UPDATE: Right on cue, after the start of the marathon, "The Walking Dead" New Year's marathon, starting tomorrow (Tuesday, December 29) with the midnight ball dropping on Thursday night, right as Daryl and Carol get "Consumed" with Season 5, Episode 6.

This marathon includes "The Walking Dead" -- starting with Season 2, for whatever reason -- and the six episodes of "Fear the Walking Dead" Season 1. "The Walking Dead" Season 6 returns February 14, 2016, and the 15-episode second season of "Fear" starts this spring. AMC tends to reward our lack of lives by dropping new promos during these marathons, and we wouldn't be shocked to see new footage for both TWD Season 6 and "Fear" Season 2 hidden between the episodes. (Tip: Put them in the Grady section; we need serious incentive to rewatch that.)

Here's AMC's schedule with all of the marathon episodes. No clue why they skipped the six episodes of Season 1, especially when they replay the first half of Season 6 before launching "Fear the Walking Dead" at 4 p.m. on Saturday, January 2.

FEAR THE WALKING DEAD

Don't forget, one of the characters from that web series "Fear the Walking Dead: Flight 462" will be joining Season 2, which has 15 episodes premiering this spring. (Maybe they'll give us a premiere date during the marathon.) Season 1 left our characters overlooking the Pacific Ocean, as Strand prepares to escape to his yacht "Abigail." They just started filming this new season in early December in Mexico, but by now they may have some early footage to show off.

THE WALKING DEAD

The mothership show ended the first half of Season 6 with that walker herd shuffling through Alexandria and young Sam calling out for his mom. (REAL bad timing on that, kid.) Scott Gimple talked to The Hollywood Reporter about what's ahead. Here's a portion of his full Q&A:

Rick, Jessie, Michonne, Carl, Ron and Father Gabriel all seem to be at risk when Sam yells for his mother. How deadly will the midseason premiere be?

It's quite deadly, sadly. There is some death going on in that but it's also unbelievably intense. It's one of the most intense episodes we've done. I know we say that a lot — I've said that about the premiere episode this year and we had 30,000 walkers. We might not hit those numbers in episode nine but the intensity by the end of that episode is not gut-wrenching — it's gut-swirling and gut-slamming and frappeing.

Maybe we'll even get a "frappeing" promo with hints on the deadliness of Episode 9. Or you could use this time to catch up on the comic book, which offers several hints. Are you planning to watch the marathons, or perhaps protest the lack of TWD Season 1?

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