Fear The Walking Dead Season 3
I must admit to being dissapointed with The Walking Dead’s TV adaptation. Especially the way they ended Season 1. But then I’m a fan of Robert Kirkman’s graphic novels, so I’m biased, or elitist, or some other kind of snob. I tried watching the second season and maybe the third, but it just didn’t do it for me.
But then in March 2015, AMC announced Fear The Walking Dead, a spin off series set at the beginning of the outbreak in California. And better still it would star our own Cliff Curtis. The real beauty of course is that it would be an original story, and any preconceptions of how things should go from reading the graphic novels totally disappeared.
Now Season 1 got off to a good start but then got a little shaky. Season 2 had it’s ups and downs, and judging from the beginning of Season 3, I don’t think I finished Season 2! But boy am I glad that I requested a copy of Season 3, because it elevates Fear The Walking Dead to being the best zombie TV show, period.
The season starts off a little slow, but goes to some real dark places real quick, and pretty soon things are kicking into high gear. The family comes together and finds refuge on a ranch set up by a group of survivalists who foresaw the end of the world. They didn’t predict zombies, but they had stockpiled.
Of course as soon as things start to settle down, trouble rears it’s ugly head. As does multiple storylines bringing in some surprising old characters.
New characters, old characters, favoutrite characters. They all come together in a grim game of Russian Roulette, with the death counter steadily rising you are literally kept on the edge of your seats trying to figure out who you’re going to have to say goodbye too.
The main story arc revolves around water and supply routes. The wilderness of the Mexico/US border means that their are not that many zombies, or people. That’s not to say there aren’t enough walkers to have to deal with, it’s just that there are different, more deadly dangers to our friends to have to deal with.
Of course the season ends with a bloody cliffhanger – but we wouldn’t expect anything less. It also ends with one of the most bizarre episodes to date. The final chapter of the season is uncomfortably and haphazardly wrapped in some Christmas dream sequence that makes zero sense and only distracts from the main story that it is wrapped around. It’s the most bizarre form of filler I have ever seen, and to be honest, it would have been better for AMC to just have a shorter last episode than do weird Christmas dream shit.
But there you have it, a slightly weird end to a fantastic season that wasn’t afraid to try new things, take a much darker tone, and entertain to the maximum.
Roll on season 4.
Rating: R16 Graphic violence, horror & drug use.
FILMGUIDE rating:
