The high ratings and glowing reviews, promoted to the top of the results, exemplify all that is wrong with current fandoms. The fans of an IP are so slavishly devoted to their parasocial relationship with a show/game/movie/book that any criticism of that property is felt as a personal attack and, as such, generates a vociferous defence.
Daryl Dixon, while being an interesting character, has been abused by the writing staff for years and finally pummelled into what we are given in this show: a bland, one-note character that looks the same, says the same old things and performs the same old actions.
To make the character stand out, he is surrounded by idiots acting in idiotic ways. We are expected to believe that these people have survived decades of a zombie apocalypse and then act in the dumbest ways imaginable.
Every egregiously stupid action performed is unnecessary - dozens of alternatives that hit the same story beats exist for each scenario, but in this show the writers have chosen the laziest, tropiest and most idiotic options that it boggles the mind as to how people watching aren't all suffering from vertigo from the constant eye-rolling.
And yet, the fandom laps it up. People wonder why so much dreck is produced these days, and it is because these fandoms accept existence over quality. We need to hold our entertainment to a higher standard and only then will there once again be a drive to produce quality art instead of just producing... something.
There was real potential for this show, a true chance to try something different and elevate the artform. With so many spinoffs it should have been possible to tell interesting stories in interesting ways, to generate some new styles and flavours to complement the existing offerings.
But instead we are given the same dull grey gruel and it is only delusion that makes some think they are eating a delectable ice cream sundae.
