Stephen Merchant Is The Standout Of A Solid If Unspectacular Season Premiere

Warning! This review contains spoilers for The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon‘s season 3 premiere.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon’s season 3 premiere jumps into its new story arc a little hastily, but this latest outing has gotten off to an exciting start nevertheless. This spinoff got exponentially better when Carol came along last season. Season 1 was little more than a shallow redo of The Last of Us with a French makeover, but season 2 reunited one of The Walking Dead’s most iconic duos and told a much more original, much more engaging story.

Now that they’ve left France, this series is starting to feel like National Lampoon’s European Vacation with zombies. In this episode alone, their sightseeing trip takes them to two more European nations. After Daryl Dixon season 2 ended with Daryl and Carol making their way through a hallucinogen-infested Channel Tunnel, season 3 picks up with their arrival in a mostly deserted England.

As a Brit, I got a real kick out of seeing the Walking Dead-ified version of my homeland. My hat goes off to the VFX and production design teams for creating such a fully realized vision of post-apocalyptic London on a TV budget. They threw in a lot of inventive little visual flourishes, too: a zombie trapped in a red telephone box; a quarantine zone with “SOD OFF!” spray-painted on the wall; Tower Bridge permanently stuck in the “up” position. Big Ben proves to be a handy tool to draw hordes of the undead away.

Guest Star Stephen Merchant Makes This An Episode To Remember

Merchant Gives A Great Turn As The Omega Englishman

Stephen Merchant in post-apocalyptic London in The Walking Dead Daryl Dixon season 3

Seeing Stephen Merchant in a Walking Dead show wasn’t on my bingo card for this year, but he makes the episode. Merchant’s Julian Chamberlain believes he’s the only survivor left in the UK; “the last Englishman in England,” as he puts it. He was perfect casting for this role. As seen in Hello Ladies, The Outlaws, and his own standup, Merchant plays awkwardness really well. Since Julian hasn’t seen another human being in years, his social skills have gotten a bit rusty, so this role demands awkwardness. But Merchant also shows off his surprising dramatic abilities when Julian talks about his regrets, his self-doubts, and his unimaginable loneliness.

Of course, it’s Norman Reedus and Melissa McBride’s show, and their on-screen chemistry is as strong as ever. I appreciated that Jason Richman and David Zabel didn’t overwrite the episode. In a lot of recent TV shows, from The Last of Us to Dune: Prophecy, the writers have felt the need to spell out every little emotional turn in on-the-nose, plain-as-day dialogue. But not everything needs to be said out loud, especially between two people who know each other as well as Daryl and Carol. Richman and Zabel leave plenty of room for unspoken moments between Reedus and McBride.

Daryl Dixon Season 3’s Plotting Feels A Bit Rushed

The Premiere Episode Can’t Wait To Get To Spain

When it was announced that season 3 would be set in Spain after the season 2 finale established a UK setting, I expected some plot contrivances to be involved in the pivot to yet another new country. But it’s not so much that the plot is contrived; they set sail from England, hit a storm on their way back to America, and wash up in Spain, which all makes sense from a dramatic and logical standpoint. The problem is that the pacing feels a bit rushed.

In the space of just one episode, this premiere races through enough material for a whole season set in England to get to the story in Spain.

In the space of just one episode, this premiere races through enough material for a whole season set in England to get to the story in Spain. It would’ve been a much neater transition if they’d set up the journey to Spain at the end of season 2 or set the Spain storyline in England. But cinematically, the Spanish setting is a treat. Once they arrive in Spain and the sun comes up, the visuals are gorgeous — it looks like a post-apocalyptic spaghetti western.

Spain turns out to be even more hostile than France. Not too long after they’ve crashed on a beach, their shipwreck is inspected by a creepy cult on horseback, wielding torches and wearing masks made of animal skulls. I can’t remember the last time The Walking Dead franchise genuinely scared me — especially since the characters have gotten so used to killing zombies that it’s become a mundane chore, not a fight for survival — but the first appearance of that group in this episode really creeped me out.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon airs new episodes on AMC every Sunday.

Overall, the third season of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon has gotten off to a solid start. The overgrown Spanish countryside, full of zombies and unhinged cultists, is a fascinating new setting for these characters to explore. Daryl and Carol have an endlessly watchable dynamic, and the final scene of the episode — in which Daryl sees those bad dudes riding through again, returns to his camp, and finds that Carol is missing — is a strong enough hook to have me excited about where it’ll go next week.