The Walking Dead Honors Cinema’s All-Time Greats With Nostalgic New Posters

You didn’t think AMC was going to sit back and let Stranger Things have all the fun now, did you?

As the Netflix darling continues to imitate cinema’s all-time greats in anticipation of its return on October 27th, AMC (via Bloody Disgusting) has rolled out a collection of new and nostalgic posters for The Walking Dead in honor of episode number 100, “Mercy.”

Reaching said milestone is no mean feat, particularly in the cutthroat business of television, and executive producer and director Greg Nicotero believes The Walking Dead‘s 100th episode – an episode that’s also doubling as season 8’s long-anticipated premiere – is cause for celebration. It’s seemingly chock-full of Easter eggs and nods to the past, but these old-school posters go one step further to pay tribute to cinema’s greatest hits.

Included in the gallery below are homages to The Thing, Indiana Jones, Back to the Future, Alien, Blade Runner, The Exorcist, Ghostbusters, The Mummy, Night of the Living Dead and many, many more.

The idea came to Nicotero while filming season 8, and here, the series stalwart recalled a conversation he had with Andrew Lincoln (Rick Grimes).

Per The Hollywood Reporter:

I was standing in front of the Sanctuary with Andy, shooting the first episode of [season eight], and we started talking about this idea that I had,” Nicotero remembers. “And he said to me, ‘What if we did The Exorcist, and you use the front of the Sanctuary as the building, and you have a stream of light coming out, with Rick Grimes standing there?’ And I looked at him and went, ‘That’s exactly what I’m talking about.’ It was just perfect.

Held up as a genuine return to form for AMC’s long-running zombie drama, season 8 of The Walking Dead is locked in for Sunday, October 22nd, when viewers will be transfixed by “Mercy,” the show’s “most ambitious” episode yet. At least, that’s what AMC would have you believe.