Could “The Walking Dead” become the top-rated scripted show on TV?
Yes. It looks distinctly possible that a zombie show, based on a comic book, on a network — AMC — no one paid much attention to just five years ago, could end the season as TV’s top drama.
No cable series has ever finished an entire season as TV’s top-rated scripted show. If “The Walking Dead” does it, it will be a watershed moment in the history of TV.
On Sunday, “The Walking Dead” Season 3 premiere broke audience records for basic cable by scaring up 10.9 million viewers.
And “Walking Dead” could become TV’s top-scripted show this year if the ratings hold. And there is reason to believe it can — because the audience for “Walking Dead” has grown like a horde of zombies.
The show set a cable viewing record with its Season 2 premiere, then broke it with its mid-season return, then broke it again with its finale. And broke it again Sunday.
Still, “The Walking Dead” seems an unlikely hit. Underdogs don’t come from much closer to the ground.
It sprang from the imagination of childhood friends Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore, two Kentucky kids who dreamed of publishing their own comics.