After years of uncertainty, ‘The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live’ just cleared up a glaring confusion in the franchise’s timeline.
Several time skips have created confusion among fans during its eleven years of run.
However, ‘The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live’ provides concrete evidence of when the spinoff takes place, with the pilot indicating its place in the Walking Dead timeline.
Episode 1, titled ‘Years,’ illustrates what happened to Rick after his Walking Dead disappearance, highlighting each event after that.
The episode starts with Rick’s escape debacle, which happens five years after the infamous bridge incident. This helps clarify the timeline after Rick’s season 9 departure.
The episode also references incidents like Rick’s years of training and the Omaha incident from ‘World Beyond,’ highlighting how much time has passed.
However, the last timestamp simply states ‘now,’ leaving the year and the exact time ambiguous.
In ‘The Ones Who Live,’ RJ’s age is crucial in pinpointing the show’s timeline.
Initially, Michonne keeps RJ’s existence a secret from Rick, but in episode 4, she finally reveals that RJ is eight years old. This detail implies that the spinoff occurred approximately nine years after the bridge incident.
When Rick destroyed the bridge and vanished, Michonne was in the early stages of pregnancy, and Rick was unaware of it.
Consequently, considering Michonne’s pregnancy and RJ’s age, we can assume that the spinoff begins nearly a decade after season 9.
These subtle clarifications help audiences keep track of everything. The timeline wasn’t as crucial in the main show because everything was happening simultaneously. However, keeping track of timelines has become increasingly complex and essential because of a barrage of spinoffs involving the main characters.
Thankfully, RJ’s age makes it quite clear that the spinoff is a modern story.
‘The Ones Who Live” is set nine years after the events of season 9. By comparing it to the climax of ;The Walking Dead,’ we can conclude that the flashforward ending of The Walking Dead takes place around 2022 or 2023.
Considering that nine years have passed since the bridge incident, we can surely conclude that ‘The Ones Who Live’ takes place when season 11 happens in the original show.
However, an exact comparison between the events of ‘The Ones Who Live’ and ‘The Walking Dead’ season 11 is impossible because of how cluttered the timeline is.
We expect the spinoff series to reference an event of season 11 to signify where it stands compared to the other.
We already know that Dead City and Daryl Dixon have advanced the timeline, and now we can guess that The Ones Who Live takes place along with The Walking Dead’s finale.
About The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live
The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live is an American post-apocalyptic television series created by Scott M. Gimple and Danai Gurira for AMC. It is set after the conclusion of the original The Walking Dead series, with Andrew Lincoln, Danai Gurira, and Pollyanna McIntosh reprising their roles.
The Ones Who Live is the sixth spin-off and overall seventh television series in The Walking Dead franchise.
The Ones Who Live premiered February 25, 2024, on AMC and AMC+.
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