‘The Walking Dead’ Boss Breaks Down The Show’s Penultimate Episode, and The Finale’s “Unexpected Turns”

And just like that, there’s one episode left of The Walking Dead. With this week’s episode, “Family”, directed by Sharat Raju and written by Erik Moountain and Kevin Deiboldt, we have a much clearer view on what the show’s endgame will be. And spoilers beyond this point, but that endgame includes Daryl (Norman Reedus) running to get medical help for Judith (Cailey Fleming), who was shot in the midst of a walker invasion of the Commonwealth.

“Anytime we have violence, especially with young people, that is something that we talk about really seriously, and we talk about how we’re going to portray it, and do we get something that is valuable for the story out of it,” Angela Kang, Walking Dead showrunner, told Decider. “We want to try and handle that sensitively.”

In the episode, everything goes down at the Commonwealth as Pamela (Laila Robins) spirals out of control and attacks our heroes, injuring Judith. Meanwhile, with Pamela distracted, the “new” climbing zombies storm the walls and invade the former safe haven. With most of our group finally reunited, this leads to a desperate dash through the city, locked in by a herd of the undead and Judith desperately clinging to life.

With the final hour debuting next Sunday (November 20) live on both AMC and AMC+, we discussed the penultimate episode of TWD, that moment with Judith and Daryl towards the end of the episode, and how much of the finale will come down to Maggie’s (Lauren Cohan) decision on Pamela.

Decider: I thought you were only allowed one F-word per season. Did you get special dispensation because this is the final run of episodes?

Angela Kang: I think at first it was one, and then we found out we could do one per episode or something like that. And, we had no idea and we were still trying to keep it kind of light. But, you know, sometimes we wrote them in, and sometimes the actors just improv the bad word version. Which used to happen even before we were allowed to have any on the air. Sometimes they just do it for fun, and we wouldn’t use that take, you know? So, we just found ourselves sometimes using the takes because they’d be really good.

With two episodes left, how much does it become making sure the pieces are in the right place on the board versus following the flow of the emotional journey?

You know, I think it’s a little bit about both. There is an element of, “Okay, well, this has to go here, this person needs to be there.” We have to get everything lined up to do that. But, we’re always still trying to follow the emotional arcs, because that’s really how the audience experiences it and what we like to write and what the actors like to act. So, I think it’s always a balancing act.

Obviously, everybody’s in trouble at the end here with walkers swarming in the Commonwealth. But in particular, it feels like the big ones are Lydia who loses an arm and is losing a lot of blood, Judith, who gets shot, and Coco, who’s still missing. Why was it important thematically to put the next generation in danger in these final few episodes?

When we talked about what the show was, and what was the meaning of the story, and what are we trying to tell, or what was [Robert] Kirkman trying to tell, what’s the show been trying to tell? I just went back to a very simple thing from the early years, since I’ve been on so long, and Kirkman used to be in the room. When he started this comic, he was a very young man and a father, and pretty newly so. This story is about your fears as a parent, of trying to navigate a world that feels broken and scary. And, it’s sort of a big metaphor for what all of us go through just even in life right now. That seemed like an important kernel because for those who know the comics, there is a very clear story that has been being told about family, and about the sacrifices you’ll make for family, and how important it is to try to create something for the next generation that can sustain. That’s just something that really, in a lot of ways, does put that next generation in an important position. Both in terms of how they see the situation, which is sometimes different from the grownups, which we’ve explored a little bit with Judith and even with Lydia earlier in the season, arguing with Maggie about things, and Elijah as well. That was something that was important to touch on in places. And, it’s also important to see that the parent’s generation or the surrogate parent’s generation in some cases, it cannot look at themselves, they have to look at what comes next. Even if we’re gone, even if everything falls apart for us, is that fair to the children that are in this world, that we’ve brought into this world, or that we’ve taken on as our responsibility?

Particularly having Judith get shot is such a shocking moment, not least of which because she’s been narrating the past couple of episodes. I imagine the thought of shooting a child was not taken lightly. What went into that decision?

Anytime we have violence, especially with young people, that is something that we talk about really seriously, and we talk about how we’re going to portray it, and do we get something that is valuable for the story out of it. We want to try and handle that sensitively. You know, Judith’s brother Carl was obviously shot at a key moment in the story. In talking about it, it felt like there were important things that happened for the story by putting her front and center in this conflict, and what that means for the grownups around her. But also, what it means for what Judith is thinking about as she’s fighting for her own life going forward.

I’ll admit that last moment when she’s being caried by Daryl, and she looks up at him and says, “Dad,” killed me. What went into crafting that line?

I think for Judith, we’ve always been trying to keep alive this idea that she, and she alone, knows that her parents are out there, or at least Mom is out there. Maybe Dad’s out there… We know that they’re both out there as audience, and they are on her mind. And in some ways, Daryl has been the closest thing to a father figure that she has – the closest thing to a parent that she has. In this scary, painful moment, we liked the idea that what she pictures is being held in her father’s arms, that’s who she imagines is carrying her to safety. And of course, it’s Daryl. And in some ways, he is that father figure for her right now. Your reaction to it is also Daryl’s reaction to it, it’s just a gut punch. Here’s this guy who doesn’t have children of his own, and he has the responsibility of a parent for this child right now. And so, that’s all of that weight is on his shoulders.

Moving over to the climbers, that whole situation has amped up pretty dramatically from, “Huh, this is a weird thing,” a few weeks back, to possibly taking down the Commonwealth. How long has that evolution been going on in the background?

There were a lot of conversations that were going on behind the scenes of The Walking Dead. And one of the conversations was with folks at the studio about walkers. This was in talks for a long time, in some form. We started the season with an exploration of lurkers, which has been part of the mythology for a long time, but we’ve never really done big episodes [on] lurkers, the particular way that they behave is, one of the things that our people are trying to go around. It’s always been interesting to me that there were these walkers that you saw, all the way back in the pilot, and there were walkers in the background of Rick climbing a fence, and there was one that was picking up a brick or a rock or something, and they move faster than I think people remember, if you go back and watch some of those early episodes. And so, it felt like, as the world is opening up, they’re just running into more varieties that maybe have been seen, but forgotten. That seemed like a good way to explore something that feels new without breaking the rules that have been established over many years. And so, that’s how that kind of came around… But it was a long conversation with many, many people involved in talking about it and approving it and all that.

This is getting back to the chess board a little bit, but geographically we’ve got a few strays out there at this point. We have Aaron with Lydia in the RV, Elijah in with the herd as long as he’s still alive, Jerry on his own out looking for him… Why leave these pockets out there when otherwise you have the group finally all together in the Commonwealth?

There were people that were trying to do so many different things, several episodes back, and rather than cleanly reuniting them all at the same time it felt like the story wanted to go in a direction where most reunited, but there were just some people that are still out there on that board, like you’re saying. And, that has an impact on our folks going forward. Especially the ones who don’t know where somebody they love, where they might be. So, that was one of those things that we did talk about, “Do we want to try to reunite everybody at the same time? Or do we let the story play out the way we think it would?” And we were like, “Man, she just had her arm chopped off, how quick is she gonna be able to get her ass to the gates?” So, that’s kind of how that evolved over time.

Two key conversations in the episode that of dovetail together in my mind are: Negan telling Maggie that she knows they’re going to have to kill Pamela; and then, on the train later on we see Negan telling Ezekiel that he knows they’re all better than him, with Maggie listening in. So, without trying to get too much into spoiler territory, how much will the show ultimately come down to Maggie’s decision on Pamela?

Without getting into spoiler territory, it’s definitely an important part of the story. But, it may take some unexpected turns along the way. I’ll leave it at that.

To dive a little further into that Negan/ Ezekiel thing, and I talked to Khary Payton last week about this a little bit, he said that Ezekiel can never forgive Negan at any point. But, this feels the closest we’ve gotten to a Negan redemption so far. Is this the farthest he can go in your mind? Or does he even have farther to go potentially, even though we only have one episode left?

I think Negan has farther to go. You know, for those who’ve been watching the season, they’ll remember that when it came down to talking about the lineup, he has no remorse, he’s kind of like, “I’d do it again.” And you know, that’s quite the thing to say to the widow of one of the people he killed in that lineup. So, that’s hanging out there, and I think that Negan is aware that there are some people that have grudgingly accepted his presence within this community. There are people that maybe have a different view of him, such as Judith, who knows him post jail years. And, there are people that may never forgive him. That’s something that when we’re exploring forgiveness, is something that we were exploring in that fashion on purpose. Because I think ultimately, somebody can be on a redemption arc, but the individual people that feel that they were harmed or have the ongoing beef with what their actions, they have to each decide, it’s not like you just get to blanket wipe away what you’ve done. So, that’s just something that he’s grappling with going forward.

This interview has been edited for content and length.

The Walking Dead series finale airs Sunday, November 20 at 9/8c on AMC and AMC+.