The Walking Dead has become a wildly successful franchise with the comic book running for 16 years and the TV show airing for 11 seasons. There are even a handful of spinoff series of the TV show. The first TV spinoff, Fear the Walking Dead, was meant to show the beginnings of the zombie outbreak. However, it sort of stopped doing that after the first couple of seasons and just became another show that takes place deep into the zombie apocalypse. It wasn’t a very good one either; it was nowhere near as great as the main show filled with ridiculousness and unbelievably stupid moments.

A lot of dumb things happen throughout Fear the Walking Dead, so much so it’s hard not to laugh at what’s meant to be a serious sci-fi drama. I’m capping this list at ten, though, to spare my own sanity and time. Let’s take a look at just some of the most absolutely bonkers and questionable choices made in Fear the Walking Dead.

10) Replacing the Main Cast With New Characters and Morgan

In any zombie apocalypse story, it’s expected that characters will be killed off over time. The main Walking Dead show lost a lot of characters along the way, but they also picked up new ones as well. There was a gradual shift in characters and there were always plenty of faces the audience knew and loved. 

In Fear the Walking Dead, the fourth season has most of the main characters leave and get replaced with brand new ones, including Morgan Jones from The Walking Dead. It was jarring. Why not give these new characters their own show instead of having them take over this one? Shifting the focus away from the Clark family was a wildly poor decision. At least The Walking Dead still keeps its focus on Rick’s “family” throughout. This is just messy storytelling.

9) Killing Several Characters Off-Screen

Again, it’s pretty normal, and even expected, for characters to be killed off in zombie apocalypse stories. This is even the case with major characters. That being said, we usually see these important characters get killed off. In the final season of Fear the Walking Dead, several important supporting characters just sort of disappeared. 

The audience felt their absence and was wondering what happened to them. Then there was eventually a throwaway line saying “yeah they died over there” like it was nothing. Sarah, Wendell, Jacob, and others were killed with a random, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it line, and it’s never seen and they’re never grieved. This is an insult to these characters, their actors, and their fans.

8) Keeping Charlie Around

Charlie was a spy for the Vultures, which played a major role in the destruction of the baseball field in which the Clarks housed their community. Charlie is also the one who shot and killed Nick Clark, one of the more interesting and fan-favorite characters. What are the repercussions of her murdering one of the protagonists? She gets to join the main group and be their friend. Yes, this happens with Negan in the main show, but that’s only after several years of being in a prison cell and taking even longer to gain actual trust. He didn’t even still feel completely welcomed by all in the end. 

Meanwhile, Charlie just immediately gains everyone’s love, support, and trust as if the other characters didn’t watch her murder Nick. Not only is keeping her around despite what she did annoying and not make sense, but her character is overall pointless. She doesn’t have a personality and doesn’t really help with the group’s survival, so even storytelling-wise there was no reason to keep her around.

7) Replacing John Dorie With John Dorie

One of the best characters who entered the show during the Season 4 switch was the gunslinging cop named John Dorie. He’s eventually killed off and replaced by a gunslinging cop named John Dorie. The new one is his father, but what are the chances of finding him in the apocalypse? Him having the same job, skillset, and name is hilarious. Talk about wanting to be exactly like your parent. 

On top of that, they both spend most of their time with June. It’s clear that they were losing an actor before they were finishing the story they wanted to tell with him, but replacing a character with the same character is nonsense. 

6) Multiple Characters Who Were Killed Off Show Up Again

Sometimes in TV a character is thought to be killed off only to return again later on. It’s a bit of a silly trope, but it does work at times. In Fear the Walking Dead, it happens quite a bit. It’s actually quite laughable. Madison Clark sacrifices herself to save her family from the burning baseball field only to return four seasons later as a child-snatcher. Alicia sees her friends and loved ones off and walks away to die from a mixture of the fever caused by a zombie bite and radiation poisoning, but then reappears in the series finale totally fine. 

The last time we see Charlie in Season 7, she’s dying of radiation poisoning and it’s heavily implied that there is no way for her to recover. She reappears for a single episode in Season 8 completely free of her radiation poisoning only for her to die anyway. This one is particularly terrible because they bring hr back just to have a teen suicide, which is just plain unnecessary. Plus, it means a little more of Charlie. Ugh.

5) Morgan Gives Up His Kid Because He Sees Zombies in the Zombie Apocalypse

Morgan has spent over a decade becoming an expert in battling zombies in the apocalypse. Yet when he’s confronted with a small handful of these zombies, he decides that his baby is safer with the villain group. He protected this baby in a nuclear wasteland and was able to defend her against zombies and human villains for quite a while, but a few zombies coming at him suddenly makes him decide the baby isn’t safe with him? This makes no sense for the character. Morgan making this terrible decision feels like an incredibly forced way to kick off the rivalry with P.A.D.R.E.

4) Chugging Beer Cures Antifreeze Poisoning

The group gets antifreeze poisoning, and the solution was to chug a few beers. This also somehow works. Yes, alcohol is medically used to treat antifreeze poisoning, but not like this. There’s not enough ethanol in beer to help at all with this. It’s also just a part of the treatment, not an instant cure like the beer serves as in the show. These characters would have just been drunk in addition to dying of antifreeze poisoning. This, plus the beer bottle-shaped hot air balloon, really proves the writers just had some weird beer obsession for a little while.

3) Impossible Geography

Time and time again throughout the latter seasons of the show, characters can easily and instantly travel the length of multiple states. Sometimes they drive, but it’s sometimes on foot. When Morgan first joins the show, he says he ran from Virginia to Texas. The characters regularly travel between Louisiana, Georgia, and Virginia at a moment’s notice several times. When location is such a vital part of a story, mistakes like this are just plain lazy.

It’s also worth noting that they revisit the Sanctuary in Virginia but don’t stop by Alexandria. It’s like they wanted to tease the fans just enough to frustrate them.

2) Magical Walkie-Talkies

One of the laziest and most annoying plot devices used throughout the series are the walkie-talkies. Not only do they somehow have enough walkie-talkies and endless batteries for them, but they can be heard over any distance. Everyone, hero and villain, are all on the same channel. Whenever anything is said over the walkie-talkies, everyone apparently happens to be listening in at the right time no matter what. They’re constantly mentioning they “heard it on the radio chatter.” 

Worst of all is that hearing this radio chatter means that they somehow know someone’s exact location. They don’t list their location over the walkie-talkie; they say anything else and it allows others to track them because they “heard the radio chatter.” This isn’t how walkie-talkies work whatsoever. 

1) Surviving a Literal Nuclear Bomb

The Season 6 finale has the villains launch a nuclear missile from a military submarine. This is not an exaggeration. It’s an actual nuke and it’s not a dud. All of the main cast survive it by hiding under trucks and behind wooden doors. They then spend the next season surviving the radiation like it’s nothing, still able to find food, water, shelter, and other supplies, as well as breathe fine as long as a bandana covers their mouths. What’s just as baffling is how it hasn’t affected any of the other shows in the franchise. Surely a nuke going off a handful of states away would be cause for concern.

Then, after a season of battling it out for survival in a destroyed, radiated environment, it turns out they could have just left. The area on the other side of a river was somehow unaffected by the bomb (which would be extremely unlikely). Why didn’t they just leave the area then? The logic doesn’t make sense, the character choices surrounding it don’t make sense, and how something as major as a nuclear bomb doesn’t impact the rest of the Walking Dead universe. This is so painfully dumb it’s actually hard to laugh at. 

Runner-Ups Worth Mentioning:

• Madison somehow has an infinite supply of oxygen tanks in the apocalypse.
• An impalement wound doesn’t affect Troy whatsoever.
• Eight year olds are able to be masters at combat, setting up shelters, and treating people medically.
• The group repairs a plane from scratch with the help of children, and they somehow all survive it crashing without any major injuries.
• Daniel is conveniently saved by a bolt of lightning striking a Walker.
• Alicia literally has conversations with her childhood self.
• Everyone forgives Strand after he became a murderous dictator.

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