When The Walking Dead came to an end in 2022, it did so on the promise that the story would continue. It held true to that promise pretty quickly as, not only did long-running spinoff Fear The Walking Dead return for its final season, three new spinoffs were launched to tell new stories featuring classic TWD characters. Against all odds, the TWD Universe lived.
When it was first confirmed that we would get the new spinoffs, it was assumed that Daryl Dixon, The Ones Who Live, and Dead City were all building towards a Marvel-esque endgame that would allow them to eventually cross over in a few years to bid the franchise farewell in the way that the original show could not. Unfortunately, a lot of fans have just realized that this won't be the case, as one of these spinoffs doesn't run parallel to the others, meaning that the crossover we had hoped for will probably never happen - at least not in the way we imagined that it would.
Dead City is actually set years after the other spinoffs
The concept of the new TWD Universe spinoffs was simple: Short, efficent, and compelling new stories that make the most of the new chapter in the franchise, allow the original actors to stay on in their most famous roles, and eventually reunite in a grand finale. It's what fans have been hoping for for years. And considering that both The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon and The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live are set in 2023 - the same year that the series finale of the original show was set in - that seemed feasible. It still is, in a way, for those two. For the other spinoff? Not so much.
The Walking Dead: Dead City is actually set in 2029. That would explain the New Babylon Marshalls' rise to power (they are nowhere to be seen in The Walking Dead) and why that particular spinoff has a relatively Mad Max feel to it in its first episode. It would also explain why Hershel is much older than he was when we last saw him in the final season of the mothership series. But it's still pretty hard to wrap your head around - so hard, in fact, that a lot of fans have just figured it out in recent months - two years after the show originally premiered.
Look, we get it: Time jumps make for great drama. It allows a show like Dead City to reintroduce characters like Maggie Rhee and Negan and make them different from the last time we saw them. It also allows the show to use that passage of time to build on the feud that they had seemingly put to rest in the final episode of The Walking Dead. When they parted ways in that episode, Maggie said that although she could forgive Negan for killing her husband Glenn, she recognised that he had changed and would no longer try to kill him. But when they reunited in Dead City years down the line, the doubt, anger, and hatred had resurfaced. Fans didn't love that as it felt like the franchise was walking back over dead storylines, but the time jump allowed for it.
Even so, I don't think as many fans were attuned to the fact that it had been six years - meaning that all of the events of Daryl Dixon and The Ones Who Live have already taken place by this point in the timeline. That also means that Maggie - and likely Negan - know that Rick Grimes had returned to Alexandria all those years ago, and yet they never mentioned it once. Not a single time did the topic of the man who got between Maggie's attempts to kill Negan all those years beforehand come up in Dead City. That's pretty baffling if you ask me, especially considering how important Rick was to both characters.
Rick is one of Maggie's oldest friends. He's the man who stopped her from killing Negan, and the man who allowed the villain to live on the hope that he might achieve redemption some day. He was taken by the Civic Republic Military before he got to see that redemption happen - which ironically came about via Negan's bond with Rick's daughter Judith. Therefore, it's hard to believe that it never came up when the old foes reunited and took multiple trips down memory lane to the dark days when Negan and The Saviors were running wild.
Now, this was all likely done to prevent spoiling The Ones Who Live, which had yet to premiere when the first season of Dead City aired. But, in hindsight, this makes Dead City's premiere as the first of the new spinoffs all the more baffling. Why would AMC launch the new TWD Universe era with what is currently "the end" of the TWD timeline?
But Rick's return never came up in conversation in Dead City season 2 either, and that leaves us all to wonder if the show will ever reference the events of the TWD miniseries, the fact that Rick and Michonne returned to Alexandria, and whether Negan was even aware of that since he isn't a part of any of these communities anymore.
Dead City's awkward timeline placement makes fans' hopes of TWD revival crossover unlikely
Dead City's long-awaited return for its second season earlier this year brought its placement in the timeline back into the spotlight. Although many knew that it took place at a certain future point in the TWD timeline, few knew the extent of it. And it has unfortunately made those same fans' hopes of a TWD crossover finale all the more unlikely.
As many of us thought that Daryl Dixon, Dead City, and The Ones Who Live were all taking place simultaneously, that would have allowed for each of the starring characters to reunite - either in the finale of one of the ongoing shows or for one final miniseries. Given that each of the spinoffs have a relatively short shelf-life (The Ones Who Live was a miniseries and Daryl Dixon will end with its fourth season) as they are telling short-term stories, the hope was that it would all build towards an Avengers: Endgame-like crossover (or a Walking Dead season 12, if you will) that would feature Andrew Lincoln's Rick, Danai Gurira's Michonne, Norman Reedus' Daryl Dixon, Melissa McBride's Carol Peletier and, indeed, Lauren Cohan's Maggie Rhee and Jeffrey Dean Morgan's Negan. But Dead City's placement in the TWD timeline can't allow for that.
Rick and Michonne made it back to Alexandria in the series finale of their spinoff. We know Daryl and Carol are aiming to return home from their post-apocalyptic trip through Europe in the series finale of theirs. When that happens, they could very well reunite with Rick and Michonne. After all, Andrew Lincoln has revealed that there are conversations about bringing Rick back in some capacity. A cameo appearance in the series finale of Daryl Dixon to have him reunite with his closest friends could be where that takes place.
But what of Dead City's stars? We don't know what Maggie is up to at this point in the timeline. Now, a Manhattan trip with Negan to rescue her son would expalin that absence, but as that doesn't happen for another six years, that's not where she is. So, if there was a reunion on-screen in the near-future, the show would write around that by having Maggie appear in some capacity (perhaps setting up the events of Dead City in a way). But considering that it seems her and Negan didn't cross paths in his six years away from our survivors' bases, that would rule an appearance from him out - and when you take into account how important Rick's survival was to his arc, that would be a disappointment.
The truth is that Rick's return deserves more than a cameo appearance in a series finale. That's where another adventure should begin for him and his friends - one more larger-than-life offering to bid farewell to these characters and the franchise. He was one of Daryl's best friends and extremely close to Carol and Maggie too. All of them should see that he defied the odds and returned from his apparent death. The same goes for Negan, who owes his redemption to Rick's refusal to give up on humanity.
Unfortunately, Dead City's existence six years in the future, and the character dynamics that it has established for the years in between, makes that highly unlikely. And given that it's the way that fans want this beloved franchise to end, that's a real shame.