Fear the Walking Dead: "Pilot" Review

Creating a spin-off of AMC’s sensational The Walking Dead is no small feat, and it requires a lot of ingredients to pull off. The cast of characters has to be equally complex and diverse as their TWD counterparts, the setting has to fresh and interesting, and narrative arcs have to be something viewers haven’t already seen in the spin-off’s predecessor. If “Pilot” was any indication, Fear the Walking Dead will cover all these bases.

The first episode introduced a slew of new, well-performed characters, an engrossing setting, and a new family theme that hasn’t really been explored before in the cinematic universe of The Walking Dead.

They don't kill zombies yet... but they will. I wonder what their weapons of choice will be...

FTWD follows the struggles of a dysfunctional family residing in the suburbs of Los Angeles. Kim Dickens is Madison Clark, a high school counselor who is under fire from her kids, Nick and Alicia (played by Frank Dillane and Alycia Debnam-Carey, respectively) for marrying her history teacher/coworker Travis Manawa (played by Cliff Curtis). Despite the impending zombie-pocalypse, "Pilot" really gave the impression that the central conflict of the show is the relationships inside this broken family. Dickens gives an excellent performance as a pained mother trying to keep her family together, starkly contrasted by Dillane, who plays the part of a drug-addled, rebellious teenager impeccably. Curtis, on the other hand, came off a little one-note in this episode. His performance of a step-dad trying to connect with his new kids is delivered well, but that was all there was to him, really. Of course, as the outbreak unfolds, I’m confident we'll get to see his character explored more as "Pilot" sets him up as a do-anything-for-his-family kind of guy.

The broken family dynamic introduced in this episode is really unique to this show. Unlike TWD, Fear the Walking Dead shows a normal family hung up on jobs, relationships, and technology slowly coming to the realization that their civilization is collapsing, whereas the characters from TWD are first introduced us to weeks and months after the outbreak ravaged society. Seeing this average 21st century family face the outbreak as it happens really feels like a fresh, new viewing experience in The Walking Dead’s universe.

Speaking of the outbreak, I love the “slow burn” approach the writers are taking to the six-episode season. For starters, once the outbreak happens, we know nothing will be the same again, so I enjoyed watching the family fix kitchen appliances, go to work, and talk about boys. Movies tend to rush the collapse of society, whereas in FTWD, we get to see it unfold slowly. It starts in the crack houses, and then slowly, kids stop showing up at school, and then videos start going viral of these strange occurrences. FTWD is showing us society’s slow collapse through the lens of your average family. And with only six episodes slated for this season, that slow collapse won’t overstay its welcome. We’ll see society’s collapse happen fast enough that we won’t get bored waiting to see what happens next, but slowly enough that we get to see the little nuances that are left out of big-budget films.

I hope they're enjoying those clean clothes, because that's going to change real soon...

The pacing of the first episode was really great. The show didn’t waste any time getting into the plot after introducing us to the characters. Travis’s son and ex-wife felt a little shoehorned into this episode – I wish they would have been given a little more screen time – but as the walkers start ravaging the city, I’m sure we’ll see both households forced together.

One thing that felt a little awkward was Nick’s escape from the hospital. Tension was being built around the idea that the elderly man in the next bed over was dying, and fans of the original show know the zombie virus is airborne, thus, the tension was coming from the idea that this guy would die, reanimate, and pose a threat to a restrained Nick. It was just odd that we didn’t see anything become of that. It’s almost as if the writers were saying, “Not yet!” The whole scene, ultimately, built up to Nick’s escape from the hospital.

The episode ended in a great way; Madison, Travis, and Nick have now seen what they’ll be up against in the coming days. I’m glad the writers didn’t drag this out – we’ve spent years watching a show about Rick and friends fighting the walkers, so it would have been annoying to see FTWD’s new characters take forever to come to grips with the nature of their new enemies.

Fear the Walking Dead started with a strong pilot that delivered several great performances, a fun, new setting, and a relatable family dynamic that will hopefully be explored as society starts to fall in the coming episodes.