^It's really pretty depressing to go back and watch season 1. It was incredible. Ground breaking TV. Now, yes it has gotten very repetitive.
Things are OK, everyone's happy/content for a while, hopeful, run low on food/diapers/etc, go out and scavenge, face off with walkers, someone(s) lost, go get them, bring them back, happy, a threat(!) fight the threat off or the threat scatters them, fight walkers on the run, major character dies somewhere along the way and people get sad, But wait! Reunited through some crazy coincidences, things are OK again, happy/content/hopeful for a while, and on and oooooonnnnnnn.....
Season 1 had so much promise. Season 2, I really liked. I feel like things really started going off the rails when the Guvna showed up. They haven't recovered. Still yet, I do have high hopes for the rest of the season.
A oft lamented loss and oft referenced as a change for the worse was losing Frank Darabont. Watching his season 1 and then watching the subsequent seasons, it's hard to not agree with people that say if Darabont had stayed on, we'd probably regard this show as being neck in neck with Breaking Bad for the best AMC show to date. I love Mad Men, too. It's just so different. Again, I still love TWD. It's just hard to shake the feeling that it could have been more.