There’s still life in the ol’ Walking Dead, based on Season 3 of Daryl Dixon. Thanks to the show moving the action from France (where it spent Seasons 1 and 2) to Spain, and a newly reunited Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus) and Carol Peletier (Melissa McBride), the third season feels fresh, fun, moves along at a brisk clip, and takes full advantage of the Spanish setting, as well as the inspiration of classic Spaghetti Westerns.
Spoilers for The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Season 3 past this point.
Picking up where Season 2 left off, with Daryl and Carol headed to England, ostensibly on their way home to Ohio (the long way around), it’s not too much of a spoiler to say that things don’t go as planned, and they end up in Spain instead. It’s also not too much of a spoiler to say, if you’ve ever seen any Walking Dead series before, that they end up both embroiled with a local community, and that things aren’t what they seem within said community.
It’s the tried and true formula of the franchise that has led our heroes taking down the baddies or taking over the location left by the baddies in multiple episodes, seasons, and Walking Dead series. But what showrunner David Zabel and company did effectively in Season 2 and continue to drill down on in Season 3 is the title character’s emotional journey, and though she’s no longer in the title – RIP The Book of Carol – our female lead gets an emotional arc as well.
The more surprising part is that Zabel actually finds new territory to mine in characters that have been around for 15 years now. Daryl has flipped from waffling about leaving France in Season 2 to trying to figure out why he’s always on the run, paired with recurrent flashbacks to his youth. And Carol, having had a dream sequence reconciliation with her dead daughter in the Season 2 finale, has a new lease on life that only becomes livelier once she finds a spark of romance again in Spain. The scripts parallel their journeys, with Daryl focusing on the past and Carol looking towards the future. Unlike the frequent criticism of Walking Dead as a nihilistic slog, Daryl Dixon Season 3 not only floats the possibility of hoping for more, but makes it a palpable possibility.
For a decade and a half, that sort of happy ending has always felt a million miles away, or would be tantalizingly close only to be snatched out of the grip of our heroes. But with the franchise whittled down to two final seasons of Daryl Dixon and one of Dead City, giving these characters closure, for the moment, seems like it could be a real thing. And with that comes earnest, bright performances by McBride and Reedus, who are, as usual, never better than when they’re together.
There are other cast members, though. Stephen Merchant guest stars as a delightfully quirky Englishman who gets them started on their journey, and sets the right, light tone for a season that has a fair amount of fun between all the zombies and other assorted, more human danger. Eduardo Noriega as Antonio, a man who takes our duo in, is an earnest romantic lead opposite Carol, and while it may make Caryl shippers bristle, there are real sweet sparks between the two. Óscar Jaenada also makes an impression as Fede, the morally questionable leader of the city which houses Daryl and Carol.
But the real stand-out of the new cast is Alexandra Masangkay as Paz, a character who seems custom-designed to drive the internet and cosplayers mad with envy: she’s a Spanish cowboy wearing a long, brown duster and a wide-brimmed hat who fights as well as Daryl, and also happens to be a lovelorn lesbian. There’s a slow burn throughout the season until her character comes to the forefront (all seven episodes were provided for review to critics), but once she does, she has the sort of iconic look and disposition that would have been right at home on the mothership Walking Dead series.
What separates Daryl Dixon, though, is where and how the show is shot. Versus the Georgia setting of the main series, shooting on location in France, and now in Spain, with Spanish film crews, gives the series the distinct flavor of the classic Spaghetti westerns it’s aiming for. And the show wears its influences on its sleeve, as Antonio is a not-so-secret cinephile who teaches Carol about the cheeseball arts of the genre. Daryl, though, was born for spaghetti westerns, and not-so-surprisingly cuts the perfect figure of the gruff, usually lone wolf longing to get out of town as quickly as possible, while slowly coming to like the populace and begrudgingly helping them.
The camera-work does occasionally veer into travelogue territory. And we once again get a Daryl Dixon motorbike spectacular this season, blurring the line between The Walking Dead and AMC reality series Ride with Norman Reedus. But mostly it’s beautifully filmed, and the stranger-in-a-strange-land vibe feels palpably different in Season 3 than it did in Seasons 1 and 2. The zombies, too, continue to be surprising and creative as Greg Nicotero and his crew discover brand new gross scares, years in and miles away.
Look, innumerable articles have been written about the death of The Walking Dead, and it’s more possible than ever that the end is near. But with TV as fun as Daryl Dixon Season 3, here’s hoping it keeps shambling forward forever.
The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Season 3 Premiere Dates And Episode Guide:
New episodes of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon premiere on Sundays on AMC and AMC+. The episodes premiere at 9 pm ET on AMC and AMC+
Here’s the full list of episodes in The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Season 3 with expected premiere dates:
- Sunday, September 7, 2025: The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, Season 3, Episode 1, “Costa da Morte”
- Sunday, September 14, 2025: The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, Season 3, Episode 2, “La Ofrenda”
- Sunday, September 21, 2025: The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, Season 3, Episode 3, “El Scarificio”
- Sunday, September 28, 2025: The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, Season 3, Episode 4, “La Justicia Fronteriza”
- Sunday, October 5, 2025: The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, Season 3, Episode 5, “Limbo”
- Sunday, October 12, 2025: The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, Season 3, Episode 6, “Contrabando”
- Sunday, October 19, 2025: The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, Season 3, Episode 7, “Solaz Del Mar”
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