Fear the Walking Dead: Dead in the Water (TV Mini Series 2022) Poster

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6/10
Better than seasons 6 & 7 even with the mistakes
mhorg20185 October 2022
Warning: Spoilers
This was well done... but it could have been better if not for all the mistakes in it. Fear writers over the last three years have taken some very stupid short cuts. They knew nothing about fallout, nothing about radiation, and certainly didn't do any research on the Navy or Submarines. First, Subs are detached for long term missions, so long hair and beards are unacceptable. One crewman is a designated barber. Second, no officer is going to allow a crewman to address him as 'man'. Third, they got no messages? How fast did this damn zombie whatever spread? And lastly, they were ordered to fire on American cities? No one on board a sub has the ability to reprogram a missile. Nor do they have the missile keys. Those keys the officers had? Those are to unlock a safe that gives access to a code that lets them open another safe where the launch keys are. This is to stop exactly the stupid events of where the Pennsylvania's missiles were launched. Which leads to: Nuclear explosions can be seen from miles away. So no one from the commonwealth or anywhere else the Walking Dead survivors are saw them? And fallout SPREADS. It spreads wide. Parts of the country would be contaminated. Lastly, US submarine missiles are MIRVS, multiple launch reentry warheads. They could devastate a small nation. Lastly, the guy gets to call home JUST in time for his wife and kid to get eaten? This would have been so much better if not for the lazy writing.
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7/10
Quick, enjoyable, and one of the best (albeit low budget) TWDU webseries. Adds a lot of context to Fear!
frankiesilver-9183624 June 2022
Warning: Spoilers
For just being yet another webseries (4th for Fear and 8th for all of TWDU) this was a pleasant surprise and one of the best mini series to date.

It's a simple 40 minute "what was it like for a navy crew at the start of the apocalypse" story and it's really interesting.

Riley's actor has a great on-screen presence and seeing how he was before he became a villain really humanizes him. Seeing him meet Teddy at the end as well was such a treat.

Also just the concept of an episode entirely on a submarine with a quickly dying crew is just great. It was fairly tense and the dilemma of following orders to nuke their own country or not to stop the spread is a cool idea.

Overall its a great time and an easy watch that enhances Fear Season 6. Easy recommendation.
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7/10
Great spinoff
DrDumb21 March 2024
Warning: Spoilers
I liked how they interpreted "family" in this spinoff. The word "family" is the key topic in TWD universe. In this spinoff, we see how some Marine Soldiers faithfully serve the US Navy to protect the country and hence protect their families. They believe "no America no family": the country should always be placed before their families. While being absent from their family members in blood, they treat each other like family.

The soldiers acted differently towards the outbreak: some soldiers (I.e. Alvarez) broke down and lost hope; some soldiers sacrificed themselves to protect the others (I.e. Pierce), and some (I.e. Alvarez) betrayed their brother-in-arm so they could live. Perhaps that was how they thought "family" was, some would do anything to protect their "family" but some would let them be "scapegoats". For Jason Riley, he believed they could get out while he never forgot to save innocent lives: although his commander asked him to surrender the key to launch the warheads, but he refuses to comply with. "If we launch the warheads, we might kill a lot of people including our family"

The moment that Jason Riley finally broke down at the end because he knew that his family was still alive but soon he realized that they weren't which really touched me. Like what Maggie Greene says "when I heard Beth was still alive, then lost her in the same day: watching people close to you die can really break you, that's what Riley went through, losing his loved ones, losing hope to survive.

Nick Stahl did a very good job in this spinoff, for presenting Jason Riley's life throughout the outbreak, from a good hearted, faithful and loyal soldier who feels sorry for not being around for his family to a brainwashed and formidable henchman who would do anything for Teddy's cult. Zombie apocalypse is dangerous, but what really is dangerous is people, like Teddy, turning a good person into a villain's pawn. That's what TWD is all about: the walkers don't rule us, people do.
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Have Not watched TWD or FTWD for a couple of years+
dave42c23 April 2022
...because every once in a while, things didn't make logical sense. And over the seasons, it just added up as did my frustration. So I gave up on them.

Anyway, I really enjoyed this 41-minute story.

(Was looking forward to five more episodes, but apparently, this was all 6 mini episodes in one)
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6/10
Do what needs doing.
reddiemurf8126 November 2022
Warning: Spoilers
During peacetime, in the gulf of mexico (not extremely far from the Texas coast), the naval submarine USS Pennsylvania and its crew are busy at work going thru war game training/strategy drills. They have been deployed for some time and haven't received much in the way of messages from home. A crew member suddenly collapses one day due to an appendicitis. An message is sent to the coast for an emergency med-evac, but no response is received on the sub. The on-board medic attempts an appendectomy when the crew member can no longer wait, but is unable to save the man's life. After his death, the crew do the only thing they can with the body, and place it in the freezer,, only to discover the body rise up and attack them later on in the mess hall. The re-animated sailor bites three of the sailors before being dispatched by a shot through the head,,, leaving the entire crew to wonder what on earth is happening to them, and if it's happening to them on a submarine what must be happening to their families on land.

While this 6-part companion to the Fear the Walking series is not incredible by any means, it is a good addition to the Walking Dead Universe imo. Seeing how everything could have started through the experience of a submarine crew who have virtually no communication with the rest of the world adds a new dimension to the universe.

While there is only one recognizable actor (Nick Stahl) for the most part of the show (the great John Glover makes an appearance at the end), the whole cast performs fairly well.

I'd agree with the imdb rating. It's a solid 6.4.
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7/10
Worst Makeup Job I Have Ever Seen!
madhouserevival15 April 2022
The premise in the show decription makes it look like it all takes place inside a submarine. It only STARTS in a submarine. Great cast, though the dialogue mostly sounds wooden in the first episode. The timing was way off in some scenes. But the thing that really botthered me was the atrocious makeup job done on the undead. I swear, the white makeup is no better than circus clown makeup. A couple zombies looked like they had zinc oxide cream thickly spread on their faces. I could actually see the THICK outline of the cake makeup. This made it impossible to take them seriously.

The director needs to quit his damn job as he obviously doesn't seem to pay attention to detail. Go back to being a producer, dude. Money is your wheelhouse, not directing.
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6/10
Great way to pass the time whilst waiting for the ongoing series to get back on the screen...
paul_haakonsen15 April 2022
This six episode mini-series or webisodes, call them what you like, was actually a fun way to pass the time while waiting for the "Fear the Walking Dead" series to start again. The people behind these series have been good as dishing out these small mini-series to stoke the fire and keep the fans anticipated and baited while waiting.

And it works. Oh yeah, it definitely works.

"Fear the Walking Dead: Dead in the Water" follows the crew and the fate of the submarine USS Pensylvania in the early days of the zombie outbreak. It was actually a nicely enough written storyline from writer Jacob Pinion and director Kenneth Requa.

Running at about 41 minutes, these six episodes actually do make for adequate entertainment, especially when binging through all six episodes in one rapid succession.

It was nice to see cast members return to reprise characters from the days before the time we saw them in the ongoing "Fear the Walking Dead" series, and especially good to see Nick Stahl (playing Riley) and John Glover (playing Teddy Maddox) back on the screen.

The special effects are good in "Fear the Walking Dead: Dead in the Water", as they have been in all the various series in this franchise. However, I just never comprehended why the face would be so sullen and sunken mere moments after someone has died and turned into a zombie. Sure, I get it that it visually makes for a more menacing zombie and lets the audience have no doubt about whether or not someone has turned, but come on, the human body just doesn't decompose and deteriorate that fast.

All in all, then "Fear the Walking Dead: Dead in the Water" is a good way to stoke the interest of the "Fear the Walking Dead" franchise. And it certainly is a mini-series that you should sit down to watch if you enjoy the ongoing series.

My rating of "Fear the Walking Dead: Dead in the Water" lands on a six out of ten stars.
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8/10
Mixed bag
tkell3110 January 2023
Warning: Spoilers
Because I'm a fan of the genre rated it about two stars higher than it probably deserves. Pros, fascinating setting on a Nuclear submarine, hints at what is going on in the rest of the world, reasonable introduction of the zombie outbreak with one of the sailor's dying, and the back story of the main character.

Cons: Acting was rough. While the initial outbreak was pretty reasonable with the deceased sailor managing to bite three other sailors before they shot him in the head it seemingly spread to the whole ship in a manner of a few hours. Did none of the three get sick before dying and turning? And how did they bite so many without them raising a general alarm? I get it, there's no way to have it spread that would hold up to scrutiny so maybe it should have started with multiple sailors dying from whatever it was that triggered this in the first place.

Overall I found it entertaining if you overlook (as you do with a lot of things in TWD universe) the things that dont make sense.
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2/10
Poor acting, low budget feel
buckmurray17 April 2022
Several reasons for a low rating:

The acting was very poor.

As a Navy veteran, they did a terrible job making it seem like it was the actual Navy. So many flaws.

Poorly written, they smashed in several storylines, Crimson Tide and Fear the Walking Dead. They failed miserably.

This doesn't hold up to The Walking Dead standards.
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10/10
Was not expecting it to be this great!
alexthelion-2112 April 2022
TWD Webisodes have not always been great. The original ones by Greg Nicotero (Torn Apart, Cold Storage and The Oath) were all very great! But after that, they went downhill. Flight 462, Passage and Red Machete were meh. Dead in the water was a great standalone short that shed light on an intriguing villain and expands the universe. I was seriously expecting to hate this! But wow this was loads of fun. Nick Stahl absolutely killed it! If it's possible to get him an Emmy for this, do it! The ending was brilliant to. Awesome work team.
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3/10
Another AMC Flop
importantleast19 April 2022
Warning: Spoilers
If you're looking for a refreshing take on the Walking Dead series, brace yourself for another disappointing hour of tv.

Right off the bat the show starts with some of the driest writing and acting of the year. Our main crew looks out of place, confused and emotionally inept. There was no attempt at making these soldiers feel like soldiers, let alone normal human beings.

Long story short, its awkward, inconsistent and shallow. The crew repeatedly question and disobey direct orders, but without hesitation, shoot their brothers dead. They almost forget to question whats even happening, switching from ready to kill to being family men with every new scene.

It takes real effort to squander a setting like "zombie apocalypse on a nuclear submarine" but they did it anyway. 3/10 dont recommend.
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8/10
Nick Stahl is fantastic.
fountasalexander11 April 2022
Sure there are flaws in this series, but if you just sit back and relax, it's an enjoyable back story that we should've had before we met Riley.

It's a shame he was wasted on FearTWD, 8/10.
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1/10
An early 90's sci fi channel b movie at best ... real trash.
ethanyt-6461325 April 2022
Warning: Spoilers
I saw the title and thought "this looks like it could be good", and it could have been. It is an excellent premise. I am NOT a sub vet, but I am an Army vet and love learning about the military. That said, I know sub crews are extremely smart, professional and disciplined sailors. Their leadership and crew would not fall to pieces such as the show portrayed. Shooting guns in a sub? An officer with long hair and a beard? They go to the weapons room and come out with no weapons. The opening shows the cook burning a pancake on a dirty grill. Come on!!! It did have an extremely low budget feel and how did a zombie get out of a zipped up body bag in a freezer (that was of coursed stored with their food). Attention to detail matters and this show had none.
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9/10
Pleasantly Surprised
meltingmel9 June 2023
I've been on a TWD Universe binge for the last several months. I'm almost caught up for the new mini series! With that said... I've watched every single web series and let me say... most of them have been terrible. But this one? It's high quality. It was written well. I loved it. It was great seeing Nick Stahl again and he once again proves he is an amazing actor. Right now? This web series killed FTWD Season 7. Which is really terrible. I wish they would put the same effort into FTWD they did into this mini series. I do really enjoy seeing everyone's origin stories. The show doesn't concentrate enough on that.
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4/10
Fear the Writer
Tweetienator16 April 2022
Fear the Walking Dead: Dead in the Water is a good example what's wrong with the whole TWD franchise since season 5 or 6 of the mothership TWD - the writing is lazy and not only occasionally plain stupid. I never was on board of a submarine but can't imagine that a zombie outbreak would overtake the crew in such a way (the show makes a convenient time jump, so the writers don't have to explain how the infected take over the sub), I just mention all those bulkheads, close them and you are save and/or you can confine the infected, on top, secure and control the Combat Information Center - easy work for a military crew, one might think. Anyway, the little show is not a total fail and not worse than the regular Fear the Walking Dead show (I must admit, that I do not watch that one anymore and missed the last two or three seasons) but you get just served the same lukewarm characters like in all the other shows, nothing really makes sense or provides real suspense, it's like eating a cheeseburger while you still do some stuff on your machine.
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9/10
First time in a while!
awesomness-9474811 April 2022
Warning: Spoilers
Walking dead is going downhill. We all know this. Every once in a while however, they give us some quality content. Dead in the Water was just perfect.

First of all, the intensity of it. While the walkers may have come back w but fast, I don't think anybody is going to shoot their own crew member just like that. The reason most characters died on their show was out of their own cluelessness.

Also, the Nukes scene was great. Should a man ever have to fire on his own country? The whole scene was just mentally intense.

But the best part for me came after they escaped the Sub. Riley on the shore listening to the death of his family, the broken look on his face after realizing that he has nothing, and the return of Teddy. The scene was just tragic. Realizing how evil he was on Fear in comparison to the broken man on here just shows how evil and manipulative Teddy is.

Not only did this Webisode improve my opinions on Teddy and Riley as characters, but it just made the whole of season 6B all that much better.
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2/10
Sub Vet
Beaumont1216 April 2022
Having spent a few years on submarines I can say I never laughed so hard in my life. Nothing about this is even close to how a submarine operates. It's embarrassing and very insulting. Whoever produced this obviously has a very low opinion of the military and that's okay, that's what this country stands for, having the right to be wrong and biased. Aside from that I can not believe the producers of The Walking Dead thought this was good, it is so far from a quality show it should be buried under the studio and never mentioned again. The story is terrible the acting is atrocious and the make-up is laughable. I gave it a 2 only because I did watch the whole thing.
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8/10
Actually pretty great
matp-4760013 May 2022
I thoroughly enjoyed this as a twd fan but I can see why this wouldn't be for everyone. What makes it so great is the little titbits of information it gives us about the world and lore of twd universe. Also Nick Stahl was really solid in this and managed to make Riley a really likable decent character. I wish there was more of John Glovers Teddy, but his Cameo was done pretty well I think.

Overall, this was better than just about every episode we have had so far in Fear Season 7 so far. However I would recommend watching it as 1 whole 40 min regular episode and not in little 5 minute webisodes.
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1/10
One of the worst shows I've seen in awhile
bgillmore16 April 2022
I'm quite surprised I made it 20 minutes into the first episode. This show is just bad, and I mean really bad, bad acting, bad SFX, bad makeup, bad story, bad everything. I've been on Navy ships and this sub wasn't even close to looking real. If you spent 15 minutes in the military you know you need to shave everyday, and have regulation haircut, I swear I seen a male "crew member" walking around with a pony tale and the lead has like 3 days worth of stubble, and thats even before the "undead" are introduced. Save yourself some time and skip this thing and go learn to knit or something.
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8/10
A surprisingly good start
mlbit15 April 2022
I was suprised that this was so good. Being a fan of the original walking dead I was absolutely appalled at the way it slowly slithered into Wokness after Rick left and basically turning into some sort of mothers meeting. Even my heroines Micheonne and Carole seemed to turn into a meek version of themselves more concerned with feelings than fighting the baddies. The spin-offs that followed were unwatchable, full of preachy woke rubbish and no real story. Men and Women with perfect makeup and hair worrying about trivialities does not a good Zombie series make. . Then we get this, and what a fantastic surprise, Fear the walking dead: Dead in the sea is very different to the other pale spin-offs . Good suspenseful story, reasonably likeable characters that you root for (unlike previous spinoff where your hoping the cast get eaten and quickly) no preachy woke messages and all on a submarine . I feel that it has a limited life in its present form as there's only so much they can do in a submarine but hopefully this will expand as the series progresses.
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2/10
I suffered thru this.
DelphinusMinor15 August 2022
I knew it wasn't going to be worth watching as soon as I heard several onboard the sub calling it a "ship". A submarine is never called a "ship". It's a boat. Then there are the sailors with longish hair and not even using proper naval terminology. I mean didn't they have an advisor to make sure these basics were correct? I'm ex navy and of course that is going to drive me bananas. The thing is tho, people that are not navy know that submarines are not called ships.

It's like a boat full of untrained undisciplined hippies.
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10/10
Love it
shyhartc29 April 2022
Great start.. I wasn't expecting this good, the setting is unique because it is in the submarine. Can't wait the next episode.

Nick Stahl is great in this role. I want to watch more episodes, I hope this has at least12 episodes.
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4/10
Constantly breaks its own rules, sloppy direction
rmmil10 April 2022
I get it, TWD and FTWD writers all assume their audiences have very short attention spans.

"Dead in the water" is a great example of this. Simply put, why was everyone turning so quickly?

I don't know when it changed, but somewhere around season 7-8 of TWD, and around season 5 in FTWD, walkers started turning more quickly. Instead of a change that took 1-2 days after death, or after a bite, suddenly shortened drastically to hours, or minutes in some cases

My assumption for continuity sake was that as the virus evolved over time, it turned the dead faster.

This "short" or whatever you want to call it throws all that convention out the window. Why were these initial outbreak zombies turning in minutes?

For the sake of the story and direction itself, I also found it hard to believe over 100 navy soldiers would so easily succumb to zombie attack. "Noooo...zombie slowly approaching...should I move? Do anything to avoid the attack? Fight back even? Nah!" TWD / FTWD always paints every soldier as incredibly incompetent in every series, completely incapable of defending themselves from slow-moving attackers.

Bottom line, these directors are just so sloppy, all the time, and this episode broke no new ground, it goes exactly like you expected it would.

However, as a plus, I will say I'm a big fan of Nick Stahl's acting, including in this. I wish he was in more things.
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3/10
Same trash writing as the rest
callezetter17 April 2022
The highschool level of comedy writing is on a roll in this one too. Sloppy pacing, quationable directing and just trash lazy writing way too often.

It had the setup to be really good, with concentrated/limited world building, cool environment and well established narrative that definitely isnt rocketscience. Why is it so hard to make even an ok pass for this creative team? Unbelievable.
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2/10
Bad acting and realism thrown out the window
Lawless-Ireland16 April 2022
There in a submarine with lots of space, You could swing a cat in the halls. I clocked like 6 of them with beards and mustaches and none of them salute there commanders or make you believe that is who there even supposed to be, And this is right from the start before any zombie stuff.

Its just really bad acting and if this is the pilot to get you interested then it can only get worse. Throw you're brain out the window and see for yourself.
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