The Walking Dead Season 2 just wrapped up, and it was phenomenal. Before I go any further let me make this as abundantly clear as I possibly can.
SPOILERS AHEAD!
If you don’t want to be spoiled, click off this article right now and go watch an Ice Bucket challenge or something.
Anyway, there are five ways that the game can end in TWD Season 2 . You can end up with either Kenny or Jane in one of two scenarios or by yourself. In two of these scenarios Kenny must die. In two of these scenarios, Kenny must live. In one scenario, Kenny could die or live.
Kenny’s scenarios have Clem and Kenny finally find Wellington, but unfortunately they aren’t taking in any new members. Wellington is incredibly secure and has tons of food, and so Kenny has to make a hard choice. He decides to plead with the members of Wellington to take Clem and baby AJ and leave him behind. You then have the choice of either following him, along with the newborn AJ from episode 4, or saying your sad goodbye and starting you new life in Wellington.
Jane’s scenarios find Clem and Jane making their way back to Carver’s camp from episode 3, which still has quite a bit of food left, along with a working greenhouse. When they think about shacking up there, three people, two adults and a child, come to the fence and ask if they can join, swearing they are unarmed. You can either choose to let them in and start a new society, or turn them away at which point you notice that the man has a gun in his back pocket, lying about whether or not he was armed.
The final scenario lands Clem with neither Kenny nor Jane. All alone now, she finds herself walking through a field of walkers. She cuts one open and smears its guts over her and AJ, and walks, stoically through the crowd.
These endings leave very little possibility to The Walking Dead Season 3 . Granted, Season 3 will probably start off in a scenario that was dependent on the ending of Season 2 , just like Season 2 did with Season 1 . But, there are very few characters left over that can make a reappearance. Nearly everyone who was introduced in this episode is dead, and Kenny is either dead or alive. Jane, perhaps, can make a reappearance, but that’s about it. I suppose Christa can also make a reappearance as her whereabouts were never revealed, but the fact of the matter is, the only constant in the ending was Clem and AJ.
So this greatly constrains the options of Season 3 … sort of. If there are going to be recurring characters, the only real choices that Telltale has to work with are Clem and AJ, and AJ can’t really be a protagonist unless there is an absolutely huge jump into the future, which I’m not sure any Walking Dead IP is willing to do yet. On the flipside, keeping AJ young also keeps Clem young, and risks Season 3 feeling like a retread of Season 2 .
Then there is the last option, ditching Clem and AJ all together. Clem’s story in Season 2 was compelling in part because it was a natural continuation of Lee’s story from Season 1 . But, attaching seasons to each other like this, isn’t strictly necessary. A throwback to previous seasons would be nice, much like how Season 2 features Kenny, Christa, Omid, and many characters from 400 Days , and even a flash back scene with Lee. In fact, throwbacks like this are what got the series on track in the first place, as Glen and Hershel from the main comic line cameoed in Season 1 Episode 1 . But the actual meat of the story can be elsewhere. We can follow some completely new survivors in a completely new area of the U.S. and it would still be compelling. After all, we still want to eventually see someone in the game series meet up with Rick and the rest of the main party.
What do you want to see happen in Season 3 of The Walking Dead ? Let us know in the comments.