'The Walking Dead' Gets a New Showrunner, and She Is Amazing

By Dustin Rowles | The Walking Dead | January 13, 2018 |

By Dustin Rowles | The Walking Dead | January 13, 2018 |

I have been a longtime fan of The Walking Dead writer, Angela Kang, even suggesting back in 2015 that she should replace Dave Erickson as showrunner to the then struggling Fear the Walking Dead. AMC has done her one better, elevating her to the new showrunner of the parent series, The Walking Dead. Kang has been a writer on the series since season two (having written over 20 episodes), and a producer for the last several years. She’s also written some of the show’s biggest episodes — the fourth season finale, the seventh season finale, and the most recent episode, the eighth mid-season finale. Oh, and before The Walking Dead? She was a writer on the cult series, Terriers. She’s good.

And whatever else you want to say about The Walking Dead, it’s the most popular series on television, and it’s now being run by a Korean-American woman. That’s big. Indeed, after some issues in its early years, The Walking Dead has since evolved into one of the most diverse shows on television (and unlike its cable juggernaut counterpart Game of Thrones, The Walking Dead has a decent rotation of female writers and directors).

Meanwhile, Scott Gimple — the subject of a petition launched to get him fired after he killed off a major character in the eighth mid-season finale — is not being fired. He’s being promoted. He will now oversee the entire The Walking Dead universe, a fairly important position with Lennie James moving over to Fear the Walking Dead, which is getting something of a reboot in its fourth season with new showrunners and a fairly exciting set of new characters played by Garret Dillahunt, Jenna Elfman, and Maggie Grace (Lost). I believe that Ray McKinnon will also return in the fourth season after appearing in the third season finale. In fact, I was more excited about the future of Fear than The Walking Dead, at least until Angela Kang took over. I suspect she will inject into the series some much needed enthusiasm.