Move over, Daryl: The women are in charge. AMC has officially greenlit the third series in The Walking Dead universe, the network announced on Monday, April 8. The new drama will begin production on 10 episodes in Virginia in summer 2019. It will premiere in 2020.
The new Walking Dead series “will feature two young female protagonists and focus on the first generation to come-of-age in the apocalypse as we know it,” the press release revealed. “Some will become heroes. Some will become villains. In the end, all of them will be changed forever. Grown-up and cemented in their identities, both good and bad.”
The Walking Dead, based on the comic book series of the same name by Robert Kirkman, began in 2010 and just wrapped its ninth season. In 2015, the first spinoff, Fear the Walking Dead, premiered and season 5 will kick off on June 2.
Scott M. Gimple, chief content officer of the franchise, as well as writer and producer Matt Negrete, will serve as cocreators of the new spinoff. Negrete will also be the showrunner of the new zombie drama.
“I’m beyond excited to be a part of this new show set in The Walking Dead Universe,” he said in a statement. “Writing and producing for the original series has been the job of a lifetime and I’m honored to be working with Scott and all the fine Dead folks at AMC in this new capacity. I can’t wait for the fans of the franchise to see what we’ve been cooking up!”
The Walking Dead universe is also expanding into the film world with three movies focusing on Andrew Lincoln‘s Rick Grimes, whose last episode of The Walking Dead aired in November 2018.
“These films are going to be big evolutions of what we’ve been doing on the show, with the scope and scale of features,” Gimple said at the time. “We’re starting with the first part of the continuing story of Rick Grimes, and there is much more on the way, featuring yet-unseen worlds of The Walking Dead and faces from the show’s past, as well as new characters we hope to become favorites, told by TWD veterans and emerging voices.”
