The Walking Dead: World Beyond premiered on AMC on October 4, 2020, with a premise that sounded like a dare. Four teenagers who had grown up behind walls in Nebraska leave the only home they have ever known to cross the country and find one man who might save the world.
Trailer, via Skybound.
The Campus Colony at Nebraska State University
The show is set in Nebraska ten years after the zombie apocalypse. The Nebraska State University campus was declared a safe zone at the start of the outbreak, protected by U.S. military personnel, and civilians fled there. That enclave became the Campus Colony, home to about 10,000 residents.
The main characters have rarely left it. Iris Bennett, Hope Bennett, Silas Plaskett and Elton Ortiz are the first generation to come of age in the apocalypse, sheltered enough to be naive about what is outside.
A Satellite of Omaha
The show eventually reveals that Omaha belongs to the “Alliance of Three,” a confederation of three survivor cities: Portland, Omaha and the Civic Republic. The Campus Colony, with its 10,000 people, is treated as a satellite branch of Omaha, which holds about 100,000.
That gap is the show’s real subject, even when it forgets to be. The teens are small-town players in a game run by bigger cities.
Aliyah Royale and the Cast
Aliyah Royale plays Iris Bennett and Alexa Mansour plays Hope Bennett. Hal Cumpston is Silas Plaskett; Nicolas Cantu is Elton Ortiz. Nico Tortorella plays Felix Carlucci, Annet Mahendru plays Huck Mallick, and Joe Holt plays Leopold Bennett.
Julia Ormond was announced in November 2019 as Elizabeth Kublek, described as the “charismatic leader of a large, sophisticated and formidable force.” Pollyanna McIntosh appears as Jadis Stokes. Joe Holt, Jelani Alladin, Natalie Gold and Ted Sutherland were promoted to series regulars for season two.
Two Seasons, Twenty Episodes
The series is a limited series that premiered on AMC, and it ran two seasons of 10 episodes each. The first episode aired October 4, 2020. The second and final season premiered October 3, 2021, and the last episode aired December 5, 2021.
Scott M. Gimple and Matthew Negrete created it. Negrete, who had written for The Walking Dead, served as showrunner. It is the third television series in the franchise and a spin-off of The Walking Dead, itself based on the comic book series.
Some will become heroes. Some will become villains. In the end, all of them will be changed forever.
The Problem With the Road Trip
That promise is the pitch, and the execution never matches it. The cross-country journey should force these sheltered kids to change, but the show keeps them passive, carried along by adults who know more than they do.
The Alliance of Three is the most interesting thing here. A confederation of Portland, Omaha and the Civic Republic implies politics, trade and betrayal on a scale the show only gestures at. World Beyond finds that story and then walks away from it.
A Franchise That Outgrew Its Spin-offs
The Walking Dead franchise has always been better at building worlds than at filling them. World Beyond was sold as a coming-of-age story, and coming-of-age needs a self that develops. These four mostly react.
The casting is not the failure. Ormond’s Elizabeth Kublek carries real menace, and the promotion of Holt, Alladin, Gold and Sutherland for season two suggests the show knew its adult ensemble was stronger than its leads. It was right.
Critics were mixed on the series overall, and that split is fair. The premise earned attention; the follow-through did not.
The Numbers
- Premiere: October 4, 2020, on AMC
- Finale: December 5, 2021
- Seasons: 2; Episodes: 20
- Created by: Scott M. Gimple and Matthew Negrete
- Metacritic: 48/100 (4.8/10)
What the Show Gets Right
The Nebraska setting is a genuine idea. The original series’ second-season episode “Nebraska” noted that the state was well-poised to resist the apocalypse because of low population density and a high level of firearms. World Beyond takes that line and builds a town from it.
That is the kind of detail the franchise does well. A college campus as a fortress, a satellite city that thinks it matters more than it does — these are sharp. The show just cannot decide whether it wants to be about the kids or about the map.
Where It Leaves the Franchise
The Walking Dead: World Beyond had a real hook: the first generation raised inside the apocalypse, kept safe and therefore unprepared. It never trusted that hook.
The Alliance of Three, the Civic Republic and the question of what Omaha’s 100,000 people owe the Campus Colony’s 10,000 are the parts worth watching, and they belong to a bigger, better show than this one.
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