Is The Walking Dead One Series That Shouldn't Be Binge Watched?

In the day and age we live in, streaming services make it quite easy to access entire seasons of tv shows all at once. Many of us refrain from abusing these resources, but it's becomes the norm for most of us to binge watch tv shows. And to be perfectly honest, it's quite difficult not to.

When streaming services like Netflix release entire seasons all at once, most of us can't help but stream every episode at the same time. Popular titles Marvel's The Defenders and Stranger Things are generally the kind of series expected to be binged. Netflix's other original series are just as easy to binge watch, but not every episodic series is meant to be viewed in this manner—The Walking Dead being the most pertinent.

Is It Difficult To Watch The Walking Dead All At The Same Time?

In case you haven't been keeping up, AMC rolled out a full rebroadcast of The Walking Dead's entire seven seasons over this past weekend in anticipation of the Season 8 Premiere. The same was done for Season 6 and Season 7 but something struck me as odd this time around.

After watching the entire series all over again, I noticed that each episode is very emotionally striking. It's not that #TheWalkingDead is heavy in emotional turmoil, all the time. It's just that the events which take place therein leave a strong impression on the viewer. When we have a week or more to delve over the events of an episode, there's plenty of time to deal with the emotional impact felt as a viewer. But when one attempts to binge all of TWD, there really isn't enough time to process every single shocking development. Each episode is so heavily compacted with content which illicit emotional reactions from us, that trying to watch it all at the same time is mentally draining. Not only that, but the shock value from extremely graphic scenes leave most of us wanting a break at the end of an episode. Therefore, binging on #TWD isn't the most efficient way to watch.

Can You Binge The Entire Walking Dead Series?

Some may take these comments as a challenge, but it's the farthest thing from a challenge. The real challenge in binge watching TWD is trying to retain all the information being delivered without becoming emotionally compromised because of said content. Each person is different, but almost any one who's seen The Walking Dead will attest to the fact that the series does indeed illicit strong reactions. Whether it's from the violence or the moments which tug on our heart strings, The Walking Dead always finds a way to touch us. That being said, the entirety of this television series might be too much to intake—when it's binge watched.

If you feel like this is a misconception, attempt to watch the entire series all over again, and see if you can binge on it just like any other. Assuming you can, then you've successfully proved me wrong. But if you can't, take this experience and learn from it.

Rethink how you watch television and be selective of how you binge. No one is saying not to binge, because we're all going to do it—just be aware of what you're watching. You never know when something as heavy in emotional content as is The Walking Dead will be more than you can handle.