The Walking Dead season 11: episode guide and everything else we know about the final season

Walkers in 'The Walking Dead'.
(Image credit: AMC)

It’s hard to believe The Walking Dead is coming to an end, but nevertheless we’re inching closer to it. The beloved show about a group of survivors trying to make it in a post-apocalyptic wasteland debuted in 2010 and ends later this year after 11 seasons.

Though the "walkers" were considered the primary threat in this world based on Robert Kirkman’s graphic novels, over the years the threats shifted from fleeing the undead to fighting other people in the daily struggle to survive. 

In season 11, just as things started to look more bleak than ever before, the Commonwealth presented an opportunity for stability and safety. A thriving community that resembles what life was like before the fall, it should have been the answer to the survivors’ prayers. So why is the Commonwealth turning out to be a nightmare?

We had a chance to screen the first two episodes of the season and here's our review

Here’s everything we know about the last eight episodes of The Walking Dead season 11. 

The Walking Dead season 11 episode guide

The time has come. The final episode of the series is titled "Rest in Peace" and airs November 20. Here's the summary:

"Daryl and Carol rush Judith to the hospital; Rosita, Eugene, and Gabriel search for Coco; Maggie and Negan take arms against Pamela; the heroes assemble for one last stand."

The Walking Dead season 11C episode guide:

The Walking Dead season 11 episode 17: "Lockdown"
Airdate: October 2, 2022
"Daryl and Negan rush to the Commonwealth to stop Hornsby from going after their families; Pamela deals with protestors demanding justice for Sebastian's crimes; Mercer needs Rosita's help to fight a swarm."

The Walking Dead season 11 episode 18: "A New Deal"
Airdate: October 9, 2022
"Carol makes a deal with Pamela to wipe the slate clean on behalf of her friends; Aaron, Jerry, Lydia and Elijah get on the road to Oceanside to fill them in on a plan; the Commonwealth celebrates Founders Day."

The Walking Dead season 11 episode 19: "Variant"
Airdate: October 16, 2022
"Eugene goes on the run, and Mercer is tasked to find him; Aaron's group faces a complication on the road."

The Walking Dead season 11 episode 20: "What's Been Lost"
Airdate: October 23, 2022
"Daryl and Carol search for their friends who disappeared."

The Walking Dead season 11 episode 21: ""Outpost 22"
Airdate: October 30, 2022
"Separated from their children, the survivors track a military convoy to a mysterious destination."

The Walking Dead season 11 episode 22: "Faith"
Airdate: November 6, 2022
"Ezekiel and Negan plan a work camp revolt; Eugene stands trial with Yumiko as his defence attorney."

The Walking Dead season 11 episode 23: "Family"
Airdate: November 13, 2022
"Our heroes and prisoners  head to the Commonwealth to confront Pamela. A swarm approaches the city."

When is The Walking Dead season 11C release date? 

The Walking Dead season 11C release date is October 2, 2022, at 9 pm ET/PT.

The first 16 episodes of the extended season 11 are available. Fans are counting down for the final eight episodes to premiere sometime before the end of 2022. 

The Walking Dead traditionally premiered in October over the years; the series premiere was on Halloween in 2010. In a shift, season 11A premiered in August 2021 and ran through October instead of starting in October, which cleared the path for Fear the Walking Dead season 7 and The Walking Dead: World Beyond to air in its traditional spot. The middle eight episodes of season 11 premiered in February 2022.

What happened in The Walking Dead season 11A and 11B?

At the start of season 11, the survivors were dealing with the aftermath of the Whisperer War. Their home in Alexandria had been decimated by the Whisperers and food was scarce. Maggie (Lauren Cohan) and her people said they had been attacked by the Reapers, a militant group that goes from settlement to settlement using up all of the resources and killing the residents. 

With food in short supply, Maggie leads a team to Meridian to take back the food from the Reapers. Along the way they encounter a herd of walkers in the subway and other threats, but it’s the tension between Maggie and Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) that causes the most friction. Negan killed Maggie’s husband, Glenn, in season 7 and the last time they saw each other he was a prisoner. Now free, they have to find a way to work together. 

Daryl (Norman Reedus) is faced with someone from his past when he discovers that Leah (Lynn Collins), the woman with whom he’d had a brief affair with in the past, was actually alive and well … and a Reaper. 

The group manages to defeat the Reapers but it comes at a big cost with losses to the group. Miraculously, though, they get the food and head home only to find that the Commonwealth has found them. 

The middle episodes of season 11 feature the group trying to acclimate to life in the Commonwealth. The Commonwealth should be a dream come true, a fully functional and thriving community of over 50,000 people run by Pamela Milton, a former politician’s daughter and her charismatic right-hand man, Lance. 

It doesn’t take long for the group to discover that something is horribly wrong at the Commonwealth. Everyone has jobs and functions in the society but it’s based on a system where anyone who doesn’t have power or influence is out of luck. 

A gilded cage is still a cage, and the survivors know that places like the Commonwealth are bigger threats than the walkers.

What is The Walking Dead season 11C plot?

Here's the preview synopsis of The Walking Dead 11C that AMC released ahead of San Diego Comic-Con 2022:

"In the upcoming final episodes of The Walking Dead, threats lurk around every corner, dead and alive, as each group continues to get caught in uncontrollable situations. The looming pressure is cresting towards a day of reckoning for all. Will the sum of their individual journeys cumulate into one, or divide them forever?"

Who is in The Walking Dead season 11 cast?

There have been a lot of losses among The Walking Dead cast over the years. There are only two cast members who have been around since the start of the show: Norman Reedus (Daryl) and Melissa McBride (Carol). Other longtime cast members include Lauren Cohan (Maggie), Ross Marquand (Aaron), Christian Serratos (Rosita), Josh McDermitt (Eugene), Seth Gilliam (Gabriel), Khary Payton (Ezekiel) and Jeffrey Dean Morgan as Negan.

Other cast members who have been with the show for a while include Cooper Andrews (Jerry), Cailey Fleming (Judith), Lauren Ridloff (Connie), Angel Theory (Kelly), Nadia Hilker (Magna), Eleanor Matsuura (Yumiko), Cassady McClincy (Lydia) and Paola Lazaro as Princess.

Now that the group has taken residence in the Commonwealth there are some new faces that have joined the cast toward the end of season 10 and into season 11. They include Laila Robins (Pamela Milton), Michael James Shaw (Mercer), Josh Hamilton (Lance Hornsby), Teo Rapp-Olsson (Sebastian) and Margot Bingham (Max/Stephanie).

With such a huge cast going into the last few episodes of the series, be assured that not all of the characters they play will make it to the end. 

Is there a trailer for The Walking Dead season 11C?

As expected, a new trailer for The Walking Dead 11C was released during San Diego Comic-Con and it didn't disappoint. 

A new teaser for the last episodes of the series was released after the mid-season finale. As you might expect, it’s filled to the brim with tension as the survivors try to survive in an uncertain world.  

Another teaser reminds us that the end is near for the show, and possibly some of these characters. 

How to watch The Walking Dead season 11

AMC is the home for all things The Walking Dead and is usually included with a standard cable subscription. If you don’t have cable, you can watch AMC through live TV streaming services like YouTube TV, Fubo TV and Sling TV.

AMC Plus is a standalone service that can be accessed as an add-on channel on Prime Video, Apple TV Plus or Roku. You can also watch on your computer or mobile device. The biggest benefit to an AMC Plus subscription is that you’ll have the ability to watch new episodes up to a week early.

For UK fans, Disney Plus is the home for every season of The Walking Dead, including season 11.  

Is this the end of ‘The Walking Dead’ franchise?

Though The Walking Dead is coming to an end, the franchise continues to expand with a series of spinoffs. Fear the Walking Dead is heading into season 8. Tales of the Walking Dead is coming with six all-new standalone episodes set in the TWD Universe. 

Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Lauren Cohan will team up for Isle of the Dead while Norman Reedus is taking the walker fight overseas in an untitled spinoff. Reedus was supposed to appear in a spinoff with co-star Melissa McBride, who bowed out of the project in May 2022. Showrunner Angela Kang was attached to lead the Carol and Daryl spinoff, but she is now attached to other unannounced TWD projects.

The big news coming out of San Diego Comic-Con is that Rick (Andrew Lincoln) and Michonne (Danai Gurira) are returning to the fold. Instead of the Rick Grimes movies that were announced several years ago, a series featuring the dynamic husband and wife duo will reveal what they've been up to over the years since leaving the show. It will start with six episodes but can turn into a larger series. 

Sarabeth Pollock
Editorial Content Producer

 

Sarabeth joined the What to Watch team in May 2022. An avid TV and movie fan, her perennial favorites are The Walking Dead, American Horror Story, true crime documentaries on Netflix and anything from Passionflix. You’ve Got Mail, Ocean's Eleven and Signs are movies that she can watch all day long. She's also a huge baseball fan, and hockey is a new favorite.  


When she's not working, Sarabeth hosts the My Nights Are Booked Podcast and a blog dedicated to books and interviews with authors and actors. She also published her first novel, Once Upon an Interview, in 2022.