Brand new streaming services and channel packages from cable and satellite providers have brought an entirely new library of shows and movies to thousands of people in recent years, meaning that the range of popular shows available to you has never been greater. All you need to do is look up something like “direct tv new hampshire” and you will encounter a huge range of options specific to providers in your area, where it is fairly likely that, if you have been looking for a new show to enjoy, you will find what you’re looking for and then some. For example, over the course of the last year or so many television fans have become huge fans of the smash hit post-apocalyptic zombie drama The Walking Dead. The show essentially follows sheriff’s deputy Rick Grimes as he wakes from a coma to find the world overrun by zombie “walkers.” Grimes journeys to find his family and, along with any other survivors they pick up along the way, begin the quest for survival.

Following the wildly successful first season of this show, season 2 has earned a lot of attention among television fans. The suspense has been compounded by the fact that this show, like plenty of other ones, has temporarily dropped off after 7 episodes, and will be resuming in February with the conclusion of season 2. So, for those who are interested in how the show has progressed, here is a brief recap of the first half of the season’s final episode.

This finale episode, entitled “Pretty Much Dead Already,” dealt with a theme that seems to be picking up some steam in the show, which is that the Walkers do not have to necessarily be looked at as dangerous monsters. The episode revolves around the concept of whether to rescue (in some sense) Walkers stuck in quicksand, or to shoot them. Hershel leads the charge against violence against the Walkers, as he believes that they are more sick humans than monsters. Shane proves this theory wrong, however, by repeatedly shooting the captured Walkers, displaying the fact that on some level they are not human (or they’d die from the multiple shots). Shane then opens up a barn filled with more captured Walkers, and the group opens fire. The episode reaches a shocking and dramatic conclusion, however, when long-missing Sophia emerges from the barn, having turned into a zombie herself. With nothing else left to do, Rick steps forward and puts a decisive bullet into her head, setting up a resounding conclusion to the first half of this season, and mounting plenty of intrigue going forward.

A glimmer of hope may have appeared in a really unlikely place. During a New York Magazine interview with Bryan Cranston, star of the equally as incredible AMC show, “Breaking Bad”, Cranston was asked why he thought the season premiere of his show was pushed to July. His answer came in on the surprising side of the fence.

“It was a decision from AMC that they wanted to position us in July, along with Mad Men. And I believe they’re going to put Walking Dead in July as well. I think it’s just a sensible thing — they want to attract as many eyeballs as possible, away from the heavy competition of the September, November, January start.”

Could be something. Could be nothing.

Full Article: http://www.dreadcentral.com/news/41889/walking-dead-season-2-early-july

The most common question you were asked was, “Why aren’t you dead yet?”

(Laughs) Yeah, man, I don’t know. I can imagine that would be a common question. I don’t know what I can say about that. I hadn’t read the comic before I read Frank (Darabont)’s pilot script, and — for an actor like me, who’s at the beginning of his career and going through pilot season — when I read the script, it blew me away. It was better than anything else out there. And I really felt that, for this part and for this project, I should say “No” and not commit to anything else before I got my day in court on The Walking Dead.

I didn’t know anything about the comic or Robert Kirkman … I knew about Frank, of course, but that was it. But it was also Gale Anne Hurd, and it was Frank, and it was AMC, and it was … y’know, it was a f–kin’ rad-ass script! They did tell me that Shane was a character that does die (in the comics), but it didn’t faze me. I just really wanted to be a part of this thing. There was no specificity whatsoever about how long I would last in this thing.

Full Article: http://www.examiner.com/comedy-in-national/exclusive-interview-walking-dead-star-jon-bernthal-answers-your-questions

AFI lauded the AMC original series Breaking Bad, Mad Men and The Walking Dead as three of its Television Programs of the Year for 2010. This marks the second time Breaking Bad has been honored by the American Film Institute, the fourth time for Mad Men, and the first time forThe Walking Dead, which just finished its first season. The awards were created as a way to preserve and honor America’s cultural legacy in the moving image arts (i.e., film and television).

Full Article: http://blogs.amctv.com/movie-news/2010/12/afi-awards.php

To hear Walking Dead exec producers Gale Anne Hurd and Robert Kirkman tell it, the original Deadline report about mass firings on the show was overblown. “It’s completely inaccurate,” Hurd told EW; Kirkman indicated to TV Guide that Eglee, an executive producer for The Shield, Dexter, and Dark Angel, “didn’t want to be second-in-command on a show when he’s used to being a top dog” and had decided to “go off and do something else.” On that latter point, Vulture can report that Kirkman was right: Sources tell us Eglee is talking to FX and Sony Pictures Television about becoming a writer and exec producer of Powers, a long-in-the-works dramatization of the comic-book series of the same name about homicide detectives who investigate cases linked to folks with extraordinary abilities. FX execs are said to be very high on Powers (a pilot order seems quite likely), and thanks to his Shield work, Eglee is someone the network and studio know quite well.

Our sources indicate Eglee has been circling Powers for months, implying that his departure from Walking Dead was not some sudden development, or something dictated by Darabont. So are Hurd and Kirkman 100 percent correct when they pooh-pooh the Deadline report? Maybe not: While it’s clear Eglee has been mulling life after Dead for a while, Vulture has also talked to people close to the show who’ve confirmed that several of the writers on the small staff (about a half-dozen scribes) very much wanted to remain full-time for season two. “It’s a huge hit show. Who would walk away from that?” an insider told us.

Full Article: http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/12/walking_dead_writers_fired.html

I talked to producer Gale Anne Hurd yesterday about the way the first season of “Walking Dead” ended, plans for the second season and those widely disseminated rumors. It turns out that when it comes to season two of the zombie smash, Hurd is rather tight-lipped, which makes sense since substantive writing on the 13 new episodes won’t begin until next month. However, the “Terminator” and “Aliens” veteran is more than happy to clear up reports about brain-eating “Two and a Half Men” stars and a possible writer apocalypse.

HitFix: Congrats on the season and for the ratings, which have pretty clearly been beyond expectations. Were there ever conversations before the premiere about what AMC was expecting or hoping for?

Gale Anne Hurd: Any numbers? No. Nope. I don’t think that’s the way that AMC approaches things and it’s certainly not the way that Frank [Darabont], Robert [Kirkman] and I looked at it. It was always, “Let’s make the best possible show. AMC has a tremendous marketing and promotions department. So let’s make sure that we’re making a show that all of us as fans want to see.”

Full Article: http://www.hitfix.com/blogs/the-fien-print/posts/hitfix-interview-gale-anne-hurd-post-mortems-walking-dead-season-1

Warning: This article contains spoilers that some readers may prefer to avoid.

AMC
The Walking Dead actor Michael Rooker has teased when fans can expect to see his controversial character Merle Dixon return to the series.

However, Rooker claims that despite hints in the series suggesting he may return to plague the other survivors for the conclusion, this is not the case.

“I won’t be back, I’m still going to be MIA,” Rooker told The Hollywood Reporter about tonight’s US season finale. “But it’s really set up well for me to bounce back, and I’m looking forward to it.”

Full Article: http://www.digitalspy.com/ustv/s135/the-walking-dead/news/a291555/rooker-teases-future-on-walking-dead.html

In an interview with EW, The Walking Dead executive producer Gale Anne Hurd (The Terminator, Aliens) denies reports that director Frank Darabont fired the hit AMC show’s writing staff. She also confirmed that all of the principal cast — or, presumably, the actors whose characters are still alive at the end of this Sunday’s season finale — are signed up for multiple seasons of the zombie show.

Earlier this week, Deadline reported that Shawshank Redemption filmmaker Frank Darabont — who developed the Walking Dead for television and directed the pilot — had let go the show’s writers, including Murder One co-creator Charles “Chic” Eglee. But earlier today, Hurd refuted that allegation. “It’s completely inaccurate,” she told EW exclusively. “[In] the writers’ room, there are people that have set up other projects that will be their first priority if their own series is picked up as a pilot or if it’s a series. I think [Eglee] just decided that he wants to run his own show.”

Full Article: http://insidetv.ew.com/2010/12/03/walking-dead-darabont-hurd-writers/

As the resident score nerd at Splash Page HQ, I sat down with “The Walking Dead” composer Bear McCreary to discuss writing music for zombies vs. music for humans, and various other elements of his “Walking Dead” work. Now that the bulk of the season is behind us, we can finally publish one of our meatiest McCreary bites: a discussion of character deaths and how to address them musically, which scenes he’s looking forward to scoring in upcoming episodes, and a little video of the man in action, conducting “The Walking Dead” musicians.

“So much of the first few episodes is about external forces,” McCreary told MTV News. “It’s about the apocalypse. It’s about trying to get from Point A to Point B. We’re trying to understand what’s going on.”

“It’s not a lot about internal forces, and when a character that we know and love passes away, that’s a moment when it’s not about the events, it’s about what these people are feeling,” he explained. “And this show is one of those rare opportunities where you get to do both. So, the character deaths are just such a moving experience, and I love writing them, even though I hate saying goodbye to these characters that I love. . . But at the same time, it’s just an opportunity for incredible drama and great storytelling.”

Full Article: http://splashpage.mtv.com/2010/12/02/the-walking-dead-composer-bear-mccreary/

In a recent exclusive interview with Collider, Laurie Holden talked about this being her third collaboration with executive producer/director/writer Frank Darabont, how much fun she’s had with the physical side of Andrea, how emotionally draining the work is and how surreal the huge success of the series has been for everyone involved. Check out what she had to say after the jump.

How did you originally get involved with The Walking Dead? Since you’d worked with Frank Darabont before, did he specifically reach out to you for this?

LAURIE HOLDEN: Well, I’ve worked with Frank on two other collaborations, The Majestic with Jim Carrey and Stephen King’s The Mist. When The Walking Dead officially got greenlit, he called me up and said, “My passion project just got off the ground. There’s a role I think you’re perfect for. Would you consider the role of Andrea?” And I was like, “Wow, I’d love to take a look at it.” So, I read the pilot script and was knocked out. And then, I picked up Compendium 1 of Robert Kirkman’s graphic novel and was just blown away by the storytelling, and I signed up immediately.

Full Article: http://www.collider.com/2010/12/01/laurie-holden-interview-the-walking-dead/