Developer:
Skybound LLC.

Compatible with:
iPhone 3GS and up (optimized for iPhone 5)

iPod Touch 3rd gen and up

iPad

Requires:
iOS 4.3 or later

Price:

$1.99

Available here

Between the amazing 3^rd season of the AMC show, and the groundbreaking, incredible, indescribably inventive Telltale Games adventure series, we’ve been treated to more “Walking Dead” goodness this year than anyone could have possible anticipated. Yet for mobile developer Skybound, it wasn’t quite enough as they now bring us yet another reason to celebrate the increasing influence of the Robert Kirkman comic series on the digital world with their gaming app, “The Walking Dead: Assault”.

The game, much like Telltale’s, is based off of the original comic, and not the TV show, which is immediately evident by the appealing visual style, where most everything in the game is smartly presented in black and white except for aspects of characters, items, and blood. It lends a very necessary immediate appeal, and produces that always appreciated (if unwelcome) “someone looking over your shoulder while you play” effect.

Unlike the Telltale masterpiece though, this game is centered more on action than character interaction, as it employs a squad based  mechanic (think “X-Men Legends”) that feels right at home in this world. At its core, it doesn’t stray far from the usual tropes of the genre, as you select a group of 4 characters and take them through a series of levels completing mandatory and optional objectives, while fighting off waves of enemies. Along the way you can improve character and group attributes, acquire a range of supplies and weapons (melee and ranged) and take advantage of character’s unique abilities and group effects such as always hitting head shots for a short period of time, or increasing overall group damage. It makes the careful selection of your group vital and entertaining.

Outside of standard mechanics, the game incorporates some specific aspects of the zombie apocalypse nicely through elements like the sound detection system, which allows you to use environmental distractions to draw zombies (though too much noise will bring down the fury of the entire horde). It also does a nice job of compensating for the limits of the touch mechanics, and everything from managing the group, to managing the camera, is handled smoothly. Meanwhile, features like your group auto firing when enemies are in range help keep the action from being upset by poor design, and really show off the potential of this type of game on the mobile format when done well.

“The Walking Dead: Assault” is designed to perfection, which is great since underneath it all is an intensely fun adventure that’s multiple sections and objectives provide a lengthy experience that satisfies that immediate “kill all zombies” urge, but also lends some real substance to the proceedings with the leveling and ability functions. Thanks to the style and execution of the game, the constant bombardment of action never really feels repetitive, and the story of the comics is well implemented through comic book panel interludes.

Right now the game is only the first in a planned series of chapters, but even if more weren’t on the way, this title would be an easy recommendation. Zombie games are a dime a dozen, and mobile squad games rarely work out as they should, but of course it’s the “Walking Dead” series that again breaks new ground. Much like pulling the trigger on a walker, anyone with a slight interest in this game can’t afford to hesitate and should snatch this app up at the introductory $1.99 price.

It was Romero’s “Dawn of the Dead” that theorized that when there is no more room left in hell, the dead will walk the Earth. While that was meant as a warning of the end of days, in this case it’s a welcome happenstance that lends us the chance to play “The Walking Dead: Assault”, a no-brainer (pun very much intended) app of the week.

So…where were we?

Oh, fine, let’s go ahead and deal with the elephant in the room: it’s been nine months since Bullz-Eye doled out its last TV Power Rankings. What can we say? There were a lot of good shows on the air between May 2011 and February 2012, and somewhere around late October, it just kind of reached a point where we said, “You know what? It’s way more fun to watch TV than it is to write about it.” Eventually, though, the powers that be pried us off the couch (there’s still an indentation where we were sitting), set us back in front of the computer, and said, “Look, the readers demand to know Bullz-Eye’s take on the best shows of the past year* and, frankly, they’re starting to get a little belligerent about it.”

(*Rounded up for statistical purposes.)

So here we are, ready to offer up our list of the 25 best shows on television** as well as several shows bubbling just under our list, plus a new section called “Still Too New to Call,” where we praise shows that seem pretty damned good after their first few episodes but simply haven’t been around long enough for us to feel comfortable including them in the other two lists.

(**Okay, technically, it’s the 24 best shows on television plus one show that hasn’t been on since 2010, but we’re so excited about that particular show coming back that we included it, anyway.)

All told, we hope you’ll walk away from this piece either nodding your head in agreement or wondering why you haven’t been watching some of these shows. If not, however, there’s a perfectly good Comments section that’s just waiting for your opinions about what’s good on TV.

Everybody ready? Then let’s get this thing started…

No, it’s not quite the same show it used to be, owing to the fact that the cast now consists of almost as many women as it does men, but with the series now in its fifth season, the trio of Kaley Cuouo, Melissa Rauch, and Mayim Bialik have probably infused “The Big Bang Theory” with more laughs than the it would’ve had at this point if it had stuck strictly to the original four geeks. The only question now is how much longer we’ll have to wait for Raj to come out of the closet…because, seriously, you don’t need to possess gay-dar to see that that’s what they’re leading up to.

When we first picked back up with Nancy Botwin (Mary-Louise Parker) for the seventh season of “Weeds,” she’d spent three years cooling her heels in the clink while the rest of the Botwin clan had been chillin’ in Copenhagen, but with Nancy being shifted to a halfway house in New York City, a family reunion was only inevitable. Big shock: Nancy started selling pot again. Possibly bigger shock: even going into its eighth season, “Weeds” is still reliably entertaining.

When it comes to watching “New Girl,” one’s level of appreciation is directly proportionate to how one feels about the concept of “adorkability,” which Zooey Deschanel brings to the small screen in seemingly limitless quantities as Jess, a too-cute twentysomething who moves in with a trio of guys on the heels of an excruciatingly bad breakup. As with most ensemble comedies, it’s taken time for the chemistry of the cast to find its feet, but it’s coming along nicely.

Some shows are perfect fare for guys and gals to kick back and enjoy together, but, guys, unless you have one of the most awesome girlfriends ever, then “Archer” probably doesn’t quality as one of those shows. Sterling Archer has the libido of James Bond and Austin Powers put together but without any of the charm, and not only is he unfailingly uncouth, but he’s a mama’s boy to boot. Damned if he isn’t funny, though, and Season 3 has started off just as funny as its predecessors…but, then, what would you expect when you’ve got Burt Reynolds playing himself?

As long as the beautiful ménage à trois between stupid people, video cameras, and the internet continues to flourish, Daniel Tosh’s career will stay in full bloom. Now in its fourth season, “Tosh.0″ may not be the most highbrow series on the air, but it’s never at a loss for material and still offers a solid number of laughs per episode.

The series takes place in Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash, the comic shop Smith owns in Red Bank, NJ, and revolves around the guys who work there – Walt Flanagan, Bryan Johnson, Michael Zapcic, and Ming Chen – as they go through their daily routine, much of which…at least for the purposes of the series, anyway…will involve the people who bring items into the store in hopes of selling them.

Yes, that’s right, go ahead and figure on every review of “Comic Book Men” featuring some reference to the series being like “Pawn Stars,” except geekier. This is in no way an inaccurate comparison. In fact, to hear Smith tell it, his pitch for the series actually involved the words, “Let’s do ‘Pawn Stars’ in a comic book store.” But, look, I’m just gonna tell you outright: that sentence alone would’ve been enough to get me to sign up for a season pass on TiVo, and having now actually watched a rough cut of the first episode, I see no reason to backpedal on that theory. Not only do we see some pretty cool shit coming into the store – like, say, a still-boxed Six Million Dollar Man figure with bionic “scope” eye – but there’s a lot of incredibly geeky conversation, too, like the guys’ deepest superhero crushes. (For the record, mine was always Tigra. Just sayin’.)

By the way, speaking of Smith, you probably noticed that I didn’t mention his name as one of the guys who works at the Secret Stash. This, of course, is because he’s got better things (relatively speaking) to do with his time. Don’t worry, though: he’s still in every episode, since the goings-on in the store end up being discussed on the group’s podcast, of which Smith is a part, and the recording sessions have been filmed and are spliced into the proceedings.

I’d really hoped to be able to sit down with Mr. Smith for a one-on-one interview during the course of the TCA press tour last month, but the man’s schedule was pretty well booked up, so the best I could wrangle was a roundtable. The good news: there were only three of us sharing the table with Kevin. The bad news: we only had 15 minutes with him. Now, please understand that I’m not being Bitchy McMoaney about this, like, “Woe is me, I only got to spend 15 minutes with the man behind ‘Clerks’ and ‘Mallrats,’ life sucks.” My issue about the time frame is…well, look, if you’ve ever seen one of Kevin Smith’s live performances, you know that the dude can talk like nobody’s business. There is video documentation to confirm that he can take a single question and run with it for an hour, sometimes longer. In short, each of us got one question answered – I was third – and after he answered mine, the publicist said, “We’ve got time for just one more.”

So, basically, what I’m saying is that Kevin Smith is not a man whose responses lend themselves to roundtables…but, hey, at least I got one question answered.

Earlier in the discussion, Smith had made a comment about how AMC had been interested in the series because they wanted to try and maintain the “geek” audience that was watching “The Walking Dead.” As a geek myself, I felt obliged to ask: just how geeky is the show allowed to get?

Said Mr. Smith…

We make a G.I. Robot joke. [Laughs.] That’s fucking so obscure, dude, I don’t know who else is gonna get it. Maybe five people on the planet…? But they let it ride. So there’s a lot of stuff like that. I mean, yeah, there’s definitely, like, “Which superhero would you most like to be?” The kind of easy stuff that people do. But then we get into deeper discussions that are more along the lines of “Clerks” or “Mallrats” or something, where we get into it.

Some of the stuff we’ve seen through has been absolutely amazing, you know? That’s been one of the fun things. Since there are transactions in the show, you get to see so much fucking shit come through the doors. So many toys, some things you’ve never seen before, and stuff like that. We had this guy bring in this Superman poster, and I’d never seen it…and I’ve seen a lot of Superman posters, but I’d never seen this particular one. And the back story he gave to it was fucking astounding. He was just, like, “This is Gay Superman.” “Well, what do you mean?” He’s, like, “The guy who painted this Superman, and he wanted this to be the representation of the ideal gay Superman.” I said, “Where did you learn this?” He’s just, like, “Everybody knows this.” [Laughs.] And I’m well studied, and I have never heard of this, never seen this depiction at all. And then Flanagan started buying into it, ‘cause he’s, like, “Look at his foot, he’s curling his toe!” It was ridiculous. But you get to see some stuff… I was, like, “That is a bad-ass poster, man! Where did that come from?”

The weird thing is, everyone that comes in to sell… Our store is not a buying place. Like, Walter believes in, like, “Get a book up on the wall, flip it, and get it off.” He doesn’t leave stuff up there forever. So you have all these people coming in to do transactions, and Walter’s, like, “Nah, it’s too much for us.” [Laughs.] “No, that’s too much. And that’s too much as well.” So there are a lot of people looking deflated. But he didn’t clown it up, he didn’t fake it for TV. He was just, like, “I wouldn’t buy this shit.” Like, at one point, he was just, like, “Am I supposed to buy things that we wouldn’t normally buy?” I was, like, “No, dude. Reality. Do whatever you would do.” He was, like, “Well, I ain’t buying this stuff!” This guy wants a thousand dollars for a Superman poster. I was, like, “Yeah, don’t buy that. Please.”

So you’re probably thinking, “What did the other two journalists ask Kevin?” And that’s a reasonable question, but I’m going to let those guys keep their own questions and answers to themselves in favor of closing with a few highlights from the panel which took place about an hour later, mostly because it produced some of the most entertaining moments of the TCA tour. Part of that comes from the fact that I’m a Kevin Smith fan, obviously, but, frankly, some of these panels can be pretty freaking lifeless. If nothing else, you can’t say that Smith didn’t liven up the afternoon for us…and to prove it, here’s a trio of quotes which sum up the general vibe of Smith’s performance:

“The experience (of working) with AMC has been religious. Now I’m going to do a bit of AMC cock suckery here, so if you have no stomach for that, just put on your iPod or something like that. I don’t watch the shit that’s on TV. I watch two channels: AMC, because I fucking love ‘Mad Men.’ I love ‘Walking Dead,’ ‘Breaking Bad.’ My wife loved ‘Rubicon.’ I couldn’t understand it, felt like a dumbass, but she liked it a lot. And I watch Oxygen because I love ‘Snapped.’ I love to see women who kill their husbands. Anyway, so AMC, the channel I watch, like I don’t really TiVo anything else. It’s just pretty much AMC now that ‘Battlestar Galactica’ is off the air, it’s pretty much all AMC shows.”

“All I ever hear single women talk about is not being able to find a good man. You will never find a better man than in a comic book store because if you throw a comic book guy just a little bit of attention and/or pussy, you got him for life. Life, the most loyal husband you’ll have. My wife, she gave me she dropped her standards this much, and she got me for life, man, much because she gave me a shot. Comic book guys are reliable dudes. So I don’t have to sell it beyond that. Ladies, if you’re looking for a man who will take care of your needs first, comic book dudes are all oral. This is where you want to be. That’s what will bring women into a comic book store.”

“AMC came down and met the boys (at Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash). They liked the boys, and Elyse (Seiden, one of the producers of ‘Comic Book Men’), calls me and she goes, ‘We got a show on AMC.’ And I was like…my fucking dick and head exploded because if I had tried to get on AMC, if that was my plan, if I had, like, fucking orchestrated it, it never would have happened. But the fact that it was just luck and happenstance that all of a sudden the network that I love, the one that I fucking watch, now I got not only do I have a show on TV where I can watch my friends for six weeks in a row, it’s on the fucking network that I love. And I’m just like I must have sold my soul to the devil or sucked a dick that I forgot about because this is great fortune that I’m experiencing. And I didn’t really earn it. So I’m just very happy to be here. Thank you.”

“Comic Book Men” premieres at 10 PM on Feb. 12, right after “The Walking Dead.”

I went into season two of AMC’s “The Walking Dead” thinking it would be a slam dunk. How could it be anything but? The first season, at just six episodes, was one of the most intriguing pieces of television I’ve seen in years. Most of its allure was the pacing. Every episode had moments of pure calm that were invariably interrupted by drooling hordes of zombies. But the zombies didn’t carry the show. The characters did most of the work, which is exactly what a good zombie show needs. We need to care about the characters so that the inevitable losses have some consequence, a task the writers of the show met head-on. All of this is to say that my expectations, high as they were, were based on the merit of the first season.

Season two started well. The survivors from last season had decided to leave Atlanta and head for Fort Benning. They hit a roadblock on the way out of town, which included a brush with a shuffling horde of zombies. We saw a pair of walkers dispatched, the first with a screwdriver through the eye, the second with a quick stab to the brainstem. It was a perfect re-introduction to the gruesome, post-apocalyptic world I loved in season one.

While creative zombie-killing is great, it isn’t enough to carry the show. There has to be some sort of plot. For season one, it was getting into Atlanta and the CDC with the hope of finding more survivors. In season two we have Fort Benning, again with the hope of finding survivors. It’s a fine plot, though it does get quickly derailed when Sophia, one of the children in the group, is chased into the woods and later disappears. Sophia’s disappearance would have been fine had it been contained to just an episode or two, but it has utterly consumed the show.

I think Shane said it best in episode 5 when he said, “…you got 72 hours and then you’re looking for a body, and that was before.” Even if Sophia was a primary character, spending this kind of time looking for her without any indication she may be alive would be maddening. I’m sorry, but no amount of Rick grimacing or Carol staring into the distance will make me care about Sophia’s whereabouts. She just isn’t an interesting character. Leaving the group to stagnate on the farm has made several of them less interesting as well.

Consider Andrea. She was one of the least consistent characters in the first season, but she also lost the most, so her wild character swings at least had some basis. In season two she’s flat-out crazy. She’s become obsessed with carrying a gun, despite the fact that she doesn’t know how to handle one. It’s not even clear why she wants one, other than just to have it, which should raise some questions for the rest of the group.

How have I not yet mentioned that she shot Daryl in the head? In case I haven’t made it clear, she’s untrained with a gun. Regardless, she thinks it’s perfectly acceptable to take a shot at a target that is mere feet from three other human beings and obscured by the sun. Would you want her anywhere near a firearm? I wouldn’t, but apparently the two state sheriffs felt otherwise. In the very next episode she has a gun back in her hand. She even makes jokes with Daryl about shooting him in the head. I’m sorry, AMC, but what the hell are you thinking?

The one good thing to come of Andrea’s utter insanity is that she’s pushing Shane further along his own descent into madness. Shane is the one interesting thing about this season, but his volatility has been wasted on the benign location and the scarcity of drooling undead so far.

I think the general lack of zombies remains my biggest issue with season two. In season one, zombies were everywhere, all the time. The world felt dangerous and unmanageable, and yet, the characters were surviving. At its core, this is what a zombie story is about. It’s about a world we all know and love becoming foreign and dangerous and the efforts we take to make the world knowable and lovable again. Once that world is knowable and lovable, the story ends. The Georgia of “The Walking Dead” is much too comfortable, much too familiar. It’s a feeling I would be fine with for an early episode but not six. It’s time to shake things up. It’s time to leave the farm and try to make the rest of the world a livable place.

ALSO: Check out our Season Two preview, as well interviews with actor Jon Bernthal and executive producer Robert Kirkman.

Bullz-Eye: I know you won’t remember me, but we met fleetingly at the New York Comic Con, during the press roundtables.

Norman Reedus: Oh, right on. (Laughs) The craziness that is Comic-Con…

BE: Yeah, there’s no way you’d remember me in the middle of all that. But it was a good time nonetheless, so it’s good to talk to you again. And I’ve had a chance to check out the first episode of the new season…

NR: Oh, yeah? What’d you think?

BE: I think I should’ve gone straight on to the second episode.

NR: (Laughs) Awesome!

BE: So when you leapt into Season 2, how enthused were you to get back to work? It seems like it’d be a lot of fun to do.

NR: It’s a blast. I wanted to go a month early and just wait for everybody to show up. It’s such a fun job. It’s by far my favorite job I’ve ever done. The crew and the cast, everyone is so tight there. We’re all just one big family, for real. I just wanted to get back to it. I’ve never really had an acting experience that’s just so…fun. It’s so engaging. I’m really into it.

BE: Do you get used to the humidity down in Atlanta pretty quickly?

NR: You know, you kind of just suffer for the show. The heat and the surroundings are definitely a character on the show, so we’re out there surviving for our lives already. But, you know, I…I’m in Los Angeles right now, getting ready to go back to George to finish the season. But it started getting cold the last night we were there, and I shot ‘til about 4:30 in the morning and took an 8 AM flight to California, so I was exhausted. But it was freezing. It didn’t feel right. I prefer the heat.

BE: I think it was Steven (Yeun) who was telling the story about how he actually passed out his first day of filming.

NR: Yeah, he did. He had a long running scene, and he just sort of fainted. It was pretty crazy. Of course, we all teased him uncontrollably forever after that. (Laughs)

BE: So do you have to get into a Daryl mindset when you go back to work?

NR: Yeah, you know, it’s interesting, ‘cause last season, it was all ‘fuck you, I hate you,’ and this season you sort of see Daryl form alliances with certain members you wouldn’t necessarily expect. Damaged people recognize other damaged people, so they have a kindred spirit going on. It’s not just so one-noted this season. He really kind of bounces all over the place, and it’s really interesting. It’s like he needs a hug, but if you tried to hug him, he’d stab you. He’s really fragile, like a little kid in a lot of ways. You see certain members of the group trying to tell him his worth, that he’s worth more than he thinks about himself, and you find a little bit about his back story, his family history, and you see how truly damaged this guy is. It’s interesting to play all those levels. It really makes for an interesting day of work.

BE: Yeah, I mean, I wouldn’t call him a delicate flower or anything, but even in the first episode of Season 2, he feels like a slightly different Daryl than we saw last season.

NR: Yeah, but, you know, even last season, I tried to tear up between squirrel throws and whatnot, just to make him still be, like, he lost his big brother. Even assholes have big brothers. I tried to make him more than just an angry guy. It was, like, show some reasons why he’s so angry and damaged.

BE: On a related note, I actually got to have dinner with Michael Rooker late last year.

NR: (Laughs) Oh, yeah! That’s funny, ‘cause he keeps texting me. He’s, like, ‘Come on, we’re going to the gun range right now,’ and I’m, like, ‘I can’t, ‘cause I’m at a motorcycle shop getting my motorcycle fixed.’ He’s, like, ‘Stop being a poopybutt.’ He actually called me a poopybutt.

BE: You know, I believe that.

NR: He did. I was, like, “Wow, that’s not very Rooker of you.” (Laughs) He’s an awesome character, an awesome guy, and a great actor. I’m looking forward to seeing everything he does.

BE: When it comes to the zombies, I know you see them all the time, but do you ever hit a point when you suddenly think, “I know they’re just people in makeup, but, damn, these guys are pretty scary”?

NR: You know, it’s wild, ‘cause you see a zombie having a cupcake or a cigarette, and then five minutes later you see them in character. Those guys who are playing zombies, they’re actors. I think people sometimes think they’re just people in zombie makeup, but when they turn it on, they really turn it on. They’re doing such a great job at being scary. It’s interesting, ‘cause the way Greg does the makeup, he’s so good with the effects that when you see a zombie, you actually feel sorry for it. But it’s actually scarier to be in a fight with one when you feel sorry for one.

BE: With the second season, can you speak at all to whether it feels different without Frank Darabont having as much of a presence? I mean, I know he’s still involved, but…

NR: You know, we all love Frank, and we all just totally admire him, but the second season just picks right up and goes so smoothly. Glen (Mazzara) is doing such a good job, and he has respect of all the actors. All the directors that come in are doing such a good job. We’re so close out there, such a tight group, that when we go to work, we all know exactly what we’re doing, we know each other characters so well that I’ll be in a scene with a bunch of actors, and one of the actors goes, ‘What do you guys think? Should I try it this way?’ And not everyone has an opinion, but everyone has each others’ back and wants them to be the best that they can be on the show. That tight family groove…we’re on point and kicking ass.

BE: How trying is the part of Daryl from a physical standpoint?

NR: It’s definitely physical, but it lends itself to the character. The onl episode that really felt out of place was the CDC, and that’s because we were in doors and in the air conditioning. It just didn’t feel right. Part of it is the bugs, the dirt, the heat, the sweat…it’s all part of the show. We’ve all grown very fond of working under those conditions. It’s weird, but it’s true.

BE: So was Daryl always destined to ride a motorcycle, or did that come about because you ride?

NR: You know, I think there was talk of me on a horse, but if you’ve ever seen me on a horse, it’s pretty pathetic. (Laughs) So that probably had something to do with it. But, you know, there’s a motorcycle there, and I didn’t ask if it was Daryl’s or Merle’s motorcycle, but they both ride it. I do like motorcycles. I have a Triumph Scrambler down in Georgia, and I have a Harley here in Los Angeles, so I do ride. But, hey, you know, it’s an efficient way to get around on no gas during a zombie apocalypse. (Laughs)

BE: I wanted to ask you briefly about the autopsy scene in the season premiere. How was that to film? It seems like it would’ve been pretty gross, real or not.

NR: I have to say, I could’ve shot that gross scene all day. (Laughs) I was like a little kid in a candy store. When you put your hands into it, it made a slurping, burping sound. They put little tubes of hot air to blow in our face to show that there’s gas going through the innards of the zombies. It was disgusting, but it was a blast. I went elbow-deep in that stuff, but I could’ve played around all day long.

BE: As far as the other cast members, I’m sure you enjoy them all, but do you have particular folks who are your most favorite to work with?

NR: Melissa McBride is one of my favorite cast members to work with. That girl…I keep telling her she’s one nervous breakdown away from becoming Meryl Streep. (Laughs) She’s such a good actress, you can just read everything in her face. I love watching her work. I really love watching Jeffrey DeMunn work, too. He’s really good. I’m really impressed with what Chandler (Riggs) has been doing. I like working with all of them. They’re all really, really good actors. I find stuff in them every day that they pull out where it’s, like, high-fives all around.

BE: So from your standpoint, do you feel like Season 2 is at least as strong as Season 1?

NR: The second season’s stronger. It’s stronger than the first. Hey, I don’t know if it’s just because we’re so invested in it and now we’ve gotten used to these characters, but AMC was ballsy enough to do a zombie show, right from the beginning, they put up six episodes to see how it would fare, to gauge  interest and see how it would do. And it did so well that I think the second season lends us to getting into the characters more. We sort of set up the tone of the world in the first season, and in the second season, you really find out who these people are, and that’s the backbone of the show, really. It’s not so much the zombies. They can kill you, but so can the people sitting right next to you. The second season is where the alliances form, where you find out who you can trust and who you can’t trust. It’s kind of like “Survivor.” (Laughs)

(NOTE: Portions of this interview appear in the print edition of TV Week Magazine.)

ALSO: Check out our Season Two preview, as well as interviews with actor Norman Reedus and executive producer Robert Kirkman.

BE: I’ve seen the Season 2 premiere, and from what I can tell, it seems like you guys are still playing at the same level that you were in the first season.

Jon Bernthal: Aw, thanks, man, I appreciate you saying so.

BE: So you guys got to play the love triangle in Season 1, and it’s obviously still ongoing in Season 2. Is it a challenge to play something like that in the middle of a zombie thriller?

JB: I don’t really look at it so much as a love triangle. I look at it more as a family that…these horrible circumstances, this disease that’s turned the world into this apocalyptic state, I look at it more as a family that’s been severely fractured by it. I think that it’s not as simple as two guys in love with the same girl. I think Shane is very much in love with Lori, but I think he loves his best friend, too, as well as their little boy, Carl. I think these are relationships that are immensely important to him, and unfortunately, they’re forever tainted and they’ll never quite be the same. In this world that we’re trying to create, all of these characters have lost so many people. I think what’s very interesting for Shane is that the people in the world who mean the most to him are still alive. It’s just that their relationships will never be the same because of what’s gone down.

BE: Shane is a pretty complex character because of his situation. Do you find it hard to find that balance of personality when you’re playing the part?

JB: No, man, I love it. As an actor, it’s the kind of part you look for. When I first talked with Frank (Darabont) about this, our goal was to not just make him sort of this one-dimensional villain straight out of the comic. We wanted him to be a layered, nuanced character that wasn’t a good guy, wasn’t a bad guy, but was a real guy. I think he’s just operating from a place of being a loyal friend and trying to do what’s best, trying to protect these people that he loves so much. I think he’s always coming from a place of trying to do the right thing, but it’s fractured. It’s just such a different, cold, brutal world now. Also, what’s very interesting about the character is that he’s the first one in the series, I think, to just sort of recognize the lawlessness of this world they’re living in now. He does it when he beats down Ed by the water in Season 1, and also when he trains the gun on Rick in Season 1. I think he recognizes that there are no real circumstances for your actions in this world, and I think Season 2 is very much about Rick and Shane splitting on how they feel the best way to go forward in this world is. I think Shane feels that, to survive, you have to make very brutal, very harsh decisions, and you really have to abandon emotion and morality and just do what’s best for survival, whereas Rick, I think, is kind of plagued by trying to do the right thing. They really become at odds with each other over those philosophies.

BE: So were you familiar with “The Walking Dead” as a comic book before you found yourself on the show?

JB: No, I sure wasn’t, man. I read the pilot, written by Frank Darabont, and it just had me there. I’d never read a pilot that good before, that detailed and nuanced, with that much attention to character and atmosphere. You know, I’ve read the comic a little bit since then, but, uh, Shane buys it so early in the comic that I didn’t really find any reason to keep reading! I mean, it’s very good, but, no, I wasn’t a fan before the show.

BE: What did you think when you first heard about the concept of the show? I mean, it’s a zombie show. Were you skeptical before you read the script?

JB: You know, yeah, I was. I mean, I knew AMC was doing it, and at that time, I really felt that AMC was the best network on television. I loved the stuff that they had on there, so I wanted to give it a read no matter what. But as soon as I opened it up and started reading it, and the little girl gets shot in the opening teaser, I was, like, ‘Oh, this is just bad ass.’ (Laughs) Like I said, the writing was just…it never really read to me like a zombie show or a genre show. The attention to detail in creating the atmosphere in that first pilot…there’s very few words. Most pilots are just a bunch of people talking in exposition, telling the audience exactly who they are and introducing people, and this, I felt, was just a slow, beautiful portrait of this world. I just felt that was a ballsy, beautiful thing to do for a TV pilot. I wanted desperately to be a part of this show just based on that writing and based on Frank Darabont.

BE: Well, speaking of Frank Darabont, the question is inevitable: has it been difficult moving forward without him, given how profound his presence on the show was in the first season?

JB: Yeah, absolutely, no question. I mean, Frank’s a dear friend, I believe in him immensely, I think he’s one of the best filmmakers and writers that our country has, so I think to get rid of him is an enormous loss for us. That being said, this cast and crew, I feel like, has responded really well. I’m proud of everybody. I think that everybody’s really trying to keep Frank’s vision and is trying to go at this full force. I’m really proud of the work that we’re doing, but to lose Frank…? That’s huge.

BE: On a non-“Walking Dead” topic, I have to tell you, I was a big fan of “The Class.”

JB: (Laughs) Oh, yeah? Thanks, man, I appreciate it.

BE: I feel like it’s going to end up coming out on DVD eventually, just by virtue of the fact that so many of the cast have achieved post-“Class” success.

JB: Ah, shit, man. Y’know, look, man, it was a really cool, fun show. We were all actors in our early 20s, everybody had basically come from theater, and…it was just a great family. Also, we were trying to one-up each other and entertain each other on set. Everybody would come and watch everybody else’s work, and we were just trying to make each other crack up the whole time. It was a lovely, lovely little family, and everybody’s gone on and done such cool stuff. It’s great. We still all try to get together a couple times a year and have a dinner. They’re really, really lovely people, and…I really appreciate you saying something about it, man. That was a great time.

BE: Yeah, when I talked to Jason Ritter awhile back, he told me about the dinners.

JB: Yeah, I just think that show…I mean, that’s a good example of a show that had a whole lot of bark before it had a chance to have any bite. They over-publicized the hell out of us before we ever came out, and then they kind of abandoned us once the show was actually on the air, publicity-wise. But we loved it. We loved being there, we all had a great time, and we all have remained very, very close. And that’s cool. It’s very rare.

BE: What are your recollections of working on “The Pacific”? I’ve talked to some of the other cast members, and I know it was a moving experience for them, both working on it and meeting actual veterans after the fact.

JB: Look, man, if you’re lucky enough to get involved in a project like that, it’s a real responsibility to get it right, to help memorialize these heroes. It’s a great responsibility, but it’s also a great thrill, because when you’re doing it for (Steven) Spielberg and (Tom) Hanks, they’ll spend the money to do it right. So to go through the boot camp and get trained by the Marine Corps and to experience the things that you get to experience, to live with these other guys and try to emulate a soldier’s life.. (Starts to laugh) You know, every kid dreams about that. WE get to go play war without the real risk. And it gives you such an appreciation of what our heroes, the real heroes, the real soldiers, what they go through and what they sacrifice every day. But it’s unbelievably fun, and it’s unbelievably rewarding, because, again, you get to memorialize these great American heroes and you get to learn so much and make great friends. I had a really great time on that show.

BE: To jump back to “The Walking Dead,” when it comes to the zombies…obviously, you see them around you all the time, but because of the tension and drama in that series, do you ever find yourself getting a little disconcerted when you’re looking at them?

JB: Man, I hate zombies, I’ll be honest with you. Look, Greg Nicotero is a genius, and the art he creates is just mindboggling. It’s just like everything else on our show: it’s sort of centered in being unique and authentic and real. They’re not just monsters. There’s a specific way in how each person has been bit, they create a specific human being who is turned into a zombie, which I think is pretty cool. The people who play the zombies are great artists. Their movement skills and the work they put into playing zombie is taken very, very seriously. That being said, man, I hate them. Call me a douchey method actor,  but I spend so much time hunting them, being hunted by them, looking for them, beating them, killing them…I just hate them. I want nothing to do with them at lunch, I want nothing to do with them off the set. I hate zombies. I love the actors that are playing them, but I hate zombies.

BE: Lastly, I was at the press round tables you did at Comic-Con, and at the time, Sarah (Wayne Callies) talked about how much she couldn’t tolerate scary movies and wasn’t sure if she’d even be able to watch her own show. Do you watch “The Walking Dead” yourself?

JB: I do watch it. That’s one of the cool things about this: I’m a huge fan of this show. I believe in it. I believe in all the people I’m working with. And I love this story. I love what we’re trying to do. I would watch this show whether I was on it or not, and I think that’s really cool. It’s a thrill for me to be on a show that my friends and family enjoy. I was on a show before this that I’m not going to mention, but I remember a couple of Thanksgivings ago, we were going around the table saying what we were thankful for, and my uncle Steve got up and said that he was thankful for the network that the show was on at the time ‘for canceling that piece of shit so I don’t have to feel bad every Wednesday night that I have to sit through it.’ It just means so much to me that now I’m on a show that I can be proud of, that I dig and that my friends and family dig. I’m a huge fan of this show regardless, and I really believe in the people I work with. That’s a very rare thing, and I know how lucky I am.

(NOTE: Portions of this interview appear in the print edition of TV Week Magazine.)

ALSO: Check out our Season Two preview, as well as interviews with actors Jon Bernthal and Norman Reedus.

Bullz-Eye: I know you don’t remember me, but you and I met briefly when you were doing the press roundtables at the New York Comic-Con.

Robert Kirkman: Oh, good! I hope I did okay.

BE: Oh, yeah, you did great. It was a lot of fun. I just got the Season 2 press kit, and I’m 95% of the way through the first episode, so it killed me to have to get on the phone with you.

RK: (Laughs) Awesome!

BE: So how excited are you about the premiere of the show’s second season?

RK: I’m extremely excited. I mean, you know, there’s a lot of pressure to follow up our first season. It was a big success, and, you know, knowing what I know of the second season and seeing what I’ve seen, I’m fairly confident that we’re still going to come out of the gate and impress people, so I’m really anxious to see what people think of it. A lot of hard work has been going into this season, and it’s great that it’s going to finally be enjoyed by some people. So I’m really excited.

BE: When it comes to adapting the original source material, you’ve obviously got an advantage, given that it’s yours… (Laughs) …but I’m sure it’s hard to pick and choose which bits actually make it onto television.

RK: It’s a process. There’s not really a way to nail down exactly what goes into it. But everyone in the room is familiar with the comic, and we all sit down knowing what happened in the book, and we look at where the show’s going and what the characters are doing, and we just kind of figure it all out. Sometimes we take things directly from the comic, and there are a lot of times when we’re talking about things from the comic, and things will go to different characters in the show, or it’ll spin off into something entirely new that wasn’t in the comic, but the starting point was something that did appear in the comic. So it’s an evolving process, and it’s neat to be sitting down to adapt something that I wrote awhile ago. The earlier material in “The Walking Dead” is something I wrote some time ago, so it’s good to be able to revisit that stuff.

BE: Do you have a favorite TV-only moment that really stands out for you?

RK: Well, there’s a lot of stuff in the second season I can’t really talk about that’s pretty great. I really like the fact that Shane is still around. I think that Jon Bernthal is an amazing actor, and we have a lot of great stuff coming up for him and a lot of stuff planned for the future. I think it was a really good decision to keep him around, and I think that he’s adding a lot to the show. Daryl Dixon’s character is a really good X-factor thrown into the mix that morphs the story around him in the show, because he doesn’t exist in the comic, so throwing him into those scenarios is a lot of fun to see how he changes things. But there’s all kinds of different stuff.

BE: I feel like Season 2 needs more Michael Rooker. What’s your thought on that?

RK: I would say that if Michael Rooker was in every single episode of Season 2 – and he’s not – but if he was, the show would still need more Michael Rooker.

BE: That’s a pull quote. (Laughs) If we could briefly touch on the Frank Darabont situation, what’s his current status on the series?

RK: Frank Darabont is still an executive producer, but he’s no longer the show runner and he’s not in the room. It’s Glen Mazzara’s job now.

BE: You and Frank seemed to have a really strong rapport at Comic-Con. Can you speak to the matter of his departure at all?

RK: There’s very little I can talk about, just because there were a lot of dealings between AMC and Frank directly, so a lot of it I’m unaware of. It’s up to Frank when he wants to talk about that stuff, so it wouldn’t be right for me to come out and say it. But Frank got this show off the ground, and I’ll always be indebted to him for doing that. I was definitely sorry to see him go, but it kind of is what it is. The show is a bigger animal than any of us, and we kind of just have to do what we have to do to keep it going.

BE: Would you say that some of his vision that he put into place while he was show runner is still visible in the second season?

RK: There are bits and pieces here and there that were broken in the room, but the important thing to note is that Frank wasn’t in the room alone at any point during the show. With the second season, it was Glen Mazzara and myself and Scott Gimple and Evan Reilly and Angela Kang and Frank, and we all worked together to map out this second season. So to a certain extent, sure, there are things that Frank suggested, just like there are things that everyone suggested in every episode throughout the second season, but… (Hesitates) Yeah, I think I answered the question.

BE: (Laughs) Yeah, you did. So I know you said of Season 1 that you couldn’t believe how much you’d been able to get away with in Season 1 when it came to the gore. Season 2 seems to be at least on a similar par.

RK: Yeah, I don’t know how far you got into the episode, but it’s pretty crazy.

BE: I’m at the scene at the church.

RK: Oh, so you saw the autopsy scene, then? (Laughs) Yeah, it’s pretty crazy. There’s more of that kind of stuff coming up in the second season. It’s really kind of ridiculous. We’re definitely crossing some lines and breaking down boundaries and all kinds of crazy stuff. It’s a constant battle to try and come up with something that AMC won’t let us do.

BE: Did it surprise you when you realized how open they were going to be about it?

RK: Yeah, absolutely. I know when we were talking very early on about the first season, I was very excited because I thought, “We’ll get to be able to do our R-rated crazy zombie gore, but we’ll edit that into the show for the DVD release,” so the DVD would be something special. You might have to watch a tamer version on TV, but at least you get to see the full craziness on DVD, and that’ll be a good system. That’ll be kind of cool. But as we kept going and moving into the show, it became clear that all that stuff was just going to air, which got even more exciting. I was, like, ‘Oh, so we don’t have to do the DVD thing? That’s pretty crazy!’ And any time there is any kind of talkback, we constantly have “Breaking Bad,” which is doing just absolutely crazy stuff, so we can say, “Aw, well, you just blew up a guy’s head in ‘Breaking Bad,’ so surely can we make a zombie piñata that explodes!”

(NOTE: Portions of this interview appear in the print edition of TV Week Magazine.)

ALSO: Check out our interviews with actors Jon Bernthal and Norman Reedus and executive producer Robert Kirkman.

It’s no secret that AMC has endured a difficult year filled with one PR nightmare after the next – including public contract disputes that suspended production on Season Five of “Mad Men” and threatened the future of “Breaking Bad,” as well as audience backlash over the season finale of “The Killing” – but it suddenly felt very personal when Frank Darabont, creator and executive producer of “The Walking Dead,” was unexpectedly relieved of his duties only a few days after promoting the show at San Diego Comic-Con. Though the network never gave a clear reason for his dismissal, it’s believed to have something to do with forced budget cuts for the second season, which came as a surprise to Darabont after the show set a new cable ratings record in its debut season.

But despite all the backroom drama and concerns that Darabont’s absence would spell trouble for the hit zombie series, AMC was insistent that “The Walking Dead” was in the capable hands of his replacement, Glen Mazzara. Then again, Darabont was already hard at work on the show for months before getting the axe, and mapped out the entire season prior to his departure, so audiences may not notice many differences (if any at all) until the show’s third season. It should be noted, however, that Mazzara is no slouch when it comes to making great TV (having previously spent five years behind the scenes on “The Shield”), and he’s still working with the same team that Darabont put together, including zombie experts Robert Kirkman and Greg Nicotero. In fact, based on the first two episodes alone, it’s pretty clear that fans have nothing to worry about.

When we last left Rick Grimes and the rest of the survivors, they had just escaped the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta by the skin of their teeth and hit the road once again in search of a new refuge. Though they don’t actually arrive at Hershel’s Farm – the provisional sanctuary featured in Kirkman’s comics – until the second episode, the season premiere has more than enough going on to keep them busy, including a tension-packed opening sequence where the survivors must hide from a herd of zombies after Dale’s RV breaks down on the highway. There’s plenty of action and gore as well, with one survivor wounded pretty badly in the aforementioned attack, another one shot in what is likely the first of many “holy shit” moments of the season, and a truly disgusting zombie moment that some people might not be able to stomach. Oh yeah, and fan favorite Daryl kicks a lot of zombie ass, but I’m guessing you already knew that.

Of course, the series is first and foremost about the relationships between its large cast of characters, and although some viewers might bemoan the slower pace of these early episodes, it allows for a lot of great interactions – particularly involving the Rick, Lori and Shane love triangle – that will only make you even more invested in their survival. And if there’s one thing that AMC can never take away from Darabont, it’s the amazing job he did with laying down a strong foundation on which those characters could grow. Because while he may no longer be around to captain the ship, Darabont’s fingerprints are all over “The Walking Dead,” and it’s the main reason why the show will continue to operate at such a high level of excellence. It may not have gone down exactly the way we would have liked, but the audience still comes out the winner in the end.

“The Walking Dead” returns to AMC on October 16th at 9/8c with a special 90-minute premiere. Can’t wait that long? Check out a sneak peek of the new season below.