'The Walking Dead' review: Round two of AMC cult zombie hit returns with more flair, humanity

Back for more zombie thrills are (from l.) Laurie Holden, Norman Reedus, Jon Bernthal, Melissa Suzanne McBride, Sarah Wayne Callies and Chandler Riggs. (AMC)

The off-season, off-camera drama that swirled around AMC's cult zombie hit "The Walking Dead" does not, at least in the first couple of episodes, appear to have compromised the quality of the show.

Frank Darabont, show runner for the six-episode first season, was replaced this summer amid considerable consternation in the zombie blogosphere that this could drain some of the show's lifeblood.


Perhaps as a subconscious rebuttal to those concerns, Sunday's 9 p.m. premiere of season two seems to make a point of looking bigger and more expansive.

For starters, there are more "walkers," the zombies who threaten to kill and devour the small bands of living humans who survived an apocalyptic event that threatens to terminate Earth life as we know it.

"The Walking Dead," patterned closely but not entirely on the Robert Kirkman comic book of the same name, has from the beginning established a good balance between the sheer fun of an old-fashioned zombie bloodfest and more serious metaphors about the darker and better sides of human nature.

You wouldn't think anything reflects our self-absorbed side more neatly than a zombie, who lurches forward in search of nothing except his or her next meal.

But the non-zombies don't always get it right, either.

Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln), the sheriff who became one of the leaders-by-default for a motley mix of survivors, finds that setting a course in this new world is at best an imprecise mix of science and art.

Not everyone likes him, and those who have doubts include Shane Walsh (Jon Bernthal), Rick's nominal friend. Trouble is, Shane is even better friends with Rick's wife, Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies). That conflict raises the question of whether and how long they all can work together.

The larger issue of holding the whole ragtag unit together comes into sharper focus as we start this season, since all the cards were thrown up into the air at the end of last year, when the Centers for Disease Control base blew up.

The CDC was where they futilely hoped to find answers, or at least refuge. Sorry, guys.

Now the crew is off on another road trip, trying to guess where to regroup, rebuild or simply feel safe for more than five minutes.

With the zombie "walkers" seemingly gaining numbers even as the good guys keep bashing in their skulls, it's hard for both the characters and the viewers to envision a good outcome here.

The uncertainty of basic survival does not, however, impede the flowering of multiple minidramas. On the contrary, it intensifies them, as if everyone senses they've got less time now to fit everything in.

"The Walking Dead" may be under new management, but it seems to have kept its rhythm, moving easily between bursts of intense violence and long stretches of psychological sparring.
