Today I will be doing a spoiler-free review of season 7 of The Walking Dead. I think this is the worst season so far for this show. I don’t think it’s horrible at all, in fact, it is a decent season for sure. However, there is so much dragging on and filler in this season that it makes it tough to get through at times. Throughout the season there are only 3 really standout episodes, which I’ll get to soon. Besides those 3 episodes, there are about 3-4 solid episodes, the biggest issue is that leaves 9 episodes that aren’t worth talking about. This season also has one of the worst episodes in the show up to this point in episode 6, which is titled “Swear.” Now those 3 standout episodes, in episodes 1, 8, and 16. The season kicks off in a crazy way with the introduction of Negan continuing from how season 6 ended. The entire episode is perfectly done and shows the fear of Rick and the rest of the group very well. Two very important things happen in this episode that I won’t talk about because of spoilers, but they change the course of the rest of the show. Episode 8 is just fantastic, with not nearly as much action as there usually is in the standout episodes for this show. Just great acting from everyone involved, where you see more of the brutality from Negan and the Saviors. In the season finale, episode 16, it is just a lot of action. However, the action is great and is a very cool ending to the season setting up a lot of potential for season 8.
The villain of this season as I mentioned was Negan and the Saviors. Negan is without a doubt my favorite villain in the show’s history and the best character of the season for me. Every time he was on screen the episode got immediately better and he just absolutely nails this role. The other standout, per usual, is Rick Grimes. The acting from Andrew Lincoln is once again perfect and this character changed a lot over the course of a season. In season 6 he was cocky and thought he and the group were invincible. While in this season he’s scared and basically gives in to all of Negan’s demands out of terror. Carl Grimes finally steps into an even bigger role as well and he nailed this transition flawlessly. The other main characters of the group still remain Carol, Daryl, Maggie, and Tara have a bigger role this season as well. I think an issue of this season was once again the pacing. I’ve mentioned this in every review so far as minor issues, but this season it was significantly worse. As I mentioned before, there was a lot of filler this season and just plain out boring episodes. I still think the plot made sense, but sometimes it felt like they were just trying to extend the season because they didn’t have enough material to get through the whole season.
I always rate shows I watch and I rate them based on 10 things in the show. Those things are: action, acting, cinematography, pacing, score, characters, ending, plot, protagonist, and antagonist. I rate all of those pieces 1-10 and then after that, I add up the scores of all 10 of them and get a total score out of 100. I gave this season a 75/100, and obviously from stuff I’ve said in this review there are some truly great things in this season. However, the problems were very glaring this season and stood out way too much for me to give this a better rating.
