‘The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live’ Season 1 Blu-Ray SteelBook Review – A Welcome Return To Form

Stars Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira return as the beloved TWD characters “Rick Grimes” and “Michonne” in the highly anticipated next series in the Walking Dead Universe. The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live presents an epic love story of two characters changed by a changed world. Kept apart by distance. By an unstoppable power. By the ghosts of who they were. Rick and Michonne are thrown into another world, built on a war against the dead… And ultimately, a war against the living. Can they find each other and who they were in a place and situation unlike any they’ve ever known before? Are they enemies? Lovers? Victims? Victors? Without each other, are they even alive — or will they find that they, too, are the Walking Dead?

For in-depth thoughts on The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live – Season 1, please see my colleague Lane Mills’s review from its original television debut here and here. 

Video Quality

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live comes to Blu-Ray with a favorable 1080p presentation that brings the series to life with great care. The locales explored for this particular outing showcase some rich detail within the landscapes and production design. From the brighter outdoor scenes to the expected parade of shadowy sequences, facial details are consistently rendered to reveal world-weary texture. You will find plenty of cuts and scrapes collected during their travels.

Colors are never truly vibrant, but they make an impression in terms of the depth and accuracy of the hues. No instances of exceptional banding or compression artifacts appeared throughout the season. The presentation delivers faithful black levels that do not stumble when it comes to object outlines in shadowy spaces. Highlights are likewise stable and never fall to blooming. This franchise continues to be treated well on Blu-Ray. 

Audio Quality

The Blu-Ray disc comes with a DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio track that handles everything well. The Sam Ewing score establishes the tone as it flows through the room with righteous fidelity. The mix does a respectable job of ensuring neither sound effects nor the score ever trounces on important information. Dialogue emerges primarily in the center channel with occasional exchanges from off-screen standing out clearly. There is some unsettling ambient activity in the rear channels that makes certain moments extra thrilling. This series embraces the zombie action with some kinetic moments that respond well in the mix. The track makes an impression when it is supposed to. This track delivers on the promise of the soundscape. There are optional English SDH, French, and Spanish subtitles provided. 

Special Features

• The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live Preview: A two-minute preview for the show is provided. 

• Show Me More – The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live: A 43-minute special is provided in which the cast and creative team discuss the need to continue this story, the scale of the narrative, the creation of pivotal moments, new and returning characters, and much more. 

Final Thoughts

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live is one of the strongest additions to the Walking Dead universe since the mothership series ended its run. Reuniting with core characters and expanding the world to exciting new places proves to be exactly what was needed to get us impatient to wait for the next episode which was so commonplace back in the day. At six episodes, this particular storyline is paced pretty well even if some impatient audience members may get antsy early on during the table setting. When all is said and done, it is a really great season of television and it has us excited to see what is on the horizon next. RLJE Entertainment has released a Blu-Ray set featuring a great A/V presentation and a couple of supplemental features in gorgeous SteelBook packaging. Recommended 

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live – Season 1 is currently available to purchase on Blu-Ray and DVD. 

Note: Images presented in this review are not reflective of the image quality of the Blu-Ray.

Disclaimer: RLJE Entertainment has supplied a copy of this disc free of charge for review purposes. All opinions in this review are the honest reactions of the author.