We waited years for an extremely scary variant of The Walking Dead walkers, and now season 4 of Daryl Dixon has answered fans' prayers—and the reactions show people are all the way back in.
At IGN Fan Fest 2026, AMC shared a special look at the upcoming season of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon for its fourth and final season. In the clip, Daryl (Norman Reedus) and Carol (Melissa McBride) are out in the wild when a walker suddenly appears. But instead of its normal shuffle, it runs at them. Full speed.
Daryl struggles to shoot it down until it gets eerily close, and he and Carol both see a tag attached to it. Before they can examine it further or figure out where it came from, they hear a rumble and look up.
In the distance, clouds of smoke signal an oncoming storm of the dead coming straight at them. The two of them rush back to the others, and when they can’t escape in their car, they take refuge behind it. As the camera looks up, we see hundreds of zombies running at top speed, heading straight past them.
Most rush forward, unaware they're hiding. But some push through underneath the car and attempt to bite the survivors, narrowly forcing them to escape. It’s a terrifying clip—and utterly thrilling for fans to finally see fast zombies for the first time in years in the world of The Walking Dead.
Fans are loving every aspect of these zombies
This is a horrifying threat to Daryl and Carol getting home, and it's clearly some new variant that was experimented on and spread fast in this part of the world (if that tag is to be believed). However, responses to the posted video on X have been extremely positive. One fan commented that this should have been what AMC did ages ago to the walkers:
they should've made the zombies run like 15 seasons ago. that looks way more entertaining
— George (@verybasedgeorge) October 14, 2026
Another fan agreed, saying that this makes the walkers a million times scarier:
They should have had them run YEARS ago. They are way more scary like this.
— OscarMike (@Nichola17893554) October 14, 2026
However, there were a few fans who wondered if this was just The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon trying to improve on their walkers because other shows and movies have made them super fast—like 28 Days Later:
Finally took a note from 28 Days Later franchise
— Matt (Flashpoint) 🇨🇦 (@CrownRoyal_007) October 14, 2026
Ironically, this actually made me snort a little. Several other zombie movies and shows have upped the ante and made these monsters a million times more terrifying. The first one I think of is World War Z. But after so many years of seeing the same kind of walkers, I’m still excited for this.
The first two seasons of this show showed that walkers can mutate. This is just something that comes from that, I’m guessing. And it’s going to make a heck of a lot of drama for these characters.
My favorite comment, however, related to one of my former passions — Call of Duty: Zombies:
It only took 16 years but TWD universe finally hit round 11 on zombies https://t.co/rd3wi4Gpvb
— ELG | Enzo (@EnzoTime_) October 15, 2026
If that’s not the most accurate description of this I’ve ever seen, I don’t know what is.
All of this makes me even more excited for season 4 of this series and how on earth this group is going to make it back to America with these walkers—or, rather, runners now—on their backs. How will our burning questions ever get answered? They might get run over by these monsters before they do.
You can watch the first three seasons of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon on both AMC+ and Netflix.
Add us as a preferred source on Google