Originally written April 10, 2017

Oh Walking Dead…I have such a love/hate relationship with you nowadays. You were once one of the most entertaining shows on TV, but now you just don’t seem to try as hard anymore. You provide me with just enough nuggets spread throughout to still keep me watching, and during these high times I’m reminded why I used to enjoy our time together so much before.

Okay, I’ll stop with the weird open letter address now. So basically, here’s what’s up with season 7 of The Walking Dead. This show has certainly had its good times and rough times. The show used to be pretty high-quality entertainment in its first three seasons. Then, I dunno, around season 4 and 5 it just started to meander, like a lot. They were dragging things out way too much and not giving enough anymore. Then, the show really managed to recapture my interest with season 6, which was one of the best seasons the show has had. Not only that, but with how the second half of season 6 went, it set itself up with so much potential to have an amazing season 7. I remembered this as season 7 was ending and I just said to myself “wow, they set things up to have such an amazing season 8!” And then I realized that they didn’t do nearly as much with season 7 as they could have.

For anyone that’s even remotely familiar with the comic that this show is based off of, you may have heard that Negan is one of the best villains that the comic has ever had. In season 7 (well, in the final moments of season 6 technically), the show finally got to introduce us to Negan. This certainly excited fans of the comic like me because this was some of the most entertaining material to read, so naturally I couldn’t wait to see it on the show. While we do get some of this great material delivered throughout the season, it’s unfortunately padded with other parts that just aren’t that engaging.

To be fair, the first few episodes of the season are really awesome, as are the last few of it. What The Walking Dead always seems to struggle with is making those episodes in the middle of the season more interesting. They have always excelled at good opening episodes and good finales, but a lot of times the episodes in between can be pretty boring. I’ve said it in reviews of previous seasons and I’ll say it again now…the show always seems to think that the standalone episodes that they do are amazing, and while there are some gems a lot of times it’s just unnecessary. I don’t understand why the show can’t just take a cue from other successful shows out there and have multiple storylines going on and progressing in every episode, rather than focus on one set of people in one episode, then a different set in the next, etc. It makes it so that I end up losing interest in certain characters because they haven’t been featured for a while.

I just approach this show anymore with a feeling of frustration more than anything. It’s just one of those shows that you hold in such high regard, and so it’s just upsetting to see it falter. I’m a big fan of the comic and of the games, but the show just hasn’t been able to hold onto a consistent quality for a while now. It’s frustrating because I know what the show is capable of, and it has glimpses of really high quality spread in it. When the show is at the top of its game it’s genuinely really good. But then I just watch it not live up to its potential other times and I get frustrated. I think my disappointment plays especially into this season because season 6 was so good, and season 7 had the potential to be even better. I still think season 7 was better than some past seasons, although my score for it will be lower only because it was a bigger disappointment. All I can say now is that I hope season 8 picks things back up again, because I want to love this show more than I am right now.

3.5/5