France, officially the French Republic (French: République française), is a country located in Western Europe. It is the primary setting for the first two seasons of AMC's The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon. It briefly appears in The Walking Dead: World Beyond and is mentioned in The Walking Dead. It was borded by the former nation of Spain to the south and the former nations of the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland and Italy to the east.
Around late 2009-early 2010, la Biomedicine DDMI created the Wildfire Virus for unknown reasons. Wildfire was at first waterborne and/or spread from direct contact and laid dormant in the brainstem, travelling through the bloodstream and presumably somehow bypassing the blood-brain barrier to do so. Upon the hosts death, the virus reactivates basic parts of the hindbrain with violent and ravenous thoughts invading the brain. If the a person is bitten by an infected individual, the virus causes a cytokine storm that typically results in death within 48 hours. The time between reanimation varies depending on age, sex, gender and body and typically occurs from three minutes to eight hours after death. The virus was discovered by the Center for Disease Control (CDC) and World Health Organization (WHO) on April 16, 2010, before it became a global pandemic on August 26 of that year with the French president declaring emergency. Three days later, society collapsed as a result of infected individuals overrunning cities and thus pushing the country and the rest of the world into martial law as the human population dropped by the hundreds of millions. France attempted to enact a national quarantine only for the nation to ultimately collapse by mid-September, leaving the former territory to be claimed by various groups and settlements. 13 years after the outbreak in 2023, a group called the Power of the Living claimed to have allegedly restored the nation and declared the Sixth French Republic. However, with the deaths of Marion Genet and Losang, it's unknown how much former national territory is still in control.
Pre-Apocalypse[]
France was a major power in world affairs with a long history and influential culture. It had over 65.03 million inhabitants just before the outbreak. Like the United States, France had a proficient military and a thriving scientific community, including the presence of la Biomedicine DDMI. The government system was a democracy under the Fifth Republic established on October 4, 1958, by Charles de Gaulle.
Since 1790, France has been organized into "départements" and "régions", areas created to facilitate the organization of the country. A départment is an administrative division covering just under 6,000 km² where a number assigned to it. On its territory lies a prefecture, acting as an administrative center. These are part of a whole called a région, with a surface area exceeding tens of thousands of km² (e.g. Maine-et-Loire is part of Pays de la Loire).
Post-Apocalypse[]
| “ | It was the French. [...] They were the last ones to hold out as far as I know. While our people were bolting out the doors and committing suicide in the hallways, they stayed in the labs till the end.
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Given that la Biomédicine DDMI was implied to have created the Wildfire virus, it's likely that France was the origin for the outbreak that resulted in the near extinction of the human race. Edwin Jenner mentioned that France was the closest to finding a cure to the virus. Unlike the American Centers for Disease Control, where scientists left to save their families, themselves or committing suicide, French researchers and scientists were unwilling to leave their posts and were among the last operating research team in contact with the CDC. However, Jenner never heard from them again after communications went down, as the outbreak continued to worsen. He ascertained that the French power grid had failed, and that the scientists were unable to develop a cure.
A state of emergency was declared in the early hours of August 26 by the President of France, which prohibited public gatherings, looting and other actions that could've provoked public disorders. Comparing to the United States, the cities registered a progressive increase of fatalities, and the countryside was largely unaffected. At some point, the situation deteriorated, and the virus likely escaped limited containment.
Following this, it is assumed that the government enacted a plan oriented to provide continuity of government, therefore evacuated to the Strategic Operations Air Base in Taverny, a town which is 12 kilometers from Paris, and then moved to Mount Verdun Air Base, which had an underground crisis command center.
Factors such as widespread unrest, acts of unobservation of governmental instructions transmitted via radio which composed the state of emergency and economic failure contributed to the alleged dissolution of the French government, although it is unknown if a precise contingent plan was activated or if the government still operates albeit isolated and severely limited. Ultimately, by early-mid September 2010, the Fifth French Republic collapsed following the outbreak and the fate of the French president and their cabinet remains unknown. Following the collapse of society, many young Frenchmen became affiliated with militant paramilitary groups known as Guerriers, or "Warriors". Power of the Living became a rising force by 2023, and had control of about half of Paris. People looked to groups like the Power of the Living for offering "order".
There is violent conflict in France regarding the origins of - and experimentation on - the undead. Although the Power of the Living also engages in research on the Wildfire Virus, there are vigilantes dedicated to hunting down those responsible for the outbreak, namely the members la Biomédicine DDMI. Ex-researchers from this lab were forced to go into hiding to avoid jail or death. Some of these ex-DDMI teams are implied to be hunted across Europe and the world.
Ten years later, the nationalist political movement Power of the Living has reclaimed, if not entirely, a great part of the national territory, leading Genet to proclaim the sixth French Republic with herself as de facto provisional president. It is however unknown if other institutions were re-established, such as a parliament or judiciary. The new political structure and administration can be described as a unitary autocracy, where Marion Genet exercises almost all control.
According to Laurent Carriere, he thinks that less than 200,000 people survived after the outbreak. He also tells to Daryl Dixon that it will take six or seven generations to repopulate the whole country.
It is heavily implied that the Civic Republic of Philadelphia, located in North America, is aware of the Power of the Living's existence in France given what Major General Johnathan Beale said about the CRM having operatives and spies across the world.
Notable Locations[]
- Agen, Aquitaine
- Languedoc-Roussillon
- Le Havre, Normandy
- Midi-Pyrénées
- Normandy
- Angers, Pays de la Loire
- Pas-de-Calais
- Île-de-France
- Provence-Alpes–Côte d'Azur
- Unspecified Region
Trivia[]
- France is the second country outside of North America to appear in the TV Universe, and the third in the entire franchise.
- The others are Spain, which is the setting of The Walking Dead: The Alien and China, which is the setting of The Walking Dead: Typhoon.
- So far, France is the only pre-pandemic nation to declare itself restored albeit allegedly.
- Given what Marion Genet said, it's possible that members of the former French government were hunted down and executed by Power of the Living including the president.