‘The Walking Dead’ Season 8 Premiere Date Unveiled Amid Worries That Stuntman’s Death Means A Longer Wait
The Walking Dead Season 8 premiere date has finally been announced, easing fans’ worries of waiting longer for the zombie-apocalypse-themed series to return after production was halted following the death of TWD stuntman John Bernecker.
Fans of the popular AMC TV series are in for a treat after the network finally revealed the show’s return date for its eighth season just as they start to worry that they would have to wait way longer because of the inadvertent death of a stuntman for the show.
The announcement, which first appeared on the show’s official website on Wednesday, stated that The Walking Dead Season 8 premiere date has been set to Sunday, October 22, 2017.
In the announcement, AMC also shared an epic key art for the upcoming new season that shows what will happen when the show returns.
Hitting off from where Season 7 ended, Season 8 is bound to take violence on a whole new level as the unveiled poster features an all-out war between Rick and Negan.
This, says the network, is based on “one of the most notorious and bloody storylines from the comics” the show was based on. In fact, the poster itself was quite similar to the cover of The Walking Dead Issue #120 that also pitted the two leaders.
#TWD Comic-Con art is finally here. Are you ready for Rick and Negan to face off this fall? #SDCC pic.twitter.com/IyoOYmTUWB
— The Walking Dead (@WalkingDead_AMC) July 19, 2017
However, the network promised fans that they still have something to look forward to in The Walking Dead Season 8 premiere since there would still be differences between the series and the comics, including one about the storylines of characters that should have been dead at this point, if the TV series were religiously following the storyline in the comic books.
“For example, Carol and Morgan were already dead in the comics at this point and Daryl doesn’t exist; so all of their storylines will be interesting to watch play out in Season 8,” AMC said.
The first exclusive photo from #TWD Season 8 shows Daryl and Carol reunited. Check it out on @EW: https://t.co/CVwP1tDQ7U pic.twitter.com/MIoqHKrO6X
— The Walking Dead (@WalkingDead_AMC) July 12, 2017
Meanwhile, new details from the probe on stuntman John Bernecker’s death has been revealed on the same day that The Walking Dead Season 8 premiere date was announced.
Speaking to the Hollywood Reporter, veteran stuntman Conrad Palmisano, who also served as president of the Stuntmen’s Association of Motion Pictures, revealed that the matter of Bernecker’s death was “never a black and white thing.”
“Something obviously went wrong,” he told the outlet.
“It’s always a pinch of this, a dash of that, then something tragic happens.”
According to the outlet, the authorities’ report on the incident is based only on the accounts of two people present on the scene: actor Austin Amelio, who plays Dwight, and second assistant director Matthew Goodwin.
Based on the report, Deputy Sheriff J.P. Traylor, the first law enforcer to arrive, was not able to get hold of stunt coordinator Monty L. Simons as well as the show’s first assistant director, whose duties include set safety per the Directors Guild agreement with studios and producers.
Based on Traylor’s report, Bernecker’s fall should have been on pad made of a layer of boxes, PortaPit pads, and another large pad. Unfortunately, the stuntman missed the safety padding by inches, after he “did not appear to get good separation from the balcony” following his jump, based on Goodwin’s account of the incident.
After the accident that caused Bernecker his life, production of the show was suspended, leaving fans wondering whether The Walking Dead Season 8 premiere date would be later than usual.
[Featured Image by AMC]
