The Walking Dead: World Beyond season 2 episode 3 spoilers follow.
Zombies might be braindead, but The Walking Dead is anything but. Across eleven seasons and multiple spinoffs, this show's version of the apocalypse has forced us to keep track of multiple mysteries that are often years in the making.
Where is Rick Grimes? What does the CRM really want? And who in God's name thought a spinoff about teenagers would be fun to watch?
But there's one mystery in particular that fans have longed to see since the very beginning, and that's where exactly did the virus come from? And if we find that out, will our survivors ever discover a cure?
Between rabies, space spores and even Breaking Bad's Walter White, many theories have been proposed when it comes to the origins of the virus, but definitive answers might never come. Still, that hasn't stopped the CRM from trying to solve this mystery and save their world in the process.
After we briefly saw scientists experiment on walkers in season one, the second episode of the final season dives deeper into this research, explaining that fungi could hold the key to stopping the walker threat. Using data he's collected from tagged zombies out in the wild, Dr Leo Bennett explains that modified fungi could speed up a walker's rate of decay and perhaps even cure the disease completely.
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Episode three expands on this even more by introducing a pivotal character who was actually first mentioned by Eugene many seasons ago on The Walking Dead. Back when he was lying about being a scientist, Eugene claimed that he was involved in the Human Genome Project under someone called Dr T Brooks Ellis.
While that turned out to be untrue, episode three of World Beyond's second season has just introduced this very man in the actual flesh as an ally of the CRM.
The previous episode hinted at this when Dr Bennett mentioned Ellis in a brief video clip, but his identity has now been confirmed during a scene in episode three where the doctor teaches Hope about yeast in class. Not only is that fungi focus quite telling when it comes to his scientific goals, but it's also no coincidence that a poster for the Human Genome Project is conveniently placed right behind him throughout this scene.
It's said that every lie contains a grain of truth, and that's absolutely true of what Eugene used to say, because it seems likely that Ellis was indeed involved in the Human Genome Project, just like he said. Given that Eugene is not a scientist himself, it stands to reason that Ellis and his work must have been quite renowned before the apocalypse hit, which bodes well for the doctor's ability to find a cure.
And if Ellis doesn't manage it, then perhaps one of his colleagues or even one of his new students will make more progress in this area. The entire first season of this show revolved around Hope being "the asset," someone with enough smarts to help the CRM fix their broken world. But even with the combined intelligence of Hope, Leo, and Ellis, a cure could still be a very long way off.
When we asked showrunner Matt Negrete about the possibility of this last year, he told us that the "challenges" of this mean a solution "might take a while to happen".
"We're dealing with scientists who live in the zombie apocalypse who don't have the resources we have now, and a lot of their colleagues have not survived 10 years into the apocalypse."
As Negrete pointed out, "it's not just a post-apocalypse now; it's post-post-apocalypse". And maybe that's for the best. The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman said a while back that it would be "boring" and "un-relatable" to follow scientists on the hunt for answers, and he might have a point, because so far, World Beyond hasn't exactly lived up to our expectations in season two...
The Walking Dead: World Beyond season 2 airs on Sundays on AMC in the US. You can stream the series on Amazon Prime Video in the UK.
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After teaching in England and South Korea, David turned to writing in Germany, where he covered everything from superhero movies to the Berlin Film Festival.
In 2019, David moved to London to join Digital Spy, where he could indulge his love of comics, horror and LGBTQ+ storytelling as Deputy TV Editor, and later, as Acting TV Editor.
David has spoken on numerous LGBTQ+ panels to discuss queer representation and in 2020, he created the Rainbow Crew interview series, which celebrates LGBTQ+ talent on both sides of the camera via video content and longform reads.
Beyond that, David has interviewed all your faves, including Henry Cavill, Pedro Pascal, Olivia Colman, Patrick Stewart, Ncuti Gatwa, Jamie Dornan, Regina King, and more — not to mention countless Drag Race legends.
As a freelance entertainment journalist, David has bylines across a range of publications including Empire Online, Radio Times, INTO, Highsnobiety, Den of Geek, The Digital Fix and Sight & Sound.
