating Negan and thought “oh, there’s more to this guy than we think”. And I was right thinking that, just had to wait for the answers/conformation in 10x22.
I’m so glad Abraham got such a decent shout out here! Yeah I get everyone was sad about Glenn but he was such a dull repetitive character. He couldn’t say a sentence without the word Maggie in it and it got so tedious. At least Abraham was more interesting.
I remember thinking season 2 was the worst. Upon re watching tbe show i realized season 7 is. They have some good moments. "Alexandria will not fall, not on this day" was a good, if not cheesy line. Sheeva was awesome too. The pacing was just all over the place. I feel like they had alot of good pieces but then tripped and fell and lost them down a drain. T-dog knows how awful that is
16:47 The Cell is easily a top ten episode for me but I understand this point. In my opinion I wouldn’t change this episode at all, you really see just how broken Daryl’s character is here and I think it’s one of the biggest introspections into his character we get. I also really liked the episode Danai wrote for TOWL though where Rick is so mentally broken. When people say that’s inaccurate I immediately know they have never been to rock bottoms basement before lol
I know it was bound to happen because it happened in the comics (even though there were characters who lasted longer than their comic counterparts). But the fact that it happened because Daryl punched Negan is laughable because it had me thinking of a joke from family guy
Daaaaaaaaamn that’s genius. They should’ve split the two deaths. End season 6 with Negan killing Abraham. This makes comic fans get a false sense of relief, thinking that Glen is safe. Then open season 7 with Daryl punching Negan and then Glen getting killed. Would’ve blown so many people’s minds and not make fans feel like it was a cheap cliff hanger
That’s actually really smart, I’ve never heard that take before
I swear i hate how little abraham is talked about lol, He's literally my 3rd / 4th fav character after Rick, Shane and Maaaybe Hershel
Yes omg I actually liked him too!! He was so badass. His character development was amazing to watch. The only thing Abraham did that truly pissed me off was when he left Rosita for Sasha. I was so hurt the way he left Rosita in their house after she said tell me why 😭 😩
@@pepeelghetto1231 same! He was badass! I loved his personality.
@@r.wilson2348why are dingleberries brown?
Hershel is my dad.
Imagine how I feel being a Tyrese fan lol
Negan is the best villain in twd, but the seasons he's in are bloated and largely uninteresting
Yeah it's a real shame, and its kinda ironic that some people think Negan ruined the show or just that his introduction and Glenn's death marked the death of the show because people stopped watching around that point, either because of that or other reasons, but for those who kept watching, Negan became their favourite character and their main reason for continuing to watch 😂
100% agree, Negan was amazing it should've been a good season but they ruined it with uninteresting story lines that no one cared about and bloated fillers. It made the whole season so slow and pointless since half the story lines they tried to feed us we didn't want to see it, it was boring.
@Schizo_Rez but also I disliked Negan as a villain, at first he was intimidating as fuck and struck fear into the characters and audience, his introduction was terrifying, but also entertaining because he was so charismatic, his swagger, his menacing nature. But then he just became too comic booky, but at the same time ironically not enough like his comic character. Graphic novels are a different medium to television, I get some things wouldn't translate well to screen, like King Ezekiel and his tiger, idk how people felt about this more eccentric larger than life characters in the comics, but in the show it just did not work and was unbelievable. The show got slower, more boring and also more weird, but the quirkiness didn't make it more interesting. The dragged out the conflict so long, giving us all these new communities and characters and showing how each one was struggling with life under Savior rule, and building up the courage and manpower to fight back. This isn't necessarily a bad thing to focus the story on, although seeing the characters broken and grieving and powerless isn't fun to watch, it is true to the brutality of the world and what humans can do to eachother, and this time not just for survival but just because they could, and how one man could exploit the apocalypse for his own gain and create this structure and order in the chaos. It's an interesting premise, but it just failed, because of bad pacing, boring unnecessary filler and bottle episodes, characters making dumb reckless decisions (and you can argue their mental state and trauma drove them into poor decision making and emotional responses, but that doesn't make it any less dumb or frustating to watch), all the overly philosophical Gimpleogue speeches, Negan just coming across as a corny cartoonish comedic villain with all his excessive leaning back and dick jokes, while not being able to say a single swear word. I think the only reason people prefer season 8 over season 7 is because it finally feels like it's getting somewhere and the action, even though it has even worse writing and is laughably illogical. Tbh idk why people thought a whole season of war was ever going to work in a survival horror drama
@@bishbosh4815 I liked Negan I can see why some people didn't but I always thought his over the top cocky attitude was just for show since he was actually broken and it was a mask to hide behind. Also showed he could push the limits and no one said anything out of fear. That season killed the show for me, Ezekiel and his stupid CGI tiger completely killed it for me. They tried to build story lines but honestly I couldn't care less about them and the kingdom in general. Seeing your favourite characters powerless isn't necessarily a bad thing, we saw it in season 3 and 4 with The Governor especially after the prison fell they had nothing, they were just trying to survive. I personally would've liked to see Negan earlier in the show, after the prison fell and for the show to have ended with 5 or 6 seasons.
@@Schizo_Rez I prefer Negan after the war as an anti hero
season 7 feels cheap and unfinished. The editing and structure make no sense at all, most of the season is small bottle episodes with 3-5 characters in small cheap sets. We go to sanctuary and focus on a few characters then bounce to Oceanside to watch a few characters, then over to the kingdom, then an episode focused on trash people… it’s all so separate and incomplete feeling.
It felt as though they were trying to connect all of these communities together throughout the storyline but as others have mentioned, it felt disjointed and clunky while also cramming in new characters who didn’t get a proper set up. Not to mention we barely had the group together.
Haha, I remember how that whole feeding-pigs-walkers thing went absolutely nowhere
They fed the pigs walkers that they were giving to the saviors . They feed their pigs corn but why waste corn on pigs ur giving away.
@nobodyr1562 I know. Like I said, went nowhere
It wasn't supposed to go anywhere? It was just a way for the kingdom to save food
For the season 6 cliffhanger, they could've shown Abraham's death, and then opened the next episode the exact same way they did, and then surprised us with Glenn's death in the premiere. I feel like that could've at least been a bit better
This is the exact same thing I've said when talking to people about the 7 premiere since it aired. Doing it the way you said would've also gave both deaths room to breathe. The way the episode goes Abraham's death gets overshadowed pretty quickly by Glenn's.
It would have better to kill off Abraham his comic death 2 episodes before the season 6 finale then just end season 6 with Glenn being killed by Negan at the lineup.
@@dragonballzmaster11 yes! plus it still would've kept people engaged and wanting to see the aftermath after the cliffhanger
@@TheTrollingMaster-xr9el I definitely agree although I definitely do like how Abraham basically sacrificed himself for the group
I'm actually doing this!
I'm currently on a rewatch and watching with new viewers, (who I've told about there being small changes but didn't tell them what I changed) but I edited the ending of the season 6 to be the "You are it" moment and then cut to black.
I'm really interested to see what the reaction is.
"The Worst Season of the Walking Dead"
-Season 8 has entered the chat
i think season 8 is better than 7, season 8 suffered alot from weekly release
@@gamingnoah9807 yea
I grew tired of the show even back in S5 back in the day when it was airing, but recently started rewatching it - I get what they say about S7, while anything with Negan is fun it really drags even by the standards set in earlier seasons.
I just started S8, and I gotta say it's been a blast so far - still plenty of silly moments but it's been a lot more entertaining in the first 3 episodes than twice the amount in S7 was.
@@IronFreakV you will probably find you like season 8 more than most people because its waay better when you watch it on streaming rather than weekly
Thank you. Season 8 is awful. Like season 7 is boring and first time I watched I really did not like it, but after rewatching it, I appreciate some moments of the season which were good. I would give season 7 a 6/10. Slightly above average
Season 8 on the other is straight garbage 🤮
3/10
Season 7 is a season that has sprinkles of good scenes and episodes throughout but it constantly drags its feet in so many ways. It simply took too long to reach The All Out War we wanted to see while also jumping around way too much. So many episodes and story arcs felt unnecessary or lasted way too long.
As a fan of the Comics, it’s such a shame that what could have been the peak of the show ended up being its lowest point of the TV franchise.
(Edit): I want to add that slow paced storytelling is not inherently bad thing, it actually works really well if done correctly like any form of pacing in media. The issue with Season 7 and 8 is that they took an arc from the comics that was very snappy with its pacing and turned it into an arc that almost felt like progress was manufactured, not earned.
Adding new material to the original source can work and the earlier seasons are proof that adding new material can actually work, Season 2 is probably the best example for me personally. But like 80-90% of the new content in seasons 7 and 8 fells like they wanted to add stuff for the sake of “adding to the source material” rather than processing how to integrate it into the story.
Completely agree
Peak was all out war and whisperer story arch in the books
The junkyard people might be the worst added material to the show.
@@brandellsarver9365 it also didn't help the dialogue was really bad around this time and the writing was beginning to drop in quality around season 6.
@@dimitrescu182 it might be. The Junkyard people and the Reapers are genuinely terrible. The Reapers could've been good if done right, but the Junkyard group never was a good idea to begin with
Season 7 just felt miserable to me. Everything moved so slowly, so it felt like the first half was just the main characters being beat down. I agree that Negan and Ezekiel were high points, and getting a look inside Sanctuary was nice. The smaller characters also got a chance to breathe, but idk. It had some good spots, but it's mu least favorite, especially after re-watching the series recently.
Also, we already found out what happened to Heath. He ended up on a ship with Dracula.
I've always said it would've been a great cliff hanger if we had to wait a week to see what happens next but having to wait months to find out what happened was a terrible idea
So that’s the general consensus. People don’t have any patience anymore and require instant gratification. The things people these days whine about is frankly revolting.
Between the channels that all think they went to film school and are nobodies critics combined with crybaby fans just shows the degradation of society.
@@South_0f_Heaven_”Criticising my favorite show? Omg guys the West has totally fallen” Get a life.
@@South_0f_Heaven_It was a dumb idea, just accept it.
I think season 8 is by far the worst season
Both Season 7 and 8 are absolute dogshit that killed my interest for the show.
Nah season 7 is slightly worse. 8 has Carl’s death but at least it has dumb action. Season 7’s highlight is Negan while 8’s is Rick
Definitely a debate between 7 or 8
@@sehvlo0254No its not. Season 1 is the worst, Season 7 second to worst. 8 isn't even close to being the worse season
@mjnonchalant huh? How is 1 the worst hello??
I don't think Rick was ever trembling afraid of Negan in the comic, he held his tongue but he was always looking for an opportunity. They made Rick in season 7 genuinely afraid, terrified, and it was... weird.
@@alexanderthered5603 i haven't seen Season 7 yet so my input might be mute on this but if I had to guess when Glenn died and got killed Rick wasn't just scared of Negan but something in Rick snapped not in the crazy kind of way but in the I can't do this anymore everyone i love keeps dying and now one of my best friends one of the first who saved me when I woke up to the apocalypse is now gone and I couldn't save him so maybe Rick wasn't just not fighting Negan because he was afraid of him but maybe because he didn't wanna try or test Negan in case Negan decided to take another one of Rick's love ones
That's what I noticed too, I'm surprised not enough people bring up that point
I stand by that that's what caused most to drop off. An entire season of the main characters being subservient to the man who killed Glenn was a terrible idea.
Rick being like that in the show just elevates Negan though. I like it
@@Telos1807Negan ruling over our characters and making them his bitch is literally why I like this season lmao
I think we can all agree Jeffrey Dean Morgan was the PERFECT casting of Negan, if it wasn't for him - this season, and many after, would've felt even WORSE for pacing and poor writing choices. Season 7 was a very mixed bag, certain aspects were cool, I was fine with the pacing change because it needed to happen to establish how much the group had truly lost from their poor judgement and bad decision-making. However, majority was dull and uninteresting, I only really cared for the Negan and Rick scenes which sadly took up about 30% of the entire season. The cliff-hanger was cool, but considering how the All-Out War goes down in the next season - it's a little disappointing to look back on. Overall I'd give it a 6/10, definitely the weakest of the entire show (although Season 8 is very close behind as well, just felt like more happened).
Bro plays and watches zombies massive W
While season 8 (understandably) gets hate for making one of the show's most fatal errors in taking out Carl and other aspects like the dialogue and production value (seriously what was up with the muffled sound effects), it becomes very evident on rewatch that season 7 actually make a LOT more smaller mistakes that ultimately harmed the show for good.
Some of the ones that bug me the most are:
1. The boomerang storytelling at its ABSOLUTE worst. I think it made a decent amount of sense when used frequently in 4B (since everybody was heading to one place but was separated), but having it done throughout ALL of season 7 was insane. No hate to her, but the fact that ROSITA appears in more episodes of this season than Rick is insane 😆
2. There are way TOO MANY new communities and characters are introduced this season. Instead of just the Kingdom and Saviors, they decide to introduce Oceanside early and give them WAY more screentime than the comics did (they only appeared in FOUR ISSUES of the comic and basically only existed to show their world expanding) and also introduce the awful "Scavengers" aka the Trash People, purely for the sake of unnecessarily adding another antagonistic group to the story instead of just...letting the Saviors be the main threat. Almost every character among Oceanside and the Trash People just...doesn't really hit at all, except Jadis (Cyndie showed potential but her actress was clearly too busy for this show lol). And speaking of the characters, this is where they stop feeling like a big family to me since they all start to divide themselves into the multitude of new groups 💔 That plus losing both Glenn and Abe (two more lighthearted characters) really weakened the cast for me, which only continued across the next two seasons losing Carl, Rick, and Michonne 😅
3. The pacing is all over the place, mostly too slow. While I understand wanting some build up for them as villains, 7A is just so BLEAK up till the midseason finale where Rick gets his mojo back. In the comics, right after Negan's Alexandria visit we find out that Rick was just mostly putting up a front and is already thinking of how they can fight back, while TV rick is just...drained. It makes sense, but still doesn't make it much easier to watch our main character and most of his friends depressed for multiple episodes. I do think 7x04 was an episode critical to keeping the audience attention. With Rick and co just getting bullied the entire episode, I genuinely think that if they went the comic route of showing that Rick is already plotting against Negan at that end of THAT episode...more people would've stayed wanting to see the getback! Also, I didn't fully learn it till watching Korotos Mystery Shack's videos (then reading it myself), but 7x08 and 7x16 are back to back events in the comics, while in the show they are separated by 8 episodes of arguably MOSTLY filler content led by the Trash People (all of which, again, are mostly irrelevant minus Jadis since they all get smoked next season)...crazy. 💀
If the What Comes After and March to War arcs were handled better, this season could've been SO good 😭
Youre the first person ive seen to actually point out the muffled sound effects. It is awful. When they stab walkers in the head it sounded like a thud rather than the usual knife noise. And the guns sound like theyre being shot underwater. It seems like they just stopped caring after season 7's lack of viewership
Completely agree! I definitely feel like the production suffered in this season, i didn't like the tone and feel of everything, it felt very cheap, the music was awful like synthesised wet farts, they made Negan way too comedic and nowhere near as intimidating as his comic counterpart after his introduction, the handling of Abraham and Glenn's deaths, overall bad writing, slow pacing, poor structure, too many needless communities and characters introduced, rampant Gimpleogue, the list goes on, on top of characters being written like idiots and making reckless decisions that compromise things
Season 7 and 8 are definitely the series low point.
Agreed
I hated season 7 except for the finale but I like season 8 or at least season 8 beginning because we got no action for an entire season and then we get fighting but the rest of season 8 was kinda mid and boring at times
It was great because I was kinda getting bored of the show and that rick was the always one who wins. But when negan came that guy gave me chills, I never thought that he will kill Abraham and glenn. It was a total shock for me, and that negan was literally terrifying and that he showed rick his place.
@@nick_4972 tbh for me Season 10b through 11 are the series low points. There's only a handful of episodes I like from that era. The story felt messy and the plot armor got to ridiculous length
I think 7 is way better then 11 😭😭😭
It's crazy to me that when this show was at it's peak i was just in middle school, growing up with the walking dead and being a huge fan from the start really affected how i saw this episode, i was just 13 when Glenn died and it took me weeks to continue watching the show again, then Rick left in 2018 when i just started highschool barely being almost 16 ( yeah, the school system works differently in my country ), i only got to experience the prime of TWD as a young kid really, and i gotta agree that Season 7 was too slow, it almost made me quit, that's when i actually started to read the comics, i am glad Season 9 picked things back up.
I think killing Maggie instead of Glen would have been awesome story wise. I know it wouldnt have been able to happen on TV but can you imagine how Glenn could have gone crazy knowing that his kid and wife were killed by negan?
I don’t know, that seems like the definition of fridging to me. To sacrifice Maggie just to push forward Glenn’s character arc or give him something to do - it doesn’t sit right.
@@rainbow_doglover8301 Isn't that what they tried to do with Maggie though? Killing Glenn to push forward Maggie's character... although not executed very well since Maggie becomes progressively more unlikable after Glenn's death imo.
If you want to see a what-if where Maggie is killed in the lineup instead, you should check out Xyeke's World The Walking Dead What-If videos.
@@frostmusicofficialthat whole death was just a L I had to take a day break after seein dat BS lol
@@frostmusicofficialbut at least Glenn’s character arc was finished. I mean after S6, the only path they could have taken him was a “dark” Glenn path and by that point everybody was dark af. The whole point of Glenn’s character by the end, was that he was the one whose light persisted despite all the horrific things they had endured. So sniffing out the “light” per se, does make things look hopeless for the group.
I think that has more of an impact for the entire group, rather than Maggie dying, where up until that point she was only Glenn’s girlfriend. Her death would have an even lesser impact than Abraham, whom he at least was like a fortress to the group. I mean her character grew stale and barely interacted with major characters significantly. She only appeared when Glenn was involved somehow.
Season 7 actually has some really good moments, Jeffrey Dean Morgan crushes it in every scene he’s in, it just drags too much. Season 8 is basically unwatchable
Your 100 percent correct on the cliffhanger. I remember it made me like wth.. to. And slowly fell off the show afterwards just didn't hit the same anymore.
I think the cliffhanger would have worked better if
a) Glenn fake out never happened and b) the cliffhanger was between episode 15 and 16
Wouldn’t have fixed it completely but it would have been way better than waiting months and months
Also let's not forget episode 15 also had a cliffhanger with Dwight shooting Daryl from behind and blood stupidly splashing the screen, which made it seem like he died. They became so obsessed with cheap gimmicks this season because they thought they needed them to keep the viewers watching and it had the complete opposite effect.
*saves to Watch Later to enjoy after my night shift with a big spliff*
Ever since the beginning of Season 7 I always say that they had a way better cliffhanger which was Negan Dragging Rick into the RV and drive off, because that moment both Comic readers and show viewers would’ve been in the same boat and had no idea what would happen next and instead of spending the summer wondering who Negan killed which everyone basically knew because it got leaked, we could’ve spent the summer wondering where Negan had taken Rick. Also this was around the time that Daryl fans truly got on my nerves because they tried defending his actions that led to Glenn’s death even though if it was the other way around, Glenn or anyone else punched Negan and he decides to kill Daryl in retaliation, all the Daryl fans would’ve hated that character and probably sent hate messages to the actor like what happened to Eugene in season 8
As much as I hated Eugene (especially in the beginning) and desperately wanted his character to be killed off, I never once thought to go and harass the actual actor because of his character. People are so fucking unhinged and delulu that they went and harassed a man who was just playing a character in a show. I remember when he spoke out about that years ago. All that tells me is he did his fucking job and killed his characters portrayal. I absolutely loveeee the person Eugene went on to be. One of the best character arks I’ve ever seen. Him and Gabriel’s character really made me change my mind once they became useful members of our beloved Survivor group.
I like that idea of ending it with Negan driving off with Rick!
Lol it's definitely true what you said in the beginning about the premier feeling like a 2 parter. Me and my girlfriend recently binged the whole show start to finish and when we got to the end of the season 6 DVD and I got up to put in the next DVD (S7) and while I was doing so I was like "believe it or not you're lucky you got into the show this late because we had to wait almost a year to see what happens next and you have no idea what that was like, it practically pisses off the whole world" lol
I think Rick’s speech at the end of season 7 when he’s talking to Negan is probably my favorite part bc at that point he dosent care, he just wants Negan dead
Daryl is too prideful to even pretend.
Until the Reapers. He learned from his mistakes
Daryl does get treatment for his bullet after he gets taken to sanctuary. Dwight takes him yo Carson to get his gunshot patched up.
The “you got no guts” scene and Negan just interacting with Judith and Carl in this season made it a 6.5/10 for me. The line goes so hard. Plus the Kingdom adds some whimsy into the show, even if it’s messed up, but still adds some new fun into the mix. Though, the choreography was lacking at times and did move too slow, I think Negan really carries the season - and almost all of the show from this point onward.
At least in season 7 we got Negan
Negan is still in season 8, genius. 8 is better than 7.
Wasn’t worth trading Glenn and Abraham for him.
@@drodgyn I think Negan is a better character than either of them.
@@mjnonchalant Negan is at his peak in Season 7 though. I can rewatch Negan scenes all day
@@drodgyn I'd trade both of them over a million times over and over again just for more Negan.
There is the years old meme which applies so well to this season. «We’re going to war, but we’re gonna talk about it for 3 more episodes first»
No way 7 is worse than 8. The dialogue, choreography and production quality is laughably abysmal
Yea 8 is a mostly embarrassing season with a few great moments
@@TAG152gaming I liked ricks speech in the finale, Simon’s scenes, and that’s about it
@@TAG152gaming season 8 was fun
Season 10 and 11 are the worst seasons. Almost everyone should agree with me
@@TheKidNextDoorOG I haven’t seen them but I believe tou
Season 7 Characters:
Rick
Carl
Daryl
Carol
Glenn
Maggie
Michonne
Sasha
Judith
Tara
Abraham
Rosita
Eugene
Gabriel
Aaron
Eric
Spencer
Olivia
Barbara
Bruce
Tobin
Francine
Enid
Morgan
Heath
Scott
Dwight
Sherry
Jesus
Gregory
Bertie
Carson
Kal
Eduardo
Negan
Simon
Daniel
Ezekiel
Jerry
Nabila
Richard
Henry
Benjamin
Alvaro
Dianne
Laura
Arat
Gavin
Jared
Gary
Cyndie
Kathy
Beatrice
Rachel
Natania
Oscar
Frankie
Jadis
2:36 I didn't even know Daryl got shot
Fan favs being killed off and too many storylines which went nowhere and added nothing to the series. Instead of 16 episodes, could have been 10...several good/great moments, but all-in-all not the best quality after the prior 3 high-quality seasons.
Who else remembers the abundance of "Who got Lucilled?" theories here on YT back in the day.
Man... those were the days. It's funny how other cope when they theorist pick their character lmao
idk how can you say this when season 11 is literally unwatchable
Yeah starting was okay but in the mid-point it literally made no sense and all the fights
Seasons 4-11 are unwatchable in my opinion loved the first 3 seasons it's was my favorite show just as good as breaking bad then gimple became showrunner in season 4
@@111horror Season 4-6 are at least manageable and consistent with the prior seasons but the seasons after 6 are just awful intangible and unconnected.
Season 11 doesn't get the hate it deservers. It's absolutely terrible, long, boring, makes no sense. One of the worst seasons of TV ever. New characters all suck. Somehow Gabriel became one of the best chracter on the show, because everyone else sucks.
@@JarinCOD Agreed! The way they did Gage was so wrong,Lance and Carver were the only good things for me that entire season. It's terribly mid and sleep inducing. I had a better time watching Season 8 than 11 because at least the characters had a soul and mattered. Plot for 11 was so cheesy and bland. BLAND! I almost fell into a coma from how sleepy it made me. I've never had this feeling of "Wow can this episode end" in a long time since Lost(good show though bad ending). I made a mistake watching this live instead of waiting for all the episodes to drop on netflix. Worst mistake of my life next to rejecting my highschool crush!
Well I'm pleasantly surprised we get season 7 early 😊😊😊
10:10 it boggles the mind that anyone would complain about him being cartoony in a literal cartoon adaptation lol
Yeah I guess some people just wanna see a complete change for the tv version
How the hell do people think the last season isn’t the worse is crazy to me
It's regurgitated hot garbage.
Season 7 the worst? I think that's objectively wrong....no seasons 7 ans 8 were the last good walking dead before it went down the gutter
16:20 “Now that we’re all at this point, it’s time for a break” *Advertisement plays* 💀
When you have a hit TV show you never overstay your welcome. Prime example breaking bad and avatar The last Airbender but The walking Dead didn't get the memo and went on longer than It needed to
Abraham isn't talked about enough because Glenn died alongside him
The cinematography and production value look far cheaper compared to the previous seasons, it’s crazy how noticeable it is
I don't know why I never thought of it but yeah your version of it where Abraham dies and then you see Glenn die in the premiere would have worked so much better why did they not do that oh my gosh
Say What You Want But At Least (In My Opinion) One Of The Biggest Reasons Why This Season Was So Bad Is Because We Had To Wait Every Single Week For Sunday Just To See A Episode That Was Slow Asf & Kinda Boring And See An Episode or Episodes Without The Main Cast Members, But Yeah I’d Say Season 8 Is A lot Better Than Season 7 But Season 7 Is Still The #1 Worst Season With S8 Being The Second.
Stop capitalizing every word
@The Thrifty Typewriter in December considering there would be no more seasons to review you could re-rank the seasons of the walking dead
It’s a shame most TWD fans never got to enjoy Negan due to them ditching it after the lineup.
He's such a terrible character
I disagree. The show had already gotten stale, and scrolling these comments shows it. People are saying season 7 and 8 are the worst or almost the worst. Seasons 9 - 11 are garbage. Etc.
The show should have ended with the finale of season 5. Many people say it should have ended in 'No way out' during season 6, but even season 6 was pretty poor.
@@gifi4 you're so right,it became such a chore to watch and I eventually dropped it
@@Iletyoulive wrong
@@leinagniust6399 it's facts
In what world would it make sense for Daryl to betray Alexandria?
Rip Abe. Some of the best dialogue in the whole book
The fact that this season is still so good despite the drop in quality and viewership, shows that this is one of the greatest tv shows of all time.
Honestly think your rating is still too generous 😆
Season 7 was an absolute slog.. the beginning of the Sharp decline was almost immediate from S7E1 being pretty damn good to E2 onwards completely downhill.
You can thank showrunner Scott Gimple for why seasons 7-8 were so bad. He did such a bad job that he was moved to Fear the Walking Dead for season 4 which is why that show tanked and felt off right after a fantastic season 3.
I was a “hardcore fan. Watched every week religiously.” The Talking Dead, too.
I dropped out and never watched another episode midway through this season.
The slow pacing doubly hurt this because unlike previous seasons where the group had setbacks, but were ultimately moving forward and victorious, this became a relentless slog of misery. The whole season, how many wins do they get?
There's moments of hope like the agreement to team up, but actual WINS?
Say they have a double agent and stop some of Negan's plans while remaining undiscovered, they manage to hide a load of resources and make strong alliances under his nose. Not with him away, but while he's there, just behind his back so there's the excitement of if they'll get caught.
The longest arc before was The Governor, and that was a season and a half and they got a big win in the middle of it, the war with Negan took longer with less happening.
I still believe to this day that Daryl should've been the second kill after making the most dumbest thing ever by punching Negan
I tell people all the time that negan realize this was a manufactured bullet because a normally or "properly" manufactured bullet would have went clean through Lucille and this bullet is extremely underpowered so somebody tried to make one. This is Eugene's first ever bullet after all
The writing from the Season 6 cliffhanger to the Season 7 opening was just strange. It was detailed as hell making it difficult to know who exactly dies, but also convoluted. Many other ways they could've done it like killing Abraham to have his death portrayed correctly without being almost instantly overshadowed by Glenn's death or ending by Negan opening the door with his line. The one they went with is awkward.
The Negan cliffhanger killed the shows momentum and lost so many viewers. This video puts it perfectly "turned hardcore viewers into casuals" yep 100%
They betrayed their audience with that cliffhanger and the deaths were spoiled anyway when the actors who played Glenn and Abraham were seen in other parts of the world during season 7 filiming. It was a mess and changed TWD forever. It took years for it to regain so of its old form and but it never fully recovered
Very proper rating at the end there, Thrifty lol. I'm excited to see your Season 8 retrospective and see how its rating compares to this! xD
Haven't mentioned this in previous videos, but I'm sorta doing the same as you. I decided to rewatch the entire show 1 season per month, and its been a lot of fun going down memory lane! ... Up until this season. Even when I was younger and less critical of a show's writing, I still felt a decline from this slow season.
18:02 "Ah, the trash people" I felt this exact way seeing their introduction again, and I'm more frustrated now than before, knowing how pointless and dumb they are.
There was just way too many new characters introduced at once, and I just didn’t care about any of them.
The bullet was modified to fit the projectile. Crimmped to be to size, usually with reloading you heat the end of the casing to shorten the diameter and tightly hold the projectile in place.
They were just trying to trick the audience by not giving Glenn a goodbye episode. For some reason they thought shocking the audience was the best option. It was all misdirect. Even the fakeout death. They gave Abraham the goodbye episode in order to make it seem like Glenn was safe.
Season 11 exists
Thank you, 11 is easily the worst out of all of them. I don't think I can genuinely find many positives about that season at all
Honestly 9-11 is the weakest since it felt like it was more a Marvel kids show where as 1-8 felt like an Adult show.
@@MistahJay7 that's honestly a good way of describing it. Yeah the whispers killed Jesus and the pike thing happened, but in the show they felt too goofy, whereas in the comics they felt a lot scarier. Season 11 especially is when the plot armor really got ridiculous
@@MistahJay7 "9/11"
season 11 is the worst BY FAR
I NEED a cut where S7-S8 are edited into one season
I just wanna mention that the production of these videos are fantastic. Especially with the ending music at the end of the videos. I don’t remember which episode the track came from (probably a season 5 episode), but I just feel something every time you summarize the video with this track in the background.
The kevin clip is so sad that something like that was in a grounded zombie survival show
Season 7 was amazing and probably one of my favorite seasons. I understand and agree with the criticism of the cliffhanger and such, but my view is that the show finally put some bigger stakes than ever seen before. The Governor did pull up on a tank, yes, but that was a scorched earth plan. Negan downright had the crew on lockdown, trapped in the paradise they thought they secured. We saw Rick finally break down, which fueled the idea of the crew being the underdog for the first time.
STRONGLY agree that it's so much less gruelling when you can binge it. I remember watching this shit week to week and it felt like SUCH a fucking chore. I genuinely considered just waiting for them all to air then binging it back in the day. It's a much more bearable season when you can just keep watching. For us back in the day though, it's no surprise why so many stopped watching.
Same, rewatching it I enjoyed it a lot better just binging it. There's even some episodes I liked more than when I originally watched it live
Season 11 BY FAR is the worst and it's no competition.
exactly
No
No, you're completely right the bullet thing is dumb in every way.
One: the casing she took was shot from desert Eagle taking a different round entirely not even the same in diameter.
Two: The odds, its completely unbelievable. What do you want from me that's incalculable.
Three: It's kinda a anti character moment, no one would reasonably do that.
As a Negan, Szn 8 is easily the worst … Szn 7 is my guilty pleasure
Can’t wait for the szn 8 title & the whole pig plot was suppose to be ?? lol
I actually really like Season 7. Was it slower and more drawn out than necessary? Yes, but it also contained many of my favorite moments from the show. The premiere is my favorite episode of the entire series, I loved the world building with the Saviors and the Kingdom and every episode with Negan was a big highlight for me, such as when he first shows up at Alexandria, when he shows Carl around the Sanctuary and when he guts Spencer like a fish. I also loved the episode where Morgan slips back into instability over Benjamin's death and think the finale is one of the show's best with building tension throughout leading to a fantastic action sequence at the end where our heroes finally come out on top after being under Negan's boot throughout the entire season. This season also contains one of the best action sequences of the entire show when Rick and Michonne run down that horde of zombies on the highway with cars and barbed wire.
Also, while people like to say that Season 7 was when the viewership really declined, it still pulled in around 10-12 million viewers per episode and actually has a higher viewership average than Season 3. The notion that "most" people quit watching around this season just isn't true.
In fairness, Season 7 is certainly flawed with some slow and unnecessary episodes/plotlines such as the Scavengers and that incredibly boring episode where Rick and Michonne search for guns and supplies at a carnival, but I've always thought the good this season outweighed the bad.
Season 8 on the other hand is much harder to defend. While it did have highlights like the occasionally thrilling action sequence and the entire Negan vs. Simon subplot, the season just drags on with mostly repetitive action and story beats, dull filler like dedicating an entire episode to Eugene's "struggle" at the Sanctuary just to leave him in the exact same position by the end and of course, the absolutely moronic decision to kill off Carl.
I'd say Season 8 is when the show truly began to decline in both quality and viewership as this was the first time since Season 2 the ratings dropped all the way to the six million mark (which would still be a high achievement for any TV show, but not The Walking Dead). This was the point where people really began dropping the show in droves and it's a shame because I and a lot of the people who continued watching thought that Seasons 9-11 were really good.
i just want to say i love this monthly review of each season that you’ve been doing this year. i have strong and mixed feelings for wach season of twd, and it’s interesting to hear your views/opinions/alternate ideas for the seasons
Omg that whole Rosita shooting Negans bat was sooo dumb, let's assume she did hit the bat, even if she did the bullet would've pierced the bat and went into negan in pieces like with Carl, I mean a METAL car door can't even stop a bullet, so wood stopping it is beyond stupid
The whole thing took way to long!! I did not like Rick like this. That is also a reason The Ones Who Live was not that exciting for me. A beat down rick is no fun to watch.
I too thought season seven was empty and had terrible pacing. However, what if they wanted it to feel empty and make you realize the gapping hole that Abraham and Glenn. No one to unite the group or ground them in confidence against the Saviors.
By the way the idea of splitting up the deaths between S6 and S7 is genius!
Certainly the strangest season.
Strong villain, huge stakes, one of the best comic arcs, etc.
Yet, too many lame stories, writing was whack, and certain characters just didn’t feel like themselves.
I definitely think season 9 after Rick left and season 10 were the worst
Season 11 made no sense
Honestly what killed this season for me was the god awful pacing of Season 7 and by extension Season 8. What should have been just one season depicting life under Negan, Rising Up against Negan, and then All out War gets dragged into two seasons and it clearly shows. And this comes down to Scott Gimples obsessive need to have boomerang story telling in his seasons of The Walking Dead
I don’t think the premier episode of The Walking Dead killed the show. I don’t think it’s a bad episode. In fact I’m someone that considers “The Day Will Come when you Won’t be” to be a masterclass in edge of your seat horror storytelling and one of the best episodes in The Walking Dead. The same goes for “Last Day on Earth”, but to a lesser degree. From a filmmaking and screenwriting perspective there’s very little I would change to how each individual episode told its story.
The only massive change I would make is instead of having “The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be” as the premier of Season 7. I would have made that episode the Finally for Season 6 and have “Last Day on Earth” be the penultimate episode for Season 6. It’s telling that the people that really enjoy these episodes like myself are the ones who didn’t have to wait for months to get a resolution to the cliffhanger that was presented in “Last Day on Earth”. We were just able to move to the next episode after the previous one finished. These episode feel like they should have been released under the same season and not as a Final/Premiere episode. But these are my thoughts. What do you guys think?
The entire opening just reminds me how ridiculous people can be.
Hi Thrifty, great vídeo as always! The "I don't know. That guy!" scene made me laugh so much
Correction: Glenn DOES have a compete arc. By finally killing people, he loses his innocence and succumbs to the dark world around him.
The audience being insulted turned into outright disrespect with that cliffhanger I hope it sticks out as a lesson for directors in the future
As someone who was watching week to week, I personally loved the cliffhanger.
Not everyone will agree, but I'll try to defend my stance:
The cliffhanger had such a huge mystery with so many possible outcomes. There were a bunch of teasers and 'leaks' and people analysing every possible detail from whose story looked 'finished' to rocks on the ground to voice lines. Every day for the entire season break, there were new articles and videos and it was by far the most active the fanbase has ever been. I even picked up the comics at this time and refused to read up to the negan arc to not spoil the show for myself.
Speaking as a new viewer of The Walking Dead. I personally understand everyone’s annoyance with the decisions that were made with Season 7. But I honestly don’t think it’s a bad season. And I completely understand how people strongly dislike the Season 6 cliffhanger. To me, it’s better as a finished product, but if they decided to make so they showed Abraham’s death than in the next episode show Glenn’s it would have been better. Since it would allow Abraham to not get completely overshadowed, and it could have avoided many other issues. I feel that the branding should have been focused more about how will the group recover from this, rather than just “Who’s getting it?” Since that creates interest only for 1 episode. But I’d argue the worst decision in the show was killing Carl.
Season 7 & 8 were no doubt bad , and in my opinion, the start of the fall of walking dead , but the worst season, hands down, was 11 . Followed closely by 10 .
The decision to kill Glenn is still in the top 5 worst writing decisions in television history in my opinion.
How are people saying this when season 10/11 exist
ikr. season 9 too
Because it's not. Season 7 and 8 are objectively the worst season's and the lowest point of the show. Cry about it, nostalfan.
@@_amp1262 no.
@dale3797 chill with the one liners bro you're good, the early seasons are just undoubtedly better than the last couple the writing the directing how they handled characters just everything is better
season 11 pure trash, all new characters suck
Negan was hilarious
As someone who sat and watched every episode live on Sunday night's religiously from the pilot to 7x1 I can't exactly explain why but I dropped the show entirely after 7x1, well I attempted to watch 7x2 but quit midway through it and have never returned to the series since. Like I said I can't really explain why but its interesting to know I'm not the only one who has done that.
As much as I adore season 7 and 8, I'll admit there were the lowest out of them all
Great video, loved to hear your thoughts and S7 can be a very passionate subject for some people. It’s personally my least favourite season of the show too but I do believe that 7x07 is one of the greatest episodes of TV, it was at that moment I stopped really hating Negan and thought “oh, there’s more to this guy than we think”. And I was right thinking that, just had to wait for the answers/conformation in 10x22.
I totally stopped being a fan when they killed off glenn... He got no proper send off.
TWD also took too much time on negan... It became so blah!
I’m so glad Abraham got such a decent shout out here! Yeah I get everyone was sad about Glenn but he was such a dull repetitive character. He couldn’t say a sentence without the word Maggie in it and it got so tedious. At least Abraham was more interesting.
I remember thinking season 2 was the worst. Upon re watching tbe show i realized season 7 is. They have some good moments. "Alexandria will not fall, not on this day" was a good, if not cheesy line. Sheeva was awesome too. The pacing was just all over the place. I feel like they had alot of good pieces but then tripped and fell and lost them down a drain. T-dog knows how awful that is
16:47
The Cell is easily a top ten episode for me but I understand this point. In my opinion I wouldn’t change this episode at all, you really see just how broken Daryl’s character is here and I think it’s one of the biggest introspections into his character we get. I also really liked the episode Danai wrote for TOWL though where Rick is so mentally broken. When people say that’s inaccurate I immediately know they have never been to rock bottoms basement before lol
I know it was bound to happen because it happened in the comics (even though there were characters who lasted longer than their comic counterparts). But the fact that it happened because Daryl punched Negan is laughable because it had me thinking of a joke from family guy
Daryl: *punches Negan*
Negan: *bonks Glenn’s head* Next time that’ll be you
Glenn with an eyeball poking out: Why wasn’t it him this time???
I made money on Abraham being the first one killed off, made it bitter sweet, he was one of the characters I was liking more and more.
Abraham dating a girl 26 years younger than him is still weird and gross idc 🤢 made me relieved he was eliminated