The Walking Dead’s time skips have been difficult to follow, but The Ones Who Live just cleared up a confusing part of the franchise’s timeline.

Warning: This article contains spoilers for episodes 1-4 of The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live.

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live just cleared up a confusing part of The Walking Dead‘s timeline after years of uncertainty. During its 11 seasons, The Walking Dead contained various time skips that created confusion around its timeline. While it was somewhat manageable to keep up with, certain aspects lacked clarification, making them a mystery. The Ones Who Live gave some insight into when in The Walking Dead‘s timeline the spinoff takes place, with the first episode providing a strong indication. Episode 1 explained what happened to Rick after his Walking Dead disappearance, outlining when each event took place.

Episode 1, “Years”, begins by showing one of Rick’s escape attempts that happens five years after the bridge incident. This clarifies when the event takes place compared to the protagonist’s season 9 departure. As the episode progresses, the show continues to indicate how long has passed, with references to Rick training for years as well as the Omaha incident from World Beyond. However, the last timestamp the show provides simply says “now”, which leaves the year a mystery, but the latest episode finally reveals when exactly in the timeline The Ones Who Live takes place.

RJ’s Age Clarifies Where The Ones Who Live Takes Place In The Walking Dead’s Timeline

RJ’s age in The Ones Who Live helps establish exactly when the show takes place in The Walking Dead‘s timeline. Although Michonne initially decided not to tell Rick about his son, in episode 4 she finally mentions RJ. Michonne tells Rick that RJ is eight years old, indicating that the spinoff takes place around nine years after the bridge. When Rick blew up the bridge and disappeared, Michonne was so early into her pregnancy that Rick didn’t even know about it. Therefore, Michonne’s pregnancy and RJ’s age suggest that the spinoff happens nearly a decade after season 9.

With how complicated The Walking Dead‘s timeline is, this clarification is a nice way to allow audiences to try and keep track of everything. The main show’s timeline was less important as everything was happening all at once, but with three separate spinoffs involving main characters, it can be difficult to keep up with when each show takes place. Given how long it had been since Rick and Michonne had featured on the show, where their story would fit into the timeline was unclear. Thankfully, RJ’s age was the decisive detail that makes it clear the spinoff is a modern story.

When The Ones Who Live Takes Place Compared To The Walking Dead’s Final Scene

Knowing The Ones Who Live takes place nine years after season 9 also offers an idea of when the spinoff takes place compared to The Walking Dead‘s final scene. Unfortunately, The Walking Dead finale doesn’t have an exact time frame, but it does seem to end around 12 years after the outbreak began in 2010. This would indicate that the show’s flashforward ending takes place in about 2022 or 2023. Given nine years have passed since the bridge incident which supposedly occurred in 2013, The Ones Who Live likely takes place around the same time as season 11.

Given how messy the franchise’s timeline is, the exact comparison between The Walking Dead season 11 and The Ones Who Live is impossible to know. There doesn’t seem to be a big gap between them, and the spinoff may still mention a season 11 event to clarify whether the show is ahead or behind the main show’s finale. Daryl Dixon and Dead City both advance the timeline, suggesting that any potential reunions can’t happen for a while anyway, but The Ones Who Live does appear to be taking place at a similar time to The Walking Dead‘s finale.