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Ethan left AK Films and went straight to MGM.
He had a car waiting now.
A few weeks earlier, driving himself had felt normal.
Now it was inefficient.
Looking for parking, sitting in traffic with both hands on the wheel, losing half an hour because Los Angeles had decided to punish movement itself – all of that was expensive when his day had become a chain of decisions.
Besides, hiring a driver put another person on payroll.
A man with a steady check could support a household.
Ethan was generous enough to call that civic virtue, and cynical enough to know it also bought him time.
MGM’s mood had changed.
After the purge of the old guard and the abrupt burial of most of the inherited slate, there was not a person in the building who failed to recognize the new boss.
People greeted him carefully in the halls, polite enough to be safe, brief enough not to test his patience.
Fear was not loyalty.
But for now, fear made the elevators run on time.
His office had been put in order with almost obsessive precision.
Files aligned, desk cleared, calls screened, appointment book rewritten.
Ethan pressed the intercom.
A few seconds later, someone knocked.
“Come in.”
Daniel Chen stepped inside.
He was in his late twenties, sharply dressed without looking ornamental, and already better at disappearing into the machinery of Ethan’s day than most assistants twice his age.
He was Asian-American, bilingual, and had come recommended by two people who did not usually agree on anything except competence.
That was why Ethan had hired him.
Not because a young studio executive needed a decorative secretary.
He needed someone who could organize chaos, survive long hours, keep confidential material confidential, and understand that a ten-minute delay could cost more than some people’s annual salary.
If Daniel kept proving useful, Ethan would find bigger work for him later.
He had already shown the judgment and discretion Ethan needed.
“Boss?”
“Bring Billy in.”
“Yes, sir.”
Daniel vanished.
A few minutes later, he returned with Billy and two people from market research and legal.
One of them, a woman in glasses whose name Ethan recognized from the last staff meeting, placed a report on his desk.
Billy did not waste time.
“We ran the zombie sweep you asked for.
Bookstores, comic shops, specialty retailers, small publishers, trade contacts.
Twenty-seven zombie-related works in total, including comics and novels.”
“Anything titled The Walking Dead?”
“No.”
Ethan kept his expression level.
Inside, tension slipped loose.
“Anything close enough to create trouble?”
“Nothing exact.
A few apocalypse survival stories.
Some monster-hunting material.
Most of it is small-press, self-published, or strictly pulp.
Legal says none of it blocks the kind of concept you described, but they want a formal chain-of-title memo before anyone writes a check.”
“Good.”
The comic did not exist yet.
Or at least it had not surfaced publicly, and no one in their sweep had found a claim strong enough to interfere.
That mattered.
Ethan was not going to walk MGM into a future rights dispute because he had treated old memories like divine permission.
The version in his head belonged to another timeline.
Here, everything had to be documented, optioned, and fenced cleanly before the first writer entered the room.
He tapped the report.
“Sort the twenty-seven by theme.
Anything involving long-term survival, social collapse, community pressure, or moral breakdown comes to me.
The rest goes into archive.”
“Already started,” Billy said.
“Only five really qualify, and even those are mostly zombie action with a little human conflict sprinkled on top.”
“Bring those five.”
Within the hour, the small stack arrived.
There were no comics.
Only novels, and none of them carried the spine Ethan needed.
One had a title so blunt it might as well have been King of the Apocalypse.
Readable, maybe.
Useful, no.
Zombie fiction existed, of course.
It had existed for decades.
But in 2002, it was rarely treated as long-form prestige drama.
The apocalypse was usually a setting for gore, satire, or survival thrills, not a machine built to grind human relationships into uglier and uglier choices.
That gap was exactly where The Walking Dead could live.
By noon, Ethan had finished the five reports and set them aside.
“No conflict,” he said.
“Keep watching the market anyway.
And put Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore on a clean outreach list.
If legal can approach them through the right channels, I want to know whether there is a way to develop an original zombie comic with a television option attached from day one.
No contamination.
No loose promises.
Everything documented.”
Billy wrote that down.
“Understood.”
“Next priority: George R.
R.
Martin.
I want A Song of Ice and Fire.
Move quickly and do not assume the rights will sit there forever because the books look difficult.”
The legal woman looked up.
“All rights?”
“Television first.
Film if available.
Ancillary if we can get it.
If Martin’s representatives push back, escalate.
We can afford patience after the option is signed.
Before that, we move.”
The room brightened in the smallest possible way.
Praise was scarce at MGM lately.
A clear order that did not come wrapped in bad news almost counted as a holiday.
After lunch, Ethan called in the production manager.
Julio Ramos was in his forties, broad-shouldered, competent, and experienced enough to understand that his job was to say the unpleasant part early.
Charles had brought him into the company, but Julio knew which Hawthorne now held the greenlight.
Ethan slid an outline across the desk.
“Look at this.”
Julio read the title first.
“The Walking Dead: Part One.” His brow tightened.
“You’re naming the sequel before we shoot the first season?”
“Keep reading.”
The outline was not long.
Background, core characters, first infection beats, the hospital wake-up, Atlanta, camp dynamics, the farm, moral pressure, and the broad shape of twelve episodes.
It gave enough to evaluate the scale without pretending to be a finished script.
Julio took his time.
When he finished, he sat back and chose his words carefully.
“As a concept, it works.
Zombies are simple.
Survival is simple.
The human pressure gives it weight.
But there are problems.”
“Say them.”
“How many episodes do you want for the first season?”
“Twelve.”
Julio’s mouth tightened.
“Then this is expensive.
Makeup, prosthetics, props, extras, weapons, locations.
You cannot shoot all of this on stage.
If you want empty streets, wreckage, traffic shutdowns, wide exterior work, that means permits and coordination.
If you want the world to feel abandoned, you have to pay for that illusion.”
Ethan waited.
“At minimum, a million and a half per episode,” Julio said.
Too little money and the show looks cheap.
Cheap zombies are worse than no zombies.”
He was right to worry.
Ethan remembered the original series costing far more per episode once it found its footing.
Even stripped for inflation and local efficiencies, The Walking Dead was not a bargain-bin idea.
It needed scale, texture, makeup discipline, and writers who understood that gore bought attention but character bought seasons.
“Budget is not your problem,” Ethan said.
Julio blinked.
“I am planning forty million for the first season.”
For the first time that afternoon, the older man’s professional mask slipped.
“Forty million?”
“Twelve episodes.
I want a premium series, not cable filler.
Award-caliber if we can get there, addictive even if critics decide to be precious.”
Julio opened his mouth, closed it, and tried again.
“That is…
aggressive.”
“Yes.”
“A first-season television project at that level will scare people.”
“Good.
Then they will remember it.”
Ethan leaned forward.
“The original structure in my head is too slow in places.
We keep the moral pressure, but we use it at decisive moments.
I do not want twelve episodes of people standing around explaining what humanity means while the audience begs someone to make a decision.
We increase the zombie set pieces, tighten the romantic triangle, and make the human conflict sharper instead of longer.”
“Who do you want to direct?”
“First choice, Frank Darabont.
He understands tension and humanity better than almost anyone in this lane.
The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile – he knows how to make people matter before terrible things happen to them.”
Julio nodded.
That name landed.
“Second?”
“Neil Marshall.
Dog Soldiers proves he can handle pressure, violence, and men falling apart under siege.
He is younger, cheaper, hungrier.”
“And if you want a miracle?”
“John Carpenter.”
Julio gave a short laugh.
“If I get Carpenter, do I get a raise?”
“If you get Carpenter on terms that do not embarrass us, I will applaud first.”
“Writers?”
“You find them.
I approve the room.
The script cannot become homework, and it cannot become a dumb zombie parade.
It needs both teeth and a brain.”
“Understood.”
The phone on Ethan’s desk rang before Julio could stand.
Ethan glanced at the caller ID and waved him out.
Julio took the hint and left, closing the door behind him.
Ethan picked up.
“Judy.”
“Your Israeli miracle is complicated,” Judy said.
“More accurately, her parents are complicated.”
“Gal Gadot?”
“Who else?
If you want this done cleanly, you may need to come to Israel yourself.”
Ethan looked at the pile of reports on his desk, then toward the studio lot beyond the glass.
MGM was bleeding money, AK Films was building a joke into a business model, The Walking Dead had just become real, and Hasbro was still waiting.
Of course the seventeen-year-old future Wonder Woman would require international diplomacy.
“Tell me everything.”
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