Though The Walking Dead will conclude with its eleventh season next year, the franchise is very far from dying. AMC have a ton of plans going forward, including multiple in-development shows and a movie trilogy starring Andrew Lincoln’s Rick Grimes. One particularly interesting spinoff will follow Norman Reedus’ Daryl and Melissa McBride’s Carol on what’s being described as a fun road trip.
The fan favourite characters will be journeying across the country, with Reedus teasing that it’ll put the pair in fresh situations as they meet new people. But that might not be the only Daryl-related thing coming, as famed leaker Daniel Richtman is reporting that AMC is working on an origins movie for the character, which might be a bit of a head-scratcher for fans as they’ll know that there isn’t a lot of Daryl’s origins left to explore.
He was introduced in the third episode of the first season, set mere months after the apocalypse began. In addition, we saw what Daryl was doing when the walkers appeared in the 2013 video game The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct, which showed him and Merle making their way to Atlanta where we meet them early in the series. I guess there’s a chance we could see their pre-apocalypse days as drifters and low level criminals, but it seems silly to have a Walking Dead movie without… y’know, the walking dead.
Beyond all that, Norman Reedus is now a decade older than he was when we first met saw him on the show and, not to beat around the bush, he looks it. So, if they did do an origin movie about Daryl, they might have to recast the role. At least, for part of it.
Personally, I’m going to wait and see if there are any more details of this before I start anticipating it. Don’t get me wrong, Richtman has a strong track record for scoops and the more Norman Reedus in my life the better, so bring on any movies and shows starring him, but I have a tough time seeing how a Walking Dead origins film for Daryl would work.