I always find it weird when people try to discredit shows because it had a bad ending. Like, Game of Thrones is one of the best produced shows ever. The actors are all incredible, the sets and costuming are all as good as it gets, and the writing kept you hooked. Obviously the show took a complete nose dive in season 8 but it doesn't discredit that seasons 1-6 are some of the best TV ever made.
Walking Dead is kind of in this realm to me. There has been exactly one show that was capable of challenging Sunday Night Football over the last 15 years, and that's The Walking Dead. Before that got to Alexandria, I remember the days of when you HAD to watch that show live or you were getting spoiled on Monday morning, either by the radio or co-workers or friends or whatever. It was unreal.
Sadly, that show also took a nose dive, but long before the final episodes. I felt obligated to stick it out and made it through the Whisperer storyline, but I just had to give up before the final season started. I couldn't do it anymore, especially with how freaking stupid Fear the Walking Dead was going. Nukes and submarines and radioactive walkers. Really?
I mentioned this in another thread but display space is rapidly running out and with The Walking Dead completely an afterthought in my mind at this point, I don't feel the need to build a collection, but I am wondering if I should just pick up Negan and Rick as Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Andrew Lincoln put on all time performances in the show. Regardless of the writing or what happened, those two had unreal chemistry together and I felt compelled to see that war through because of the actors.
I do wonder if it's worth commemorating the show with just those two figures, as you mentioned.
To me the biggest issue with The Walking Dead, compared to Game of Thrones, is that it doesn't have an end in mind, it's still shambling along like a zombie, with multiple spin-offs and whatnot. At least Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira finally came back to finish Rick and Michonne's story but it was so... Meh.
The entire franchise just turned into a low budget theme park ride but without any of thrills or excitement. Character arcs, relationships, deep philosophical questions from the first few seasons were completely ditched in favor of a cheap Marvel-like direction for the series. Characters stopped behaving like they were supposed to to fit whatever it is they felt like doing for their "TWD Universe" Daryl and Carol are no longer believable characters or even feel like real people, none of the world feels believable, human or authentic.
However, as opposed to Game of Thrones, the legacy of these characters remains intact, because while they may have turned them into paper cutouts of their past selves, they didn't outright destroy them with horrible writing, which Daenerys, Jon Snow, Jaime Lannister, just to name a few, were victims of, and therefore their legacy is destroyed to the point I don't even want to own a representation of them in any form, no matter how amazing those first seasons of GoT were.
Owning a Rick and Negan would at least remind me of all the good times I had with the show and the brilliant season 7 premiere, which I consider to be the truly last amazing TWD episode, and like you said it would be a good way to commemorate a show I was once obsessed with two of TV's most iconic characters. It's part of the reason why I still own Threezero's Rick, even though it's not a good figure by any means.
I hope they make more like Shane and season 5 feral Rick.
Season 5 murder jacket Rick is my definitive look for him, if INART never make that version they should at least include the jacket since it feels like an integral part of his character and he does use it for the last time in Season 8, with the blue shirt.
Unlike you I stuck to it 'till the very end... and it was painful at times... very painful
Maybe it was the completionist in me or maybe I was just very desperate or really bored... I dunno... well, I'm a retard, so probably it was just that
but I watched every single episode of TWD universe - every single one! And while there were some glimmers of hope in the original show here and there every once in a while it never felt great again after season 5. At least not for me. The ending was okay-ish. The new shows are okay, not great. World Beyond was horrid. And Fear the Walking Dead was too after season 4 but I just had to stick to it till the end out of some sense of obligation or obsession or whatever but Fear really was the worst of them all. The writing became so damn stupid I really don't think I've ever watched anything
that bad ever in my entire life. 'cause usually you'd just stop watching if something was that bad. It's the normal thing to do. But I didn't
And I wanted to give up soooo many times... it was really hard work to pull through. No kidding. At the end I was like "Only one more season to go. You gotta get through this somehow and then it can finally all die... Please just let it all die..." And the first 6 episodes of the last season were so horrible... it was a chore... can't even tell you how many times I fell asleep... and again I wanted to just give the f*** up before the last half aired. It just didn't make any sense anymore. But boy was I glad I didn't. Honestly! I had a blast!!! It was so fun to watch the last couple of episodes. I can't remember the last time I had such a good time watching something that was not comedy. I don't know if it was intentionally funny because they just didn't give a **** anymore or if they thought packing everything into the final episodes that fans ever wanted to see, whether it made any sense for not was a good idea... I don't know. But it was so ******* fun to watch. I kid you not. It was like all out stupidity. They brought people back from the dead, whether it made sense for not only just to instantly kill them again in some cases. It was hilarious! I loved it! And I would watch it again
any time! It was that entertaining... Loved it!
Sorry for the wall of text but I just had to get that out of my system
Oof... I tapped out after Season 8, and only watched Rick's final episodes and recently
The Ones Who Live, and after watching that I really just wish Rick had died on the bridge. The rest of the big iconic moments they adapted from the comics I just watched on Youtube, and honestly I didn't feel like I missed much, pretty much everything in between those moments was convoluted filler with cardboard characters.
I only watched Fear once and never bothered again, I did check out how it was progressing from time to time out of morbid curiosity and boy... It really was total garbage, I can't imagine wasting my time watching that in it's entirety.