The Walking Dead: Dead City episode 1 review: Mayhem at Manhattan

As we slowly usher into a new era of The Walking Dead, we look back and wonder how beautifully our characters have evolved over time. Everything falls into place once you think about the journey of the villain-turned-saint Negan and farmgirl-turned-walker terminator Maggie.

However, in The Walking Dead: Dead City, they meet under different circumstances.

Will Negan be able to complete his redemption arc? Will Maggie be able to look in the eye of her husband's killer and feel anything else except hate and resentment? Only time will tell.

The pilot of The Walking Dead: Dead City was titled Old Acquaintances. It was directed by Loren Yaconelli and written by Eli Jorné. It was released on June 18, 2023, on AMC.

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The Walking Dead: Dead City episode 1 review: It's raining walkers in the dead city

The Walking Dead: Dead City is set almost 15 years after the unholy events of Rick Grimes waking up from a coma and discovering a new family. There are a couple of changes this time around.

Human beings have learned to coexist with Walkers, just the way they did in real life when a deadly pandemic hit the globe. However, peace is never an option in this vicious universe.

Maggie is still the leader of Hilltop but nothing is the same. A newer baddie named The Croat is on the loose and he operates almost like a pre-incarcerated Negan.

And the worst part is, he has taken Maggie's father's namesake son hostage to a Manhattan infested with Walkers. The widow's motherly instincts instantly kick in and she is ready to do anything to retrieve her son, even if it means partnering with the killer of her husband, Negan.

She has learned some slick new moves and almost functions like a hacker/slasher video game character. Some humans have made a sleepy town called New Babylon their permanent settlement, and it is here where she meets Negan.

He is not alone but with his adoptive daughter Ginny. It doesn't take Maggie too long to convince him to enter a particular hellhole to bring back Hershel because she knows Negan is longing for her forgiveness.

Later, a new character named Perlie Armstrong gets introduced. He almost has the same values as Rick Grimes but the only difference is, Negan is miraculously afraid of him.

Meanwhile, Armstrong is on the hunt for Negan because the crime he committed will never be forgotten or forgiven by the law. Furthermore, Armstrong, a marshal, strongly sides with the law. Armstrong figures Negan and Maggie are headed to Manhattan and follows them.

Negan leaves Ginny with the new hilltop and embarks upon an uncertain journey. There are moments when Maggie observes Negan's affection towards his daughter and it reminds her of her own failure as a wife and mother.

The duo then kidnaps one of Armstrong's comrades as an insurance policy and makes it to Manhattan via sea.

Manhattan in The Walking Dead: Dead City is hell on earth. A tiny island, crawling with walkers. Life is an afterthought and only the dead are alive. While the land is infested, the skies are ruled by humans.

Humans in Manhattan have adopted a new way to travel from point A to B, via a cable system. It's not a hundred percent effective but extreme situations demand extreme responses. The Croat's reign of terror over this island is even candidly displayed as he does not think twice before taking lives.

Maggie and Negan have to protect themselves from Walkers, The Croat, and Armstrong, whose do-or-die attitude makes him follow the duo to Manhattan. A game of cat and mouse ensues in the dead city where Armstrong ends up killing his own insurance policy.

After dodging the marshal and walkers, who not only walk but fall from the skies, Negan and Maggie take shelter in a building but there they are introduced to a horrifying new character who does not have a name as of now. Friend or foe? That remains to be seen till episode 2 of The Walking Dead: Dead City comes out.