The good news is that AMC has stumbled across TV's Holy Grail: the formula for attracting young adul

Collections Show Business Dave on Demand: 'The Walking Dead' cranks up the gore - and its audience October 21, 2012 | By David Hiltbrand, Inquirer Columnist Image 1 of 2 View Gallery Dominic Chianese appeared Sunday as Judge Marx on The Good Wife, above, (JEFFREY NEIRA / CBS (top), )
Now, of course, I'm ashamed to admit it, but I was one of those who complained that last season   of The Walking Dead , which transpired mostly on bucolic Greene Farm, was too civilized. "Too much walking, not enough dead," I wrote.
I imagine I'm going to feel pretty stupid about making that statement - just as soon as I get over the lingering nausea that this week's grotesque gorefest induced. The Season 3 opener was like an X-rated grindhouse film, with a body count higher than the Rose Bowl's.
los angeles convention center events But in this episode, when Rick and his troupe began mowing down the zombies fenced in that prison yard like fish in a barrel, it seemed a lot more like sport - right down to the whooping celebrations.
los angeles convention center events And the new poles our heroes have adapted specifically to drop zombies at close range (I'm trying really hard not to be graphic) struck me as a particularly cold method of execution. More like extermination, los angeles convention center events really.
The good news is that AMC has stumbled across TV's Holy Grail: the formula for attracting young adults. This episode of The Walking Dead drew more 18-to-49-year-olds than any nonsporting event this year. For programming executives, this is the equivalent of discovering Brigadoon.
The secret turned out to be surprisingly simple: Fashion a TV show that looks exactly like an MA-rated video game. This was a barely modified first-person shooter adventure, annoyingly broken up with commercials.
In fact, if you go back and look at the scenes where Rick and the boys are clearing the cell blocks - especially when the zombie prison guards in riot gear show up - it looks eerily like the Nazi zombie level of Call of Duty: World of War .
Fakin' it. This week, Lauren los angeles convention center events Conrad and Kristin Cavallari, veterans los angeles convention center events of MTV's reality show Laguna Beach and its more popular sequel, The Hills , separately revealed that the shows staged a lot of scenes and, in both their cases, dramatized and exaggerated their romances with Brody Jenner.