Okay, so the story can be repetitive and the characters annoying for the sake of drama, but what about the drama itself? Surely if the drama is compelling enough that makes all the dumb antics worth it, right? Oh, if only that were the case. The drama of The Walking Dead is just not very compelling. Part of it is that we really dont know much about a majority of the characters. It is so painful to watch the show try to establish a connection between the audience and Tyreese's love for a character like Karen, who died in episode 2 of the fourth season. No time is spent to develop her, which wouldnt be so bad if Tyreese had also been developed enough so that wed at least care about his reaction. Since that hadnt happened either, it falls flat. Such is the nature of The Walking Deads drama. It merely expects you to care instead of earning it; superficial and surface level at best. This is strange, because it has more than enough time to develop its characters. A counter example of this is Game of Thrones, which is able to juggle an immense cast over great distances and make the most out of each characters limited screen time. The Walking Dead spends more time with a smaller group of characters in one location, yet for some reason the majority of them still come off as underdeveloped. A perfect example of this is the episode The Grove, infamous for the death of the two girls Lizzie and Mika. Such a situation should be heartbreaking and disturbing, but Lizzie is so annoyingly stupid up until that point that it instead inspires anger, relief, and maybe some laughs. Who honestly felt bad when Carol put her out of her misery? Frankly, she was doing us a favor. But were supposed to feel bad because she is a kid. That may be the case in real life, but this is television. The audience needs to like a character in order to care. Basically, when one watches The Walking Dead, you get the sense that its trying to be more important than it actually is. Its trying to say something about human nature in the face of extinction. But every time the show opens its mouth, it comes off as pretentious and self-important. When it stops to develop its characters, the resulting drama is hammy, hence why it continues to be overlooked among its peers despite its popularity.
