AMC is expanding “The Walking Dead” aftershow “Talking Dead” into a year-round talk franchise. The cable channel announced Wednesday “Talking With Chris Hardwick,” a new hour-long talk show that will air at 11 p.m. on Sunday nights — specifically Sunday nights when new episodes of “The Walking Dead” or “Fear the Walking Dead” are not airing. On evenings when they are, Hardwick’s long-running aftershow “Talking Dead” will air instead.

Each hour-long episode of “Talking” will feature Hardwick interviewing a single guest or cast. Unlike “Talking Dead,” which focuses on the “Walking Dead” universe, “Talking” will feature guests from across pop culture.

“Chris Hardwick is just the ultimate fan guide, advocate and conversationalist. He took our desire to serve the fans of ‘The Walking Dead’ with an hour of discussion and analysis following each new episode and turned it into the #1 talk show on television, and a model that has been widely emulated but never quite duplicated, because Chris is the key,” said Joel Stillerman, president of original programming and development for AMC and SundanceTV. “Between ‘Talking Dead,’ his podcast and panel moderation at events like Comic-Con, there is just no one better at drawing out guests’ humanity, celebrating content and serving fans. We are looking forward to expanding our relationship with Chris through this new version of ‘Talking’ that will allow him to do what he does best – give our viewers a front row seat to some of the biggest topics in pop culture today and a host who has an incomparable affinity for the content they love.”

Hardwick also hosts the late-night game show “@midnight” weeknights on Comedy Central.

“‘Talking’ will have the skin of ‘Talking Dead,’ the soul of the Nerdist podcast and the guts of a Comic Con panel,” said Hardwick. “I have loved learning how to do a talk show these last six years on ‘Talking Dead,’ but am eager to expand the format into other areas of pop culture.”