Maggie
This week, without really announcing a specific reason why, the only currently named future spin-off of The Walking Dead had its name changed.
While we do not know what the Rick-Michonne or Daryl spin-off series will be called yet, AMC immediately announced the name for the Maggie-Negan spin-off back when that was revealed, “Isle of the Dead.”
Now, that’s been changed to “Dead City,” without anything approaching an actual explanation, from what I can find. But I have some theories.
The show is set in Manhattan, and has Maggie and Negan being forced to team up to survive for…reasons. I think the idea is that Herschel has gone missing and maybe Negan’s wife and baby are also in danger, but I don’t know if that was ever confirmed. Regardless, the two are not allowed to kill each other, despite their history.
One reason for the change may be that “Isle of the Dead” sure sounds like a tropical, Dead Island-type setting if you just said that with no other context. While yes, Manhattan is an island, that’s not exactly what comes to mind with that title. Dead City…implies a big city full of a lot of zombies, which is what this is. So there’s one potential reason.
Another one? I do wonder if AMC wanted to steer away from the “of the Dead” subtitle, obviously made famous by George Romero’s series of zombie films that started the genre in earnest. Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead, Night of the Living Dead, etc. Obviously we have seen other zombie fiction go down this route, Shaun of the Dead, Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead, but perhaps AMC did not want to get The Walking Dead mixed up in that naming scheme.
All the other Walking Dead series have non-“of the Dead” names, Fear the Walking Dead, Tales of the Walking Dead, The Walking Dead: World Beyond. But either with Isle of the Dead or Dead City, this is the first TWD project that does not have “Walking” in the name. Walking Dead City doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue, I suppose.
When we learn the names of the other two spin-offs, the Rick/Michonne love story and Daryl’s European adventure, mark my words, they are not going to be “of the Dead” either. We’ll see if they jam “Walking” in there somewhere.
Dead City is currently filming, and season 11 of The Walking Dead, where we know a whole lot of major characters will not die, is about to wrap with a string of final Commonwealth episodes this fall.
Follow me on Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and Instagram. Subscribe to my free weekly content round-up newsletter, God Rolls.
Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.
