And as for the new show, several of the characters are Hispanic. It appears that one character, based on his last name, is Native American.

Sorry. I just don't see where killing off three black characters in season 5 of the original show supports a "tradition of black dude dies first".

Family drama is more often than not the wrong way to go. Well-adjusted children tend to be tediously smug and screwed-up children tend to be annoyingly stupid. It was a problem in the original Walking Dead with the Lori-Rick-Shane triangle and the irritating plots that revolved around Carl's refusal to do what he…

I don't think the original Walking Dead kept the tradition of "black dude dies first". They killed off Jim, Ed, and Amy before Jackie, T-Dogg, or any other black character. The first walkers Rick saw were all white. Seems like the first black walker we saw was Morgan's wife.