The Walking Dead, CS Idea

The Walking Dead and Transmedia storytelling

After some confusion about the brief, I think I finally have it pinned down. Well I hope so! As it is a very broad brief I am hoping this will be right! After discussing with my team mate Liam, we decided to look at The Walking Dead and how it uses Transmedia storytelling. The definition of Transmedia storytelling is the aspect of telling a story across multiple platforms and formats. Each different method of storytelling uses different techniques to appeal to an audience who enjoy storytelling through that selected type of media platform. E.g. a graphic novel will tell the story through visuals, a game will tell it through the game play, music and character interactions and a film/tv show will tell it through characterization, character interactions, sound and visuals.

The series was first a graphic novel created by Robert Kirkman.

 It then became a television series on AMC, and was then turned into a 5 part game. 

There is also another game in production set for release at the end of 2013. 

This is a perfect example of Transmedia storytelling and the coherent world they have created around this one narrative and its many characters. I decided to look at the Graphic Novel to the Game, with my question being:

How does The Walking dead successfully create a coherent world throughout the Graphic Novel and Game through the use of Transmedia Storytelling? 

Graphic Novel

The Graphic Novel was first released in 2003 as a series of comics created by Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore. It is based around the story of Rick Grimes, a police officer who awakens from a coma to find he is in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. It follows the story of how he reunites with his family and his struggle for survival. The Graphic Novel has been extremely successful, now on its 89th comic, and still going strong.

The Game

The game is a 5 part series created by Tell Tale Games based solely on the Graphic Novel. Created in the same style, the thick lines and bold colours give the same feel as a comic. The game however follows the story of a new character called Lee, who, after being arrested finds himself in an apocalypse. He meets a young girl called Clementine. The narrative then follows these two characters as they group together with others to survive, while searching for Clementine's parents.The game has also been very popular with its story really strong along with its characters. 

The world in which these stories are set is a large a diverse one. It is our own. Characters can come from all walks of life and have their own personalities and morals. One of the main reasons why these worlds are still so coherent, even through lots of different media is the links they make to one another. For example, a player of the game could start reading the graphic novel and see a familiar character, they have already grown this emotional attachment to that character so they read on. It is the same for the TV show, characters and locations are mimicked in the game, and players feel like they can relate to these faces and areas. 

Propps Theory in Relation to The Walking Dead:

• The Hero- Lee
• The False Hero- Andrew St John
• The Villain- Zombies, plus Bandits
• The Donor- Doug
• The Helper- Kenny
• The Dispatcher- The World, and Bandits
• The Princess (and her father)- Clementine

What I decided to have a close look at is how the characters and locations are coherent throughout the game and comic. Firstly I had a look at which locations and characters were the same in each.

Another game I looked at was AMC's small game based on Shane. It illustrates the coherent world of the Walking Dead. It shows how he survived the zombie outbreak before he went to check on Rick in the Hospital.  Below is screens from the game, and how they have used the graphic novel style.

Below is Shane from the comic.

From the Tell Tale game a character as well as his location that is used from the comic is Hershel and his farm.

Below is Hershel's farm in the comic. 

 This is Hershel's farm in the game, and as you can see it is almost identical to the comic. For fans of the comic this is a coherency that had to be kept in detail.

This is Hershel in the comic.

He is quite old, with a rugged, bearded face, and wears an army looking jacket around his farm.

Below is Hershel from the game. As you can see, they are identical. The creators of the game have put a lot of effort into creating the characters as identical as possible.

Another example of this is the character Glenn. Glenn appears in the comic and in the game, and the games narrative serves as a prequel to how he meets Rick.