The Walking Dead: New images reveal clues for mid-season premiere
AMC’s ‘The Walking Dead’ Season 9 returns on Sunday, February 10, but subscribers to AMC Premiere will get to exclusively view the episode one week ahead of time, right after the Super Bowl.
AMC has put fans of The Walking Dead through a lot of change this season, but even if cable ratings have dropped for the show, the zombie apocalypse drama is still the most popular series on the network and one of the biggest phenomenon in television. AMC is rewarding its most enthusiastic fans with an early treat by airing the midseason premiere right after the Los Angeles Rams take on the New England Patriots, a full week before the official release date.
The S9 second half premiere, “Adaptation,” will air on AMC Premiere, which is a $5 per month add-on package that is in addition to either Fubo basic or FuboExtra packages.” One advantage—just like Netflix or Amazon Prime—is you can watch the entire drama ad-free as well as have access to exclusive and premiere content, director-cut episodes, specialized movies, to say the least, to whet your zombie appetite. Of course, there’s always the extra incentive to binge the show, a more preferred way to watch for many.
AMC tested out the early release option during the season premiere last fall. In addition to those of us at New York Comic Con (lucky me), Premiere subscribers got the opportunity to watch the first episode of season nine the day before the official cable network date.
“In addition to commercial-free viewing of our original series, AMC Premiere customers have enjoyed a variety of other benefits like early access to premieres and the ability to binge full seasons of some shows before they appear on our linear network,” said AMC executive vice president of innovation Mac McKean, according to IGN. “Last fall, we offered the season nine premiere of ‘The Walking Dead’ one day early and it resulted in the single biggest day of new sign-ups in the history of this new platform.”
If anything, the ninth season has been all about bold choices for The Walking Dead, one of the most thrilling and groundbreaking series on the small screen, but which was increasingly becoming stale. Andrew Lincoln (Rick) left to resurrect his role in future TWD movie installments. There was a time jump. Maggie left with very little explanation. There’s a baby Michonne-Rick. And a new badass kid on the block, Judith, sporting her dad ’s iconic sheriff’s hat.
There’s also a completely new horror, the Whisperers, a frightening group who wear the skin-masks of walkers and strike terror wherever they go. Highly anticipated by fans of the comic book series, the emergence of the knife-wielding collective has got Deadheads pumped.
The Whispers’ leader, Alpha, is played by a fearless, bald, and of course masked Samantha Morton, who from the clip released by AMC, sounds terrifyingly resolute as she warns the post-Grimes group, “Your people crossed into our land. Your people killed our people. There will be conflict.”
AMC also just released new images from the midseason premiere, including an intriguing shovel-carrying Negan. What do you think? Will he surprise viewers by turning a leaf and becoming the good man Carl always envisioned? A new, benevolent leader (my theory)? Or will he go right back to his old ways?
“The second half of “The Walking Dead” Season 9 finds our groups of survivors, both old and new, continuing to deal with the impact of events that took place during the six years that have passed,” described a press release from AMC.
“Since the disappearance of Rick, many of these characters have become strangers to each other, and in some ways, strangers to themselves. What they do know is that they are in undeniable danger. They will soon realize the world just beyond does not operate as they thought. The group’s rules and ways of survival no longer guarantee their safety. A whole new threat has crossed their paths, and they soon discover it’s unlike any threat they have encountered or endured before. The group will start to question what they think they see.”
Here’s a look at the released images from the TWD midseason premiere.
The Walking Dead season 9 returns on AMC on Sunday, Feb. 10, at 9 p.m. EST.