AMC was looking to give The Walking Dead universe a huge 2020, but the coronavirus delays have thrown a wrench into their plans, leaving fans to wonder what their new schedule will look like. At this point, all three The Walking Dead shows have been affected by the coronavirus, which is currently turning the film and TV industry upside down.
Production of The Walking Dead's season 10 will end early with episode 15, and the finale acting as a standalone episode.
To coincide with its ten-year anniversary of the The Walking Dead series premiere in December 2010, AMC wanted to make 2020 the biggest year yet for The Walking Dead universe, and it had a clear plan to make that happen. The second half of season 10 of the main series would have wrapped up in mid-April, just in time for Fear the Walking Dead, but it likely would have begun airing it 16-episode season in late July, presumably without a midseason break. That way, the season would have ended by the time The Walking Dead season 11 premiered in October.
With a plan like this, for the first time ever AMC would have been able to air weekly episodes of a Walking Dead show nearly all-year round. This would have been huge for the network, but this schedule may have been derailed by the coronavirus, and understandably so. What AMC does next may depend largely on just how long it takes the film and TV industry to pick up again. These delays could always be extended. Either way, at this current juncture it may be difficult for AMC to fit everything it had on its plate in 2020.
The Walking Dead season 10 finale may be released sometime in the early part of the summer, but what about World Beyond and Fear the Walking Dead? To keep too much from being pushed to 2021, AMC could air these shows back-to-back. That's one solution to the problem, but it's something that AMC has avoided in the past. Generally, AMC has opted to schedule their shows so that Fear the Walking Dead is on when The Walking Dead is on hiatus. If AMC still doesn't want to take this direction, it could delay one of the two shows to the fall, in place of The Walking Dead season 11's first half. Delaying season 11 may have to happen anyway, with production on that being delayed as well.
The coronavirus pandemic has created an unfortunate - yet unavoidable - situation for AMC, and the only thing that's clear at this point is that there doesn't seem to be any "good" solution to AMC's Walking Dead problem.