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Comparing The Walking Dead Comic to the Show So Far

I’ve been hearing people saying for months that the original Walking Dead comic is better than the show, so I thought I’d give it a try for myself. I’ve said previously that I haven’t wanted to read it as not to spoil the show, so I compromised. I’ve read up only until the part which was the season two finale, or as close as I could get to it.

I was amazed to learn that out of 90 some issues, the entire series of The Walking Dead so far has only covered through the 12th book. I guess if ratings keep up, we’ve got a hell of a ways to go.

There are a TON of differences between the comic and the show, and fans of the source material seem to claim that they prefer the plot of the graphic novel. I agree on some points, but not on others, and so I thought I’d talk through the different changes, and whether I think the show improved the comic, or made it worse. Obvious spoilers ahead for the show, and please refrain from talking about events that happen in the comic after the one’s I talk about. Thank you.

No scene with the Morgan’s zombie wife

Verdict: Worse

One of the most heart-wrenching moments for me in the early episodes was when Rick met Morgan and his son, and there was a sequence where Morgan debated about whether or not to execute his wife who haunted his boarded up house daily. It was an exceptionally powerful emotional moment, but it didn’t happen at all in the comics.

No Merrell

Verdict: Better

I really didn’t like the whole Merrell plotline, and leaving him on the rooftop after “accidentally” losing the key is a loose end that has yet to pay off a long while later. In the book, Merrell’s character and in turn, that scene, do not exist.

No Daryl


Verdict: Worse

No Merrell means no Daryl, and I think most of us can agree that it would be a real shame if this character wasn’t around. He’s perhaps the most badass of the group, and brings a new dynamic that is desperately needed. But in the book, again, he doesn’t exist.

Shane dies very early

Verdict: Much worse

This caught me off guard more than anything. The confrontation between Rick and Shane escalates incredibly quickly, and Shane goes off his rocker and threatens to kill Rick. He’s interrupted by Carl, who shoots him in the neck. The Shane and Rick feud was the driving force for practically the entire TV show so far, and I really appreciated the way that tension was built until it all culminated in the episode before the finale. To kill Shane so early seemed wrong, and as such, many future plot points I liked from the show no longer exist, but we’ll talk about those later.

No trip back to the city

Verdict: Better

I didn’t like the sequence in the show where they went back to Atlanta to get Merryl, then they ran into that other group, as the entire scene just seemed out of place and pointless. I was glad it didn’t exist in the comic.

No CDC


Verdict: Better

Again, this seemed out of place in the show. I think they were attempting to provide some sort of scientific explanation for the zombies, but that’s not really what the show’s about. Perhaps they go there later in the comic, but I’m not sure.

Roamers and zombies, not Walkers

Verdict: Whatever

Even small details are changed like how Walkers are referred to as Roamers instead, but mostly as “zombies,” the traditional word that’s been mostly avoided in the show. Just interesting to see that they changed this for some reason.

Tyrese is more interesting


Verdict: Better

I can’t figure out if T-Dog is supposed to be Tyrese on the show, but they don’t seem anything alike. T-Dog is given almost no lines and nothing to do, where Tyrese becomes a pretty important, well-rounded character. He also has a girlfriend, daughter and her boyfriend with him, none of whom exist in the show. I like him much better in the comic and he’s a real force in the group and actually has a purpose.

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51 Comments

  1. After reading all the comics and watching the show I think they are both equally great. Yes they have their differences, but nothing to make one far greater than the other.

    Also, I think they meet Tyrese right around the same time they meet Michonne, the sword wielding woman, and I think it’s right before or soon after they find the prison.

    If T-bone is supposed to be Tyrese though, that sucks, he’s a great character in the comics.

  2. It’s difficult, but I DO have to view these as separate entities.
    When I heard that there was a TV show being made, I immediately knew there would be changes.
    My problem with the book is that it comes out once a month, is short and the cliff hangers are either misleading or they’re killers.
    For much of the second season of the show, I was wanting Shane dead. I wanted Michonne to show up badly.
    Shane not being around would drive Rick into a leadership position with no one to stop him. It looks egotistical, but Rick feels a strong need to protect his family and his group.
    The book, for all of it’s twists and turns and lack of solutions to sub plots other than to just walk away from a hanging story thread is necessary for MY enjoyment of the TV show.
    AMC’s Walking Dead does NOT need the book, however.
    They DO need Kirkman. Even though he can get carried away with killing off interesting characters. He may need a leash.
    So my strongest commitment is to the book…….and the show.
    I probably could have gotten by without either, but then all I’d have to fall back on is REAL LIFE.
    And that’s no fun.
    No zombies in real life. 🙁

  3. I think you’re wrong, but again, you’re right in the “whichever you’ve viewed first is the better” I guess.

    I mostly disagree on the Dale/Andrea relationship.

    In the book (no spoilers, I swear), Them being together show that the modern world and social interactions has changed.
    They’re first together out of stress and the need of being protected and loved in a world neither you and I can imagine living in, and this relation grow to love pretty quick to balance all the despair.

    In the TV show, I think they didn’t show that because it was just “wrong” to show that kind of relationship on TV. They even make Andrea older to justify a possible flirt that didn’t really happen.

    Anyway, I stick with the book being better, but the TV show isn’t bad at all. I love watching it every week. I just don’t like some aspects like Lori acting bitchy sometimes, Carl acting less maturely than the book, and T-Dog being totally useless since the pilot…

  4. T-dogg isn’t Tyreese, Glen Mazzara said the other day that they are going to introduce him in due time. I still prefer Shane dying when he did because it gave more depth to Carl, who on the show so far, is second only to Lori as the most annoying character. In the comics, Carl killing an (alive) Shane made for an even more WTF moment, because up to that point, it seemed like a stock zombie apocalypse book, and that was the first of many main character deaths.

  5. The way I see it, (I’ve read all 94 issues) is that the show and the comic are two different stories with (mostly) the same characters… you’re doing yourself a disservice by holding back from reading the print media though, in my opinion…
    Kirkman has stated that they’re keeping the show different from the comics on purpose, to keep geeks like me who’ve read the series from being too bored with it, from knowing what’s gonna happen. I *like* that. Thinking of them as different stories, or “parallel universes” kinda makes it easier to deal with the differences.

  6. So… the comic had an interesting, important and well-rounded black guy named Tyrese. The show has… a pointless, token black character named “T-Dog.” Then they invented more white people to pick up the slack, I guess.

    Uh huh.

    To be fair, I don’t really follow the show… but that sounds really bad. T-Dog? Really?

  7. As I have watched every episode of walking dead, with like a serious addiction, I have not got around to reading the comic yet, if someone has a link I would greatly appreciate it. But anyways. The story line, the amazing like wtf moments is what makes the series great to me. As a person who loathes zombie flicks, or zombie everything. This show sucked me in and has held me for two seasons. Whether or not the comic is better has never come across my mind, why should it matter? The story telling, the special effects, the just amazing character development, which doesn’t happen in very many shows now a days, is what I am looking for. Not if it is the same as the comic.

  8. I’ve read all 94 issues; there may be a minor character named Daryl at some point, but it is not the same character.

    I haven’t gone back to do a side by side comparison like you have here, but it sounds like this could work out fairly well for the show… I dropped the book for a few months after issue #25, because it really went downhill. Seemed like Kirkman was out of ideas and had already exhausted most zombie movie cliches, so he just started throwing out stupid decisions on the characters parts to drive scenery changes, and would arbitrarily kill cast members or insert pointless gross out moments to try and keep the “energy” up, and, for me, failed miserably. I actually wrote to him a few issues later when I read a few more a friend had and found it actually got WORSE, and the same friend was excited to show me that my e-mail ahd been printed and I actually felt bad that Kirkman seemed genuinly caught off guard and even a little upset that I’d dropped the book and thought the story had died.

    Since then, it’s picked up a little bit, and he seems to be attempting to move beyond “zombies everywhere, run away, nowhere is safe, people are worse than zombies, repeat” formula, but we’ll see.

    It seemed like last season of the show was quickly moving that way, with “Carl is never in the house” and “Lori is a moron” being the driving force for drama outside of Shane and Rick’s tension (definitely something the comic could have benefitted from to help pad out the early going), and I haven’t watched any of the newer episodes because it just seemed so plodding and inane; maybe I’ve dropped it too soon? According to your math, we should probably have two more seasons before it turns to shit.

  9. Daryl is not in the comic and Tyrese comes much earlier than Michonne aka “Hooded Stranger with Zombies.” There are a lot of changes from the comic, such as the Sophia incident and the death of Shane, but what surprises me is that nobody yet has mentioned Carl’s age in the comics compared to the show. He is around 10-11 in the show, but only 6 in the comics, which makes what he does (killing Shane and other things I will not spoil) even more extreme.

    I really like both the comic and the show. I have been following the comic since before it was released (Image released a teaser of the first issue online a few months before it came out) and continue to enjoy both forms of The Walking Dead. They have done a really good job of keeping things different from the comic, yet keeping some things the same yet still making it work.

  10. It wouldn’t have been appropriate to have such a young kid so all the stuff that Carl does at such a young age, so they had to age him up. Just like they did for all the kids in Game of Thrones.

  11. Chalking it up to a bunch of bullet points is not a good comparison of quality in this case. Character development and the like are better all-around in the comic, and that’s the only factor that really matters. Compare the integral, warm, competent, badass sniper Andrea of the comic to the useless, spiteful bitch in the tv show, for instance. And while the finale to the Sophia saga in the show was great, keep in mind they blew half a season on looking for one little girl. Half. A. Season. Think about that for a minute. The television show is embarrassingly-paced, while the comic almost always keeps the story moving forward. Also, Carol for some reason is ancient in the tv show and also useless. In the comic, she had sex appeal at least. And T-Dawg? Jesus Christ. Why no Tyrese? Is having a STRONG minority character completely off the table? Also, Rick in the comic is an epic badass who nearly always does what’s best for the group even if his decisions are occasionally morally gray at best. Rick in the show does moronic things and then whines that he does everything for the group, but the list of things he’s actually done is almost nonexistent.

    And Shane in the show was a one-note pain in the ass. Two full seasons of him shouting over and over the exact same shit he could have just shouted in the pilot and made his point? Kevin Smith once said “repetition is comedy” and having them keep Shane alive for that long when the character had offered everything he had to offer in the first few eps was pointless and was only there to sllllloooowwww ttttthhhhheeeee pppppaaaaaaacccceeee down to a crawl by finding different ways to reiterate the same fucking argument between him and Rick. Not the stuff of storytelling win, my friend. I’m pretty sure they killed Dale in the show when they did because the actor will literally die before they get to his awesome demise in the comic’s story at this rate. Or if they were smart, they’d have moved the “Fear the Hunters” arc into the second season and given Dale the proper send-off he deserved while having something actually happen on the farm besides just having the same stupid arguments for a whole season.

  12. Hah, I did the exact same thing with “try to catch up to the show and go no further so as not to spoil it” with the comics and was done at Issue 12. At this point, with the hooded character and prison revealed already, and the whole story of the show being so different than the comics, I’ll probably go in and just read them anyway.

  13. I agree with a lot of what Trashcanman says. The show has two huge problems: pacing and character interaction. in terms of pacing, season one stumbled when the group traveled back to the city for no reason with the Vatos episode. That entire episode was stupid and pointless for a lot of reasons, but when they have so much to explore before finding the prison, like Wiltshire Estates, why waste time rehashing what you’ve already done, particularly for no pay off? I agree that the Sophia as a zombie moment was awesome. It’s one of my favorite WD TV moments, period. But it came at the cost of the entire first half of season 2. Searching for Sophia just became a punchline, not something that I think many viewers cared about, after 6 or 7 episodes of it. The show’s bigger problem is really the characters. Oh god, the characters. Andrea is an annoying harpy. Lori is an annoying harpy. Carol is useless. T-dog cut his arm once, apparently and then stopped participating. Put Lori and Andrea in a scene together alone and you get discussions where Andrea advocates letting a 12 year old girl decide if she wants to commit suicide and Lori complaining about too much laundry. They’re both finding a way to somehow have all parties involved be wrong and argue about completely separate things. What kind of character development is that? You should care about BOTH characters. You’ve gone badly wrong when you not only don’t care, but actively want both of them to die for being so awful. Dale was a case where he should have and could have been awesome. He tried to serve as a moral compass but ended up just coming off as one note. I saw season 2’s turning point back into a quality show as Dale’s death. It not only removed an irritating character who was not going to develop any further, but it gave me hope that the same fate could befall some of the other characters who are nothing but a dead weight to a show that has a lot of territory to explore.

  14. I read the books first and enjoy the show. There are thing from the book I missed seeing in the show but then you get a place or character and you get excited to see what they a are going to be like. I understand why they do the things they do on the show. You have to keep people coming back and watching. A comic is much more different and its the art and dialog that keeps me at least in to it. In my mind at this time for me both a like but I hope they follow the books events as much as they can. If they do the next two season for sure will rock.

  15. It’s completely whatever you’ve seen first. I’ve got friends who have watched the show and never read a single book…which to better enlighten them, I gave them the first 3 volumes to read up on. Surprisingly one said that the books were incredibly more deep and richer (per the story) and the other said that the show was more enticing to him. So … whether one is right over the other I think is a mute point.

    The show is OK … my only grief with it is that they take WAY TOO LONG TO DO ANYTHING … every episode has Rick’s wife being a b*tch and Shane doing crazy stuff till the FINALLY killed him. Carl is way too annoying and everyone else seems to be even LESS important than what they are in the books.

    Just my 2cents.

  16. I have to agree with Trashcanman. I got tired of shane quickly, dont like andrea portrayal as in the comic as I feel much more connected to all of the survivors but on the show half of them are useless, hated the search for sophia as it needed to move quicker, and the lack of Tyrese is atrocious. I also hated that Carl killed zombie shane rather than alive shane. Which also means that Rick cant drive back to ATL to dig up Zombie and Shane once they find out that everyone is infected. But for all of the negatives, Darryl is a huge redeeming factor.

  17. I disagree with a lot of these, but the one that stands out the most is Shanes death.

    I prefered how they did it in the comic with Carl shooting Shane, Rick putting him in the ground and thinking thats it. Then finding out later about how it doesn’t take a bite for a person to turn and dealing with it.

    Also it starts to illuminate Carl as a badass kid who is learning to survive. Instead of a whiny brat who refused to listen to adults.

  18. the problem with the show is inconsistencies and dragging on plot lines.

    i can udnerstand dragging the farm for a season, it seems like each major area is a season, which will lead to great seasons further down the line, next up the prison as i am sure you figured.

    but the issue is that they make up characters, say andrea, a human rights lawyer, but then have her on board to kill anything without any real transition? i totally forgot she was that lawyer too until i saw season 1 again with a friend who was watching it his first time.

    the bad side about dragging the plot, is the writers o fthe show seem to run out of ideas, they had to make sofias arc last 6 episodes, and randy’s arc last 4, way too long. if they excelled tha barn scene, with shane losing his shit, and spent the remaining first part of season 2 dealing with shanes easy ability to lose his shi. it owuld have allowed much more actual character development, or at least the appearance of it. then start part 2 of season 2 with going into town finding asshats, and maybe have a real confrontation with the other group and have that cause the finale with zombies.

    the other group sent 2 guys, they get killed by rick. they send in another group, whos to say they wouldnt all head into town and set up camp at the completely abandoned town? and work from there? i would prefer that much more than kill or let randy live for half the remaining episodes. the other group finds their way to the barn, shenanigans ensue and a battle for the farm takes place. our friends win, a couple of the “abused” people form the second group (you know there would be some who didnt like it there) give up and make peace and become characters, preferably one being tyrese, like come on, t-dog, only black guy to live for a season in a horror and hes completely useless.

    the battle draws out the zombies, in the zombie mix shane and rick have their showdown, and everyone leaves the farm, the ninja zombie whisperer shows up and they all get to the prison, end scene.

  19. I also like the comic books better because of the character development.

    Mainly the way that Carl grows very fast an he kill Shane, why not keep that and if you need the shook moment of Shane getting up like a zombie and then Rick could shot him and get closure, this would be better for two things it will reveal what the Dr. said at the end of season 1 and at least give Lori an actual reason to get mad at Rick when he told her not just because she its a stupid bit**

  20. So…I skimmed over a lot of the comments and didn’t see this mentioned.

    I like both the show and the book equally – both have their faults, but both are some of the best zombie-lore out there right now. Enough said on that point.

    To me, the reason the show is paced different and such – Robert Kirkman is a producer on the show. The creator of the comic. And from the articles I’ve read, he has quite a bit of pull in what and how the show is done.

    This is just a guess – but I’d assume Kirkman looked at the weak spots of his comic and tried to change them to make better TV. A la keeping Shane alive longer. Even when reading the comic, I thought this happened entirely too quickly.

    And with Shane living, this snowballed into a lot of different avenues for Kirkman to tell new or slightly altered stories he’d already written. He is a writer to begin with, and a very talented one. He’s just updated his own work, sort of like George Lucas…only…not so poorly.

  21. yeah, I really like tyreese and his the little small subplot with his daughter and the boyfriend. I also disliked otis in the comics, and I also prefer the tv hershel.

    However, overall, I look at them as two different stories and I don’t really like comparing them. I enjoy watching the tv show and seeing where they go with it, and I like the slightly more graphic comic for going where they go. I do the same with the Sookie Stackhouse series. I like the books, but comparing them only serves to make me upset about how they brought something to life or what they decided to in/exclude. Seeing them as two different stories allows me to enjoy both.

  22. Forget Angry Shane, Carl growing desensitivity to zombies and human life in general in the post apocalypse is far more compelling than episode after episode of the infighting Farming Dead.

  23. It is not a graphic novel. It is a comic book. Graphic novels ARE a thing, sure, but the Walking Dead is not that thing. Just a pet peeve of mine.

  24. I enjoy both the comic and the show. I think a better analogy would be that the comic is Glenn, and the show is Merle and Daryl bored on a Friday night.

    As always people will disagree. And I have to disagree with a couple of your choices because “you don’t know”. Dale is a much better story arc in the comic, his death in the show is pretty empty and pointless.

    Sophia plays a very important balance to “the world” as far as Carl goes. Her way early death just proves that Carl will not develop in the show into the deep character he is in the comic. (I’m blaming this on child protection laws that exist in Hollywood but not in comic land.)

    Your critique of how long Carl is out is skewed because while in the tv show only a couple days pass for the characters, for a viewer a month goes by. The same reason the search for Sophia seems so tedious.

    I am mixed on your pick “They Leave the Farm Peacfully”… the show was very suspenseful… but, in the comic, the farm returns with new suspense and characters. So, gratification now or gratification later… it’s a wash.

    I think I have to disagree with how Shane dies, too. I don’t think this is comparable as in the comic it is Carl who kills Shane. This scene is very, very important to comic Carl’s development. In the show Rick kills Shane depriving Carl of a critical moment that wont be required as Carl of the show cannot ever be the Carl of the comic like adult characters can.

    It was really fun reading your article, though. Well written… and like I say, we all have oppinions. Yours seem well thought out. Kepp on posting.

  25. Save yourselves the terrible agony and read the comics. Making a show out of this is as appalling as making Brad Pitt a MAIN CHARACTER IN WORLD WAR Z. The show has boooooring character development. I honestly think Kirkman has bent over to take it in the ass on this T.V. show letting the Hollywood bigamists pitch it just right to make it Americanized. Reading some of these comparisons online Comic vs. Show makes me wonder if any author of these article had even heard of the comics before they became infatuated with the show. Compared to the originality of the comic these season dvd’s will have best satisfaction with someone yelling pull and you shooting your heart out.

    Go ahead and disagree i know i have more taste and you are probably as annoying as Lori is in the show.

  26. Haven’t read the comics so can’t compare between that and the TV show. Have to say though was totally disappointed with S2. That farm was dull as proverbial bats**t. Were they trying to deliberately make me hate all the main characters? If so they succeeded. The only character I have any time for is Daryl, aside from that I wouldn’t mind seeing them all turned into zombie snacks. The plot arcs (if you could call them that) were the most cliched, uninteresting load of soap opera I’ve seen in awhile. Kinda like Zombie Dynasty. Plus I disagree with pretty much everyone that the focus needs to be on how the survivors fare in a post apocolyptic world. Couldn’t care less quite frankly. I want to know why it happened, how it happened and the big picture story – the most interesting parts of the series so far centered around the CDC and the infection. Will definitely be giving S3 a miss if all it’s got to say for itself is more walker slayings, more chocolate sauce fake blood, more self righteous rubbish from Lori & Andrea, more whinging from pasty faced Carl and more dreary fights over who shags who and blah blah ad nauseum.

  27. I completely disagree with the comment about liking which you saw first. I’ve watched the show which brought me into the whole series, then found out there was a video game with a story prior to the events (which was awesome, it’s by TellTale, check it out) and then found out about the comic which the game’s events leads into. To me, the characterization in the comic beats the show hands down.

    Keeping Shane along longer may have lengthened the drama but it was rather unnecessary. The whole point was that Shane’s world crumbled when Rick returned and everyone begin seeing Rick as the authority figure. It was a key point that Rick still doesn’t quite realize how bad the situation was and that his son had to pull the trigger. It also showed a bit more of Lori’s personality when they buried him.

    I didn’t like the CDC, it was better when they found out these information from experience and fellow survivors. I’m also not entirely sold on the concept that it accesses the brainstem especially since that part of the brain doesn’t control hunger.

    So as a preference, I really enjoy the comic and the game. The show wasn’t bad but I believe I won’t continue to follow it.

  28. The comics are not bad, but they have some downsides that are pretty annoying.
    For example, too many characters are killed off by some zombie magically appearing behind them. Even in areas that were supposed to be clear, areas that seconds ago had been checked!

  29. I have to say I am a fan of both the comic and the show for different reasons. I don’t think any side by side comparison of characters or plot can really say one is better than the other. While i agree that the pacing is a little slow in the show, I chalk it up to the difference in medium from the comic book. You can ready througha single issue in two minutes if that if you are a fast reader so yes, the pace is alot faster.
    As for the differences of the characters, i beleive that was also as a result of the change in medium. Anrea and michonne are my two favorite characters in the book, both bad-asses with their own set of issues and quirks. In the show Andrea is decidedly less bad-ass and more bitchy and stupid. Tyrese vs. t-dog is also another big character change up which does not live up to my expectations. That said however, in the show i love Daryl, and i think his awesome bad assed self is a welcome addition. I dont remember his pressence ever showing up in the books but that is no loss. Both have their own story archs and while one is based off the other i dont think either is without their own special something that makes me continue to watch and buy the comics.
    pesonally i prefer reading over watching for almost any movie or show that was made from a book, but that is simply due to my love of reading 🙂

  30. Got hooked to the series first then went to the books because I needed to find out more about the mysterious hooded character. I enjoy both the series and the books. However, they are so different I treat them as two different franchises. Here’s a couple of my own observations:
    1) Some of your “worse” labels for the books actually result in “better” when you get further along in the story, imo. For example, Shane’s early death results in Rick becoming both Rick and Shane in the books; the tension is interestingly within him instead of the more obvious duo.
    2) The book’s characters have more depth to them, and I actually felt bad when they died. Otoh, many of the show’s characters (Andrea and Lori, for example) are more annoying in what they say and much more useless in what they do. I keep hoping for them to die.

  31. Well in the comic they had one man writing the entire story, in the show they have an entire hivemind to think up their material, so of course they will think up better ideas.

  32. I’m not diagreeing with whoever wrote this article…I just find the way this article was written to be naff, like written by a teenager. No class at all.

  33. I think the Comic books are better through the point that the show has gotten too. The whole thing with Sophia was WAY WAY WAY too dragged out. Seriously season 3 is going to start with them just BARELY getting to the Prison. If it goes on at this rate it will take 15 -18 seasons just to get to Issue 100. Tyrese is a better character than most, although Daryl is a bad ass and since I began watching the show before reading the Graphic Novels missed not having him. The shows writers can’t keep dragging things out so long, it was too much for most of season 2.

  34. I do not agree one bit with shane dying early being worse. He was an annoying character i thought and was begging for him to die each episode because i hated him. The whole point of him was to make rick more realistic in the world he was in more than he already was, making him a better and in some cases worse leader. So yeah read the rest the show will barely follow it and the actors will start getting too old before they catch up, due to all the extra plot they are adding in to pad out the show and make more money. Maybe they’ll kill Rick’s son because he’ll be too old at this slow pace.

  35. I disagree with the ” whatever you youve seen first is better”. I have watched the show since the beginning, and have recently read all the comics. I’ve always thought that every character on the show was unlikeable. Does anyone else think that they picked the worst actor for Rick?? Every time he gets serious he tilts his head and squints his eyes more. Huge over actor. He is much more likeable in the book. Same goes to every other character. I didn’t like Andrea’s and Dale’s relationship in the T.V show. Andrea was so mean to Dale it was pointless to even have a relationship between the two of them. Even thought the age difference was a little weird, I liked their relationship better in the book. Lori is a bitch in the show, I never really felt her love for Rick. You never questioned the fact that she loved him in the comic. Tyrese should have been incorporated in the show for sure! He was a much better “number two” than Shane. I’m glad they killed him earlier on. The only character that I found was equally as likeable was Glen and Maggie.

  36. I just want to know why you keep referring to Merle as “Merrel.” His name is Merle. M-E-R-L-E. Pronounced “murl.” The way you are spelling his name reads “Mare-el,” with two syllables instead of one. He is not an outdoor shoe company; he is a redneck. Merle.

    A quick look at the show’s official web page will confirm this.

  37. On a more serious note, I tend to prefer the show. Mostly this is due to the poor dialogue in the comic, but also because in the comic the characters’ actions seem to come out of nowhere. For instance, Shane… In the comic everything is fine until he leads rick out into the woods, confesses all his feeling for ricks wife, and then Carl shoots him. There is no lead up to this, it just blind sides you. The more I read it, the more this kind of thing happens. The authors seem more bent on shocking us with what the characters do with little concern of whether or not it is believable. In the show, the characters act like people, albeit scared people, their actions make sense. Shane has to build up to wanting to kill Rick over time. He doesn’t just get angry ONCE (literally once.. maybe twice) and try to kill Rick. It doesn’t seem like it was something that was brewing inside of him, it just seems like the authors got tired of him and said, “eh, lets make him go crazy and kill him… in the next few pages.” The show makes us hate Shane. The comic just tells us that we should; Its pacing is way too fast, and because of this, none of the character’s actions make any sense.

    I agree with some that many of the characters in the show are unlikeable, but they are just as unlikeable in the comic. Lori is just as annoying… Rick acts like a crazy person in the comic, etc. In the comic, everyone is waaaaaaay too concerned about screwing each other. Dale and Andrea together? He is old enough to be her father. It’s just creepy. Every character just wants to bone someone else… Even Sophia wants Carl to be her boyfriend. It like if someone isn’t fucking someone else, it’s worse than being bitten by a zombie.

    But back to the dialogue. In the comic it reads as if it was written by an angsty teenager. For instance, regardless of which character it is, any time some one is angry with some one else they will exclaim, “Fuck you you stupid bitch/asshole!” even if it completely out of character. Hershel even says this at one point, and then later on tells someone to watch their language. Everyone acts like they are teenagers anytime they get even slightly emotional. SPOILER: Carol slitting her wrists because Tyresse gets a bj from Michone? Really!?! After everything she has been through, she tries to kill herself over a man? Seriously, these are supposed to be adults, yet, even considering the horrible circumstances, they ALL act like children in the comic. It’s really silly. And the actual children.. “oh a girl kissed me, now I have cooties. ew!!!” Jesus christ. It’s really bad. The characters have no emotions aside from horny, angry, sad, and happy… (and they are only happy because they just had sex so they are no longer horny).

    Honestly, after reading the comic, I was surprised that it was even CONSIDERED for a show in the first place. What saves it is the basic premise. Most zombie movies only show us the immediate situation. The Walking Dead shows us what happens after the world went to shit, and that is a great idea. Many of the plot points are interesting too, such as what happens in Woodbury with the Governor. But the dialogue is just sooooo bad it’s comical, and not in a good way. The show really improves upon this. I’m actually happy the show doesn’t follow the comic. The comic can really only be profound if you are 16 years old. For a person like myself who’s pushing 30, the show is better simply because the maturity level is higher and it treats its audience accordingly; like adults. Not like a bunch of hornball kids, whose major life concerns come down to “pwning noobs!” which is how the comic seems to treat its audience. At least, that’s how I felt reading it.

    wow. ok. sorry for all the rambling.

  38. ok… gonna keep rambling. Why does everyone think the character development in the comic is so great? There is no character development. Are we reading the same comic? I feel nothing for the characters in the comic. Like a said before, the only emotions people have are sad, angry, horny, and happy because they just got laid. EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER INTRODUCED IN THE COMIC INSTANTLY HAS TO TRY AND FUCK SOMEBODY WITHIN THE NEXT FEW PAGES. It’s like there is a competition. That is not character development. It’s ridiculous. What people say is boring in the show IS CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT. We find out who these people are, before the crisis, and now who they have become. In the comic, Lori’s character actually points this out in the 25th or so issue (not sure of the exact one, but it’s a ways into the series) that she and Carol no nothing about each other. Which make us realize, you know what, we don’t know anything about these people either. All we’ve seen them do is kill zomibies, fuck each other, and then get mad at each other for fucking someone else. There is more character development in a soap opera than there is in this comic. All the characters are completely one dimensional. Predicting what they will do in any given situation is as easy as pie. The show at least keeps me guessing.

    why am I even arguing this? The only response I’ll get will be trollish… I’ve never even been to this site, nor heard of it until now. I just wanted see what people’s opinions were on the show vs the comic. I was HOPING for something lees shallow than what i found here, which essentially boils down to, “I like the comic because the show is main stream and saying I like the comic better will show people how smart I am.” ughh. only doing this ’cause I’m bored at work anyhow. don’t bother responding to me. I won’t be back.

    You folks need to read something good… This comic was severely disappointing..

  39. dude,
    i´ve read all the issues (102) and have seen all the episodes of the show.
    The comics are better than the show. You have to read to see that.
    I´m not saying that the show sucks, but it could be really better for sure! I´m hoping that the 3rd season bring a better plot, because the prison is perfect to do so.

  40. not read the comics yet… but something I think is being overlooked..on the tv show, Carl still DID ultimately kill shane… he’s still on a path to being cold and heartless…and as season 3 opened up a badass as well

  41. I really would be appreciative if someone who has read all the comics could possibly tell me why there are 3 graves at the end of episode 4 season 3 on the tv show. It ends with glenn looking at hershel and tossing the shovel to the 2 new prisoners and saying dig me two more [graves].

  42. I totally hate to agree with #a guy but he seems to be the only one who really likes graphic novels… he speaks nothing but the truth we do not know anything about this people… so that totally trashes this so called character development…

    Don’t get me wrong I do like the show and I do like the books… I’ve read all books (103) and watched every available episode and one only thing I have to say

    They (books &TV show) are so different, they shouldn’t even be compared the story lines at so far between them… and it’s totally understandable the book’s story line is soooooo psychologically damaged that it would be impossible to air that kind of stuff on TV… those of you who’ve read issues 25-48, the fear the hunters arc and the available parts of something to fear arc, only you will get what I mean..

    So… whatever!!!

  43. I agree with you about Shane he was the best character in the series and he also had the best character development out of all the characters.

    He saved season 2 from being complete shit as far as I’m concerned. For the rest of the characters execpt Daryl was crap
    in season 2 I don’t understand all the hate he gets or am I supposed to like the other boring characters without any depth to them?

    Rick is way too damn boring for a main character Shane was the person ready to charge at anything and his decisions were way better than Rick.

    I thought Merle was lame but man the show needs him. I like Merle way better in season 3 and I wish Michonne didn’t show up it just makes her kills lame it works for the comics not the show.

    Carl development? Please it doesn’t work on this show the kid is one of the worst characters on it. Shane was the only character that I felt was truly flesh out the guy had some more paths that he could take.

    If this was Rick doing it most people wouldn’t have called him out like they did with Shane they hated him since the start especially the comic geek fans who wanted him to dead. So Carl would get shit development in the show he would just not turn into a badass like the comics they are trying to on the show but it’s laughable.

    I could do without the missing Sophia plotline that was really bad how was the scene astonishing? Sophia was a minor character who had less than 10 lines I’m glad she was gone.

  44. @ a guy: So rare to find someone who sees the comics as what they are. I mean sure, the storyline may be great and become even greater later on (I’m still stuck in the prison), but man the dialogue sucks.

    Example:
    Tyrese: I’m about due for some alone time.
    Carol: Really Tyrese? Is that so? Allen is watching Sophia… and that clean spot on the floor back there looks really comfy.
    Tyrese: Who am I do deny a woman what she wants?
    Carol (lying on her back): Just be quick about it, this floor is cold.
    Tyrese: You be quick. I’m going to take my time.
    Carol: Yes, sir.

    I mean, COME ON! This is porn-level bad. It’s so painful, I hardly manage to read one chapter per week. And the only reason I keep trying is because of the show.

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