The Walking Dead Spinoff Series Detailed: Prequel Timeline

With The Walking Dead, viewers were thrust right into the action, scarcely seeing the world before it was filled with roving hoards of the undead. As we're reported before, fans will soon be able to enjoy the world and its madness all year thanks to a spinoff series that is in the works. Details have been slow to surface, but have been brought to light regardless and newest among them is a glimpse of the timeline: the spinoff series is set to be a prequel of sorts, starting farther back before the zombies arrive.

The spinoff series has been in the works for more than a year, but is now gaining speed and, by the looks of things, going to be making its official debut in the relatively near future. We've known the general storyline for a while, and that it would be set in a completely different part of the country, but some additional details were recently given by Robert Kirkman at South by Southwest.

With the spinoff series, which is yet to receive an actual name, nothing about the comics will be involved. It is its own show, and its purpose is to help give a fleshed out look at the other parts of the US before the event happened. With Rick, we saw only a very brief time before the event, then were thrust into the new zombie-filled world when he awoke in the hospital. Things aren't going to move at such break neck speeds in the new series, however.

Rather, the series will step back and show more of the world and the characters' lives before the zombies arrive, making it more of a prequel that eventually catches up to the original series. Most of the series, though, will be after the event, of course.

Going on, he said:

You can watch it by itself and get your own experience. But if you are watching both shows there are things like, 'Oh they discovered this, or they discovered that in a different way.' There are a lot of things about The Walking Dead world these characters have to learn or figure out to get by. And there may be some things that are discovered in the companion show that haven't been discovered in the other show yet. So there could be like a thing where, 'Oh, they encountered a zombie in season 4 in The Walking Dead that could do this and now we know why that was.' So we're going to be doing things like that are going to be pretty cool, but for the most part [the two shows] should be able to stand alone.

SOURCE: Entertainment Weekly