Why The Walking Dead Should Stop Giving Out Screeners To Critics – Forbes

The Walking Dead

Its rare that Ill make an argument for something that will actively make my life more annoying, but at this point, Im starting to believe that it might be a good idea for The Walking Dead to stop giving out episode screeners to critics. Which would include me.

Why? Well, first you have to understand why screeners exist in the first place. Its like getting an early review copy of a video game. Critics get access to episodes of a show before they air so they can prep preview and review coverage around when the actual episode airs. Theres an understanding that youre not going to post the review of an episode before it airs, unless youre specifically told a spoiler-free preview review is cool, and the concept works. The network gets timely, consistent coverage for a show, the critic gets to release thoughts exactly when theyre relevant without waiting for the actual airing and scrambling to get the first review up for clicks.

And yet sometimes this goes wrong, like how Game of Thrones eventually had to stop giving out screeners for critics because of leaks. And the same thing has been happening to The Walking Dead for years now, and its getting kind of annoying.

There is quite literally an entire fansite built around spoiling The Walking Dead called The Spoiling Dead Fans, or TSDF. While sometimes they get inside information or secret set snaps, the majority of their coverage is someone either with the site who has access to screeners, or someone they know who has access to screeners, who every single week writes a massive article a few days early (screeners usually go out on Wednesday) spoiling every aspect of the episode. I know this is based on screener access because I am watching the same episodes as them, and there is literally no other way they could get this level of information. They are never wrong because they are watching the full episode, or talking to someone who has.

Heres an example of one of those for this weeks midseason finale (obviously full of ten million spoilers). Every week on reddit they do a Q and A explaining every detail of the episode early. This results in a huge chunk of the fanbase knowing exactly whats coming, and we get things like people spamming comments on social media under tweets or Instagram posts with spoilers that come from these revelations directly. Or in this weeks case (mild spoilers) they take the air out of the midseason finale by saying it doesnt have a big moment that people were expecting. In the past, theyve spoiled things like the exact list of all the heads that ended up on pikes in one of the biggest moments in series history.

The Walking Dead

Its gotten so bad and widely known among the Walking Dead cast and crew that Chandler Riggs actually wrote a personal letter to TSDF in order to pretty much beg them not to spoil the fact that his character died back in season 8. They agreed to that request, and yet every single cast member isnt going to write a letter every time they dont want something about them spoiled, and weirdly, by agreeing to Chandlers request, they are acknowledging what theyre doing is harmful and bad for the show. Cool, you listened to Chandler because he personally reached out, but what about every other actor, director or writer that wanted their own moments to be a surprise? Yet TSDF ruins them every week.

It seems like the only way to deal with TSDF would be to simply cut off screener access for all critics, because we cant know for sure how theyre getting their information. If this was a blanket ban it would cut me off too, but at this point, Im not sure what else AMC is supposed to do. Maybe reset everyones access and just let a scarce handful of critics back in who they deem trustworthy enough.

I guess I dont even fully blame TSDF for posting information theyre given, because theyre not journalists, theyre just random internet fans, so they can do what they want and arent bound to any particular code or embargo system. Yet I think it makes the show actively worse when we get a massive 1,200 word spoiler dump every single week before airing, which trickles its way into social media and can spoil the show for fans who arent even searching out spoilers. Its high time to figure out how to kill this, at least in terms of spoiler sources with screener access.

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Why The Walking Dead Should Stop Giving Out Screeners To Critics - Forbes

Reviewed and Recommended by Erik Baquero