A time jump could be a major boon for The Walking Dead

There are rumors circulating that The Walking Dead will experience a time jump in season 9, and that could be exactly what the show needs.

As The Walking Dead cast and crew starts filming season 9, rumors have been swirling that recent set upgrades, including a windmill and water tower, are signs that there will be a time jump in season 9. Over the past few seasons fans have expressed disdain for the show’s pacing, and a time jump might be exactly what  the show needs.

Fear the Walking Dead has been doing great after its soft reboot in season 4. Fear has been successfully managing two timelines, both of which take place at some point well after the events of the season 3 finale. Morgan Jones made the jump to Fear, which means the timelines in the present have finally merged. 

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There’s a distinct advantage to jumping ahead in the timeline. For one, you can skip a lot of the rebuilding that will have to happen following an event like All Out War. The narrative skips ahead as well, so you can show characters in a very different place because time has passed. Skipping ahead freshens things up.

That’s one of the distinct downfalls of the way The Walking Dead has been filmed since season 6. The events that have transpired with Negan have almost happened in real time. Judith is a bit older, sure, but in reality it hasn’t been more than a few years since the apocalypse began. There’s not a lot of room for character growth when the sixteen episodes of the season play out over the span of a few weeks.

Looking at other longstanding shows and it’s clear that time passes, and so too do the stories. Grey’s Anatomy comes to mind because over the course of fourteen seasons, the time has passed quickly enough for interns to progress through their internships, residencies and fellowships. New interns have made it through their internships. The characters fall in love, get married, and have kids. Those kids, who were born on the show, are now pre-teens.

Having the kind of temporal progression that shows like Grey’s Anatomy enjoys could be a boon to The Walking Dead, which tends to spend a lot of time preparing for the next big catastrophe. Instead of focusing on an event, a season of sixteen episodes could represent a year. That would pose a challenge to the writers, who would have to pack a narrative into fewer episodes (say, 4 episodes each for winter, spring, summer and fall) but it could be done.

Next: Fear the Walking Dead stays on top of Sunday night ratings

A time jump, if done properly, could be a major step for The Walking Dead and move the story into the future.