‘Walking Dead’ Producers Talk Horrifying Season Finale

The following article contains SPOILERS for the season finale of The Walking Dead, “Last Day on Earth.”

The six season finale of AMC’s The Walking Dead is leaving many fans distraught and upset after seeing an extreme cliffhanger ending. The ending scene shows Negan finally meeting our main crew from Alexandria. He bashes in the head of one member of the crew with his barbed wire-covered baseball bat but it is unknown which person was on the other end of the bat.

Walking Dead producers are opening up about Negan’s arrival and that shocking cliffhanger during AMC’s Talking Dead.

Robert Kirkman, who wrote this finale, talked about introducing such an iconic villain into the series.

“I think that for a TV show to be going into its seventh season and to get this huge event that is going to skyrocket things for many season to come… I feel like it’s puts everything in a great place. So I think Negan’s arrival on the show is absolutely awesome.”

Kirkman also commented on the ending of the eposide and why it was so important to leave audiences in the dark.

“I’m feeling, oddly, great. I’m very excited where it’s at. What’s happening in the show is extremely sad and extremely depressing but I think it’s going to put us into a good place going into season 7.”

“First of all, as a fan, I love cliffhangers. I love that tension. I love the anticipation of finding out what it is. If you read the comic book series, I think pretty much every issue ends with a big cliffhanger… And I think that’s a lot of fun. But this story, the cliffhanger isn’t the story. The story of the episode, and Scott and Matt Negrete did such a great hob of setting up how confident Rick was going into this. This episode is about the loss of that confidence. It’s about changing that mindset. It’s about tearing Rick Grimes down and that’s the conclusion of this story. So while it does seem like a cliffhanger, that’s the conclusion. And the story of who died, the story of what comes next, of who Negan killed, of what comes after that, that’s really the story of season 7.”

Dead showrunner Scott M. Gimple, addressed why this season had such a cliffhanger ending. He compared this ending to a famous season cliffhanger from ABC’s Lost, when the question was asked who is in the hatch?

“The end of the story is what people saw. And when we reveal who was on the receiving end there, that’s going to be the start of another story. The kickback effects from that, what it makes everyone into, how people react, how the world changes for everyone, that’s the next part of the story.”

“I would say, when they opened up the hatch [on Lost], we had to wait and see who was in the hatch. I liked thinking about that. I liked talking about it. … We have to do an episode that justifies it to you. We have to do something so great and so intense that you’re like ‘Okay, all right, fair play.’ That’s the challenge we have and we’re going to do it. We’re going to deliver you something fantastic. … We want you to be one of those people in that lineup. We want you to feel that suspense and that terror and that pain, and were going to deliver you a story next season that justifies it.”

Who do you think was killed by Negan? Comment below, join in on the speculation and talk all things Dead!

Source: Entertainment Weekly

Chelsea Lewis

Chelsea Lewis

Chelsea Lewis, TV division, joined Heroic Hollywood in 2016. Prior to joining the team at Heroic, she worked for TheCelebrityCafe.com covering everything from music to...