AMC

Another TWD. What is This, a Crossover Episode?

Andrew Lincoln as Rick Grimes in The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live. (Photo by Gene Page/AMC)

There are a lot of things people can say about The Walking Dead franchise: Gory, groundbreaking, high-grossing… But a romance drama?

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live, the latest spin-off for the AMC/AMC+ juggernaut, concentrates on original series stars Andrew Lincoln’s Rick Grimes and Danai Gurira’s Michonne: two people with a complicated past who may, or may not, be able to live without one another.

“We watched a lot of Bridgerton,” Lincoln joked when asked about the peculiar tone for a show about the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse.

He then gave a more serious answer, saying that “this is essentially the DNA of the original episode” of the first Walking Dead, which was about “a man in search for his family.”

“That DNA is very much in this story, but we wanted to sort of make it a bit more operatic and, hopefully, shade in a universe with what the grown ups have been doing while we’ve been scrabbling around for 10 years,” Lincoln said.

Danai Gurira as Michonne  in The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live. (Photo by Gene Page/AMC)

Gurira was hesitant to say anything about the show, or her character’s journey, that might constitute a spoiler. But she did promise that “there’s a ride people are gonna get and I really, really want them to take that ride.”

“She definitely is going through quite a journey in the series,” she said. “There are a lot of things that happen that she does not expect. There are ways that she has to pivot and adjust that she did not expect in the journey to find her man.”

This is, of course, one of many series that have continued the story of characters who appeared in the first TWD, including Dead City and Daryl Dixon.

When asked if these stories might lead to a giant crossover episode or event series, executive producer Scott Gimple admitted that he’s had “dreams of that” since he started working on the first Walking Dead.

He also noted that “I guess the answer is yes” and that “I have laid little breadcrumbs toward that.”

But is it possible that this show could extend longer than a season?

Gimple said that “anything is possible” but “we’re focused on this one right now.”

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live: Cast Diaries: Season 1 (2024) premieres Feb. 25 on AMC and AMC+.

More Vampires to Interview

The second season of AMC’s Interview with the Vampire won’t premiere until May 12 on AMC and AMC+. But the channels did offer a few bites of news to hold us over until then: David Costabile (Breaking Bad; Billions) will guest star in the second season as a character named Leonard who is described as “a seasoned television personality” who “has a run-in” with Eric Bogosian’s journalist, Daniel Molloy.

Other recurring guest stars this season include Roxane Duran (The White Ribbon, Riviera) as Madeleine and Bally Gill (Sherwood, Slow Horses) as Real Rashid.

And, as previously announced, Delainey Hayles is taking over the role of the eternally young Claudia from Bailey Bass.

“Claudia is still Claudia,” Hayles said. “She still has all the attributes that we know and love. She’s still bloodthirsty. And I think this season, we see her evolving into an older version of herself, so I’m looking forward to people seeing that.”

Jacob Anderson as Louis De Point Du Lac and Delainey Hayles as Claudia in AMC’s Interview with the Vampire. (Photo by Larry Horricks/AMC)

As to where this season fits into the story of the vampires Louis (Jacob Anderson) and Lestat (Sam Reid) that fans are familiar with through Rice’s books and the Brad Pitt-Tom Cruise film adaptation, executive producer Mark Johnson told journalists that “this is the second part of the book, and we follow it somewhat religiously with the same, I think, same interpretation that [series creator] Rolin Jones took with the first section.”

“The book spoke to us, and it really dictated where we went with this,” Johnson continued. “At one point, when we did the first season, we actually toyed with going to Europe where most of this takes place — all of it pretty much takes place. But we held off. So, this is really the second half of the book.”

Interview With the Vampire premieres its second season on May 12 on AMC and AMC+.

Casting and Development News

Giancarlo Esposito stars as Gray Bourgeois in Parish on AMC. (Photo by Eliot Brasseaux/AMC)

• Giancarlo Esposito stars in the new AMC original series, Parish, as family man “Gray” Parish. He’s happy with his quiet life running a luxury car service in New Orleans. But when his son is murdered, Gray heads back into his old life of organized crime and violence. It premieres Mar. 31.
• The second season of AMC and AMC+’s Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches, starring Alexandria Daddario, is currently in production. New cast members include Alyssa Jirrels, Ted Levine and Thora Birch. It will return later this year.
• After the success of its adaptations of Interview with the Vampire and Mayfair Witches, AMC is again delving into author Anne Rice’s treasure trove of scary stories. The cable channel has announced that it is “actively developing” a potential third series, this one set in the world of The Talamasca, a secret society that’s featured in several of the late author’s works. John Lee Hancock (The Blind Side) is writing and executive producing.
• AMC has ordered a third installment of its horror anthology series, The Terror. The Terror: Devil in Silver comes from Halt & Catch Fire‘s Chris Cantwell and Victor LaValle, who wrote the book that serves as its source material. It follows a working-class mover named Pepper, who, through a combination of bad luck and a bad temper, finds himself wrongfully committed to a psychiatric hospital. Inside this hellscape full of people whom society would like to forget, Pepper must contend with patients who work against him, doctors who harbor grim secrets, and perhaps even the very Devil himself. Emmy-nominated director Karyn Kusama is also an executive producer and will direct first two episodes.
• Siblings Toni, Towanda, Trina and Tamar Braxton, as well as matriarch Ms. Evelyn Braxton, are returning to the reality TV space with the upcoming WE tv show The Braxtons. Their previous WE tv show, Braxton Family Values, ended in 2020.
• New and returning shows coming to ALLBLK and WE tv this year include Mama June (new season starts Feb. 9), Bold & Bougie (series premiere Feb. 15), The Barnes Bunch (series premiere Apr. 11) and Love During Lockup (new season starts Apr. 19).

Murdoch Mysteries on Acorn TV. (Photo by Stephen Scott/AcornTV)

• Acorn TV will air a three-part series, Ellis, which stars Sharon D. Clarke as a tenacious cop who is parachuted into failing investigations. Each two-hour episode sees Ellis and her right-hand man DS Harper (played by Andrew Gower) arrive at a different police station, where she will have to win over the local detectives and immerse herself in the cases she has come to solve. It will premiere later this year.
• Shows returning to Acorn TV this year include Murdoch Mysteries (Feb. 26), The Brokenwood Mysteries (Apr. 29), Harry Wild (May TBD), My Life Is Murder (TBD), Recipes For Love and Murder (TBD), Under The Vines (TBD) and Whitstable Pearl (TBD).
• This summer, ALLBLK will premiere the reality competition series Deb’s House. It focuses on music mogul Deb Antney, who pioneered the careers of Gucci Mane, French Montana, Nicki Minaj and more, as she looks for the next great musical talent.
• Reality series Kold x Windy moves from WE tv to ALLBLK for its second season, which premieres this summer. My Mane Problem returns to the channel on Apr. 25. New show include Supa Girlz, which is about competitive dance teams and premieres Mar. 7. Other returning shows include Makeup x Breakup and Wicked City.
• BBC America will air the nature programs Planet Earth III: Bonus Edition and Predator v Prey on Feb. 17 and Apr. 20, respectively, while IFC and AMC+ will debut In the Kitchen with Harry Hamlin on May 15.
• New horror programming coming to Shudder and AMC+ include the films History of Evil (Feb. 23), You’ll Never Find Me (Mar. 22), Baghead (Apr. 9) and Infested (Apr. 26).
• New Sundance Now and AMC+ series include Far North (premiering Feb. 15), The Long Shadow (Mar. 21) and Scrublands (May TBD). New programming coming to Sundance TV and AMC+ include new series True Crime Story: Smugshot (Mar. 14) and the second season of True Crime Story: It Couldn’t Happen Here (Apr. 18).

NBC/Peacock | AMC | Apple TV+ | NatGeo | FX/Hulu

On an Apple device? Follow Rotten Tomatoes on Apple News.