I dont think HBO would force the writing staff to make each season be 16 episodes long so they could milk it even more; and I feel like they would have respected more Frank Darabont's vision (for better or worse)
Seasons are broken up into 8 episode chunks and it's up to the writers to make of that what they will. They could choose to tell more contained or concise stories but they usually choose to follow the comics' pacing instead.
Also, they might have stuck with Frank Darabont or they might not have. He's infamously difficult to work with and HBO doesn't always stick with their showrunners. And even if they did stick with him there's no guarantee the show would have been better or even as "good" as the version that we currently have.
Also also, HBO milks the fuck out of things too.
The production value would have been infinitely better on HBO if nothing else, which the show is desperately missing.
I feel like these "Every show would be better on HBO!" type of comments come from people who only watch the best of what HBO has to offer and ignore everything else they do.
Production value wise, the only thing TWD is missing is excellent direction (which has been the case for
almost every episode except for the pilot) - what we've gotten instead is pretty standard cable fare. There is the occasional wonky CG effect, but other than that the production values are good.
More profanity would have painted a grittier picture and been more true to the comics.
There's already plenty of profanity on the show. I do agree that some scenes would have been enhanced with a "fuck" or two, but those instances could be counted on one hand.
I'm not sure why there would have been more nudity considering I don't think there has really been any at all in the comics.
It's HBO. It's what they do.
More 'fucks' alone would've made it better.
uh huh