‘The Walking Dead’ Boss Angela Kang Teases a Commonwealth Showdown

After a break, The Walking Dead is finally back for the second third of its final season. And spoilers beyond this point, but it’s looking like we’re about to get a surprising showdown between Maggie (Lauren Cohan) and Daryl (Norman Reedus).

“I don’t want to get into too much of a spoiler, but I’ll say that there’s a series of interconnected events that lead to this moment, six months later,” Angela Kang, showrunner for The Walking Dead, told Decider. “What we’re gonna start to see is the story that leads us to that point.”

To find out a whole lot more about the episode, including the breaking of Maggie, why they underplayed the reunion between Daryl and Connie (Lauren Ridloff), and whether we’ll see Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) again, read on.

Decider: When you’re entering the endgame like this, where do your priorities lie? Are they still about letting the characters drive the story, or does it start to flip more in the direction of plot?

Angela Kang: I think with this show it’s really both. We always want to make sure that it feels like there are things that are moving forward and that the plot continues to kind of drive from episode to episode. But at the core, this is a very character driven show, and so we don’t want to get away from that. So there’s definitely episodes throughout the season that sometimes will feel more plot driven, and then there will be other ones that feel more of a deep dive into character. But hopefully both things are running at the same time so that we’ve got a good mix.

You have this chunk of eight episodes, and then beginning here with what is a “premiere,” it’s wrapping up the conflict from the first set of episodes. Then towards the last 10 or 15 minutes or so, setting up what seems to be the conflict for the next episodes. Did you look at this as one big season? How did you craft these 8-episode arcs for the ebbs and flows of the break?

We’ve always on this show, because they air in blocks of eight, we tend to look at each block eight as its own mini-arc, but then we’re also trying to look at the arc of the season as a whole. With a 24-episode season 11, the sub-division became really important for us just to get a handle on discrete blocks of story. But I think we often don’t make such a clean break, it’s not like a mid-season finale or premiere necessarily immediately starts it up, sometimes we’ve got action hanging over. We wanted to look at this block of eight and go, “what is the main issue that they’re dealing with and what’s the vibe of it?” and so we kind of wanted to pursue this neo-noir feel in bits and pieces of this block. I think it leans into a thriller vibe a lot in this section. As well as zombie world, so there’s always gonna be moments of horror and the scares and all of that. It’s a different type of a threat for our people that they’re dealing with, and trying to negotiate as they get deeper into the story of the Commonwealth.

This seems to be a huge episode for Maggie. What was it like breaking her down like this, and why was it important to do that now?

For Maggie, she’s been in such a dark section of her story where she’s had to make some really, really tough calls as a leader, as a parent, and as a friend to these people. I think we really felt that, because she’s been in this story with Negan, in some ways, Negan started to move towards where Maggie was philosophically, and Maggie started to move a little to where Negan was philosophically. Not that they’ve met in the middle exactly, and they’re still very, very different, but we felt that it was important to bring her to a low point after this mission, because missions that involve killing all or almost all of a group, there is a darkness to it. And so they got what they needed for their own survival, and she avenged the people that she lost in her and Elijah’s community. But it comes at a pretty heavy cost for her, and we felt that that was important to see that she reaches this point so that she can really reflect on where she wants to go next after this.

I know you’re saying they haven’t flipped, but watching it almost feels like Negan and Maggie are in a mentor-mentee relationship in a certain way here, where he’s kind of coaching along this dark path. Particularly given what she does to the Reapers, and the cliffhanger, you’re saying Maggie has not gone full Negan — but does she have farther down to go? Or does she turn back towards the Maggie we know and love going forward?

This is probably as full Negan as we’ve seen her. One of the things that Negan probably planted in the first block of episodes, was this idea that if he had everything to do all over again, he would’ve killed them all because the fact that he left them alive is what led to his ultimate downfall. And it’s as dark and as honest as he has gotten with her. So I do think that that’s something that sits with her. But Maggie at heart really is somebody who doesn’t want to hold on to anger and bitterness, and wants to feel hope. I think that’s part of the journey that she’s got to go on to figure out, can you come back from something like this?

This is more of a logistical question, but at the end of this episode, is Leah the only Reaper left? Or are there more of them out there somewhere?

Leah is the only one left.

Let’s move on to Alden then. What led to the decision to kill him? It’s such a sad, awful, gut-wrenching scene when Maggie has to put him down.

We talked a lot about this, and at first we were like, well, maybe when they leave him at the church that’s it for him. They know that they’re leaving him there to die. And that didn’t quite feel right to me, so then we thought, well maybe the reward for all of this is that he’s alive at the end, but that didn’t feel right either because there’s got to be a cost to everything that they’ve gone through, and also his injuries were so severe and the Reapers were so dangerous. So we talked about it, and it felt like really, what would happen probably is that it’s not a good end, but she’s trying to hold on to hope. Because like I said, I think Maggie really, truly wants to believe that he has hung on somehow, but it’s just the scenario that she finds him in, there was a microcosm of what happened with all of them. He and a Reaper fought to the death. I think all of that is just weighing on her because she feels like, “I brought these people here, I brought somebody that was a friend that I cared about here and he’s gone and we’ve lost so many, and we’ve won and why doesn’t it feel like a victory?” So that’s part of what is in the heads of our characters as they move forward in the season.

What about Negan? He leaves at the end, and I know the show is completely different from the comics, but he doesn’t really play into the Commonwealth storyline at all in the source material, doesn’t show up again until years later. Is Negan going to be gone for a good chunk of this? Or should we expect him to pop up any time soon?

Without getting into specifics, Negan will pop up again. We are definitely not trying to cliffhanger, “Are we never gonna see Negan again?” it’s more like, what is the context we’re gonna see Negan in next? You will definitely see him in this block of episodes.

Daryl finally has a reunion with Connie here and it’s very sweet and very nice, but I don’t think it was necessarily the sweeping, romantic thing that fans were expecting. Is that because romantically, things have shifted towards Daryl and Leah? Or were they never there with Connie to begin with? Or I guess a third choice, potentially.

I think it’s the third choice. I think for Daryl, he moves slowly with all things in any relationship, whether it’s romantic or platonic or even just, the next-door neighbor. Does he trust them enough to help them with the trash? Daryl, in a lot of ways, is a wise, elder leader of this group, and yet there’s so much of him that really has an inner child. There’s just sweetness there. But it’s interesting because depending on your ship in the show, there’s people who are like, “I’m disappointed that there wasn’t a sweeping romantic moment with Carol” and then there’s “I’m disappointed there wasn’t a sweeping romantic moment with Connie” but I don’t think Daryl moves like that, if that makes sense. That just felt true to the character.

Daryl vs Maggie is a surprising twist at the end of the episode. I’m sure there’s a lot more story to come, but even at six months that’s a relatively short time for The Walking Dead to set this up. Is this the major conflict for the rest of this chunk of episodes? And what, if anything, can you tease about that?

I don’t want to get into too much of a spoiler, but I’ll say that there’s a series of interconnected events that lead to this moment, six months later. What we’re gonna start to see is the story that leads us to that point. And it’s funny because six months is not a lot of time, and yet in Walking Dead time, that’s a ton of time because we tend to do so much of our story like, “and in the next hour, this is what happened.” So for our characters, they do pass some time in the story to come in ways in which we don’t always on the show. But there’s definitely a flow of things that ramps up quicker and quicker as the episodes go along.

What can you tell us about integrating at least a part of the group into the Commonwealth? What that is going to be like?

I think for our folks who are just now integrating into the Commonwealth, it’s a little surreal for them. After everything they’ve been through, they really need this in many, many ways. And they get a spot of peace and stability when they’ve had nothing but just war and famine and the weather is even their enemy. But at the same time, they’re realizing that having the world go back to something like it was before, the world like it was before wasn’t necessarily great for all of our characters. It’s a society that’s very very separated by class distinctions which you see on full display in this next episode. And they’re just grappling with: what is survival now when you’re in a society like this? Because it means different things, especially for people who are used to being warriors and being out there in the world fighting zombies, it’s a completely different set of things that they’ve got to figure out in order to ensure that there’s some safety for the people they love, and the children.

We get to see Maggie at Hilltop, we know a group is going over to the Commonwealth. Is Alexandria done at this point? Or will we be going back there some time in the future?

We will definitely be finding out more about what is going on with Alexandria and the specific nature of the deal that the Commonwealth has with Alexandria.

Quick one to end it up, we’ve seen in the promo that Carol is baking cookies again, always an ominous sign for fans… As you’re heading towards the end of the show, how much have you been looking back at the series’ history to loop in little nods, easter eggs, whatever as you wrap up?

That’s always been part of what we do on the show, we try to remember things that have come before and, can we give a little nod here, or little Easter egg there? It’s fun for us to do as writers, and I think that fans generally, the ones that really know their show history, they enjoy it too. But it also just feels true to the characters. They have so little to hold onto, and when they find something that matters to them or that works for them, they figure out ways to bring it back. We thought that it felt really right for Carol to wind up at that bakery after what she did in Alexandria.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

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