![The Walking Dead Season 6, Episode 16](https://api.time.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/walking-dead-finale.jpeg?quality=85&w=2400)
The Walking Dead is slated to return for its seventh season Oct. 23, a mark many television showrunners never even dream of reaching. But in the eyes of AMC executives, the zombie drama hasn’t nearly come close to running its course.
During Goldman Sachs annual Communacopia Conference Wednesday, AMC Network President and CEO Josh Sapan revealed that he thinks the show has the potential to run for as long as Star Trek has. Of the zombie series, he said, it “has incredible long life left in it,” and could continue to run for “many, many more years.”
“[Star Trek] came and went three times,” he added, according to The Wrap. “We do think that we have a franchise [in The Walking Dead] that is one of the rare franchises that you occasionally come across in what we do for a living.”
Given that Star Trek just celebrated its 50th anniversary, TWD has a lot of catching up to do.
Read more at TheWrap.com.
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Write to Megan McCluskey at megan.mccluskey@time.com