The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon - Season One Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		3.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.5
Overall		3.5

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon - Season One Blu-ray Movie Review

You know what they call a zombie in Paris?

Reviewed by Randy Miller III February 9, 2024

Continuing the long-running franchise's glut of spin-offs and detours such as Tales of the Walking Dead and Dead City, the TWD train keeps chugging along with Daryl Dixon, a no-brainer solo outing for its most popular character. The story keeps time with his established path during all 11 seasons of the original series, which concluded with him attempting to find his own happy ending after leaving the Commonwealth. Naturally, that doesn't happen right away, or this would be a pretty damn boring series... and while it certainly doesn't reinvent the wheel, the back-to-basics approach works in Daryl Dixon's favor and makes this brief six-episode season worth looking into for die-hard fans.

Daryl Dixon opens with our title character washing ashore after a long (and mostly unconscious) ocean trip, sprawled atop a lifeboat. We'll find out soon enough why and under what circumstances, but where is is now is more important. Road signs indicate he's in France near Marseille, where the only things separating this post-apocalyptic wasteland from America are the language and architecture. A houseboat provides shelter for the night, and a tape recorder establishes some context from an unknown survivor. Armed with little more than a knife and a harpoon, Daryl soon puts them to use against a group of "burners" (again with the non-"Z" words), walker variants whose acidic touch leaves a horrible wound on his forearm. A chance encounter with English-speaking natives proves almost fatal, but Daryl is soon rescued by nuns making do in a nearby abbey; chief among the inhabitants are kindly Isabelle (Clémence Poésy) and highly intelligent young Laurent (Louis Puech Scigliuzzi), believed by the group to be a future Messiah. Their strange behavior causes Daryl to leave in haste, but a sudden attack by soldiers prompts his return for a violent battle that ends with Daryl setting out with Isabelle and Laurent, with the ultimate goal being his safe return to America.

The soldiers didn't arrive by accident, of course: they're led by face-tattooed Stéphane Codron (Romain Levi), who's seeking revenge for his brother killed during Daryl's encounter with those English-speaking natives. Codron answers to cold-blooded paramilitary leader Marion Genet (Anne Charrier), whose ship Daryl escaped from before washing ashore, and it's not long before the soldier discovers their planned path to Paris pinned to a map at the abbey.

Not surprisingly, then, trouble lurks around every corner for Daryl and company, who will eventually grow in number and meet new friends and potential enemies on their long journey to Paris up north. A once-bustling pre-school is now occupied by world-weary children and their dutiful leader in the second episode "Alouette", and a full-blown community (complete with a bustling night life and and old friend of Isabelle's) is discovered in "Paris Sera Toujours Paris". So too is a hostage situation involving a French boy and an older American, and of course the military group led by Codron narrows their search slowly but surely. Then there are the slow-walking "burners", always ready for a fight.

Like most variants of The Walking Dead dating back to the original show, Daryl Dixon often mixes a bit of past and present to establish context for its main and supporting characters. While these brief flashbacks don't all hit the mark, the main narrative through-line of this six-episode first season, episodic as ever, proves a solid enough foundation to keep things moving along steadily. Sure, the first episode features more walking than any of three Lord of the Rings movies and some of the encounters with like-minded survivors are more memorable than others, but the majority of Daryl Dixon comes across as sturdy enough post-apocalyptic fare that TWD fans may as well try on for size. I mean, these spin-offs aren't stopping anytime soon, so you might as well watch a halfway decent one, right?

All six of these first-season episodes -- "L'âme Perdue", "Alouette", "Paris Sera Toujours Paris", "La Dame de Fer", "Deux Amours", and "Coming Home" -- appear on this two-disc Blu-ray release from RLJ Entertainment, which arrives in standard Steelbook packaging with no "regular version" in sight. Although the A/V presentation proves to be hit-or-miss, a few short but welcome bonus features bring a bit more added value to this reasonably-priced set.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon - Season One Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Daryl Dixon doesn't exactly stand out for its visuals; occasionally striking imagery aside, the franchise's trademark murky landscapes and dimly-lit interiors prove to be challenging visual roadblocks that RLJ Entertainment's Blu-ray doesn't always measure up to. Don't get me wrong: the majority of it looks very good in the right lighting conditions, with decently crisp image detail and visible textures that showcase the cluttered wasteland that our main characters trek through. Unfortunately, its murkier moments are typically swallowed in a sea of dull earth tones and medium-gray blacks that show infrequent amounts of ghosting and digital smearing. Black levels fluctuate as well in these moments, and various compression issues such as trace macro blocking, posterization, and light banding can also be spotted on occasion. I can't place blame solely on questionable disc encoding... but there's clearly some room for improvement, even if some (most?) of these issues probably won't be all that visible on a small to medium-sized display.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon - Season One Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

On the other hand, the DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio mix does a very capable job of bringing Daryl Dixon's soundscape to life, which isn't always as active as expected given the mostly desolate landscapes and lack of dialogue in non-group settings. Still, lively use of the rear channels in apparent in unexpected places, and obviously fight scenes -- human-on-human, and of course human-on-otherwise -- spring to life with all the gushy, gory sound effects you'd expect from the franchise. Infrequent flashbacks to pre-apocalypse moments also bring their own sonic delights, especially the lively streets of Paris and a bass-heavy nightclub that opens the second episode, and the sporadic original score also enjoys a strong and dynamic presence. But while the wide majority of this lossless audio presentation doesn't exactly swing for the fences, it has its fair share of highlights and doesn't suffer from the issues of its video counterpart.

Optional subtitles, including English (SDH), are included during the episodes only. Unfortunately the SDH subs are very distracting because all non-speech sounds appear in all caps (ex. "BIRDS CHiRPING" and "SPEAKING FRENCH").

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon - Season One Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

This two-disc release ships in standard Steelbook packaging -- again, no "regular version" is currently available -- with striking black design elements and a blue, white, and red-stiped gradient that mimics France's flag (rotated, I guess). Both discs sit on overlapping hubs on the right side and each of them includes a few welcome extras.

• Cast Diaries (Discs 1 & 2, six segments total) - These bite-sized interview clips feature various key and supporting cast members -- basically everyone mentioned above, as well as a few other characters -- who talk briefly about each episode with supportive clips and a few bits and pieces of production footage.

• Episode 1 (4:16)
• Episode 2 (3:44)
• Episode 3 (3:28)
• Episode 4 (3:54)
• Episode 5 (4:49)
• Episode 6 (4:31)

• Show Me More: Daryl Dixon (Disc 2, 42:34) - This more detailed and nicely produced mini-documentary -- which is apparently the 16th episode of AMC's ongoing series of the same name -- takes a slightly broader look at the season's production with longer cast and crew interviews, more footage from the set, and coverage of Daryl Dixon's special effects, location shooting, characters, special effects, and more.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon - Season One Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Daryl Dixon may just be the most structurally sound spin-off of The Walking Dead to date; it's got a decently strong narrative, a welcome "back to basics" approach, and it stars the franchise's most popular character. Even so, there's an unavoidable familiarity to the long-running formula and universe (fight zombies, walk around, meet new people) that prevents it from being more than just "good", though desperate TWD fans starved for new content may find themselves enjoying the show even more. RLJ Entertainment's Blu-ray package is a bit of a mixed bag in the A/V department, but this is still a recommended (and very affordable) release for die-hard fans and curious newcomers alike.