New Year, New News: The Walking Dead

Even as Andrew Lincoln promises that the second half of Season 7 will see The Walking Dead returning to “the thrill of the fight”, the more telling Walking Dead news is the fact that AMC stock dropped significantly – and that’s likely due to the lower-than-usual TWD ratings this past fall.

Seriously, the numbers say it all – ratings declined steadily from the Walking Dead season premiere through episode 6, and there were only tiny bumps for episode 7 and the midseason finale:

• 7×01: 17.03 million
• 7×02: 12.46 million
• 7×03: 11.72 million
• 7×04: 11.40 million
• 7×05: 11.00 million
• 7×06: 10.40 million
• 7×07: 10.48 million
• 7×08: 10.58 million

Comicbook.com pointed out that these ratings “matched some of the lowest since Season 2” (that being, of course, the infamous “farm season”), but I’m certainly not surprised. The question is, can The Walking Dead deliver what Andrew Lincoln essentially promised in his recent interview with EW? He claimed that it’s “The Magnificent Seven in the back half. Rather, the magnificent eight episodes” and even said that there’s a moment in episode 16 that made him punch the air and “do a little jig” when he first read the script.

As a Rick Grimes fan, I’ve been feeling increasingly jaded with the character since probably the middle of last season, so of course I hope that I’m not out of line in taking Andrew Lincoln’s comments to heart. I want to see Rick back in the fight; I’ll also admit that it was exciting that the band got back together at the end of “Hearts Still Beating” – and apparently, according to that same EW interview, we’ll see a lot more of them together in the second half of Season 7.

The problem is, can The Walking Dead boost its ratings about 38% to get back to where they were? Can AMC regain the 30% stock loss they experienced throughout 2016? I have my doubts about those ratings, but if Andrew Lincoln is right – if fans will actually be seeing the opposite of what we recently experienced – perhaps TWD has some promise left, after all.

What do you think about the drop in The Walking Dead ratings? Do you have high or low expectations for the second half of season two? Let us know in the comments!

Author: Tara Lynne

Tara Lynne is an author, fandom and geek culture expert, and public speaker. She founded Ice & Fire Con, the first ever Game of Thrones convention in the US, and now runs its parent company Saga Event Planning.

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