SDCC 2016 – The Walking Dead
The second of two Comic-Con Hall H panels focused on The Walking Dead universe tool place on Friday, following what fans saw at the Fear the Walking Dead panel. Of course, many were far more excited about getting a look at the upcoming season of The Walking Dead, with the continuation of the Negan storyline, the introduction of The Kingdom and King Ezekiel, and of course a foll0w-up to who was killed by Negan’s barbed wire-wrapped baseball bat at the end of last season. The cast and crew were on hand, despite being very secretive about the upcoming season, but the first trailer for season 7 certainly set things up right.
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The trailer makes it clear that we are all going to have to wait until the series’ October premiere to learn the fate of our characters. We see the start of the trailer highlight each of the characters under the threat of Lucille, with flashbacks to the earlier days for each of them in this series. That’s it though as far as seeing these main characters. It is then all about introducing the growing world of The Walking Dead and reminding us of the other characters such as Carol and Morgan, who were last scene being saved by men with uniforms and skill to take on walkers.
There are lots of hints surrounding the threat of the season that is Negan. He clearly has a no-nonsense attitude about how to the world he occupies and the people he leads. We even see some of his men kneeling as he walks by. Whatever is going to happen concerning Rick and the Gang versus Negan, it’s going to be a huge challenge for sure. Of course, comic fans may know where things are going and it should be interesting to see how characters such as King Ezekiel (and his pet tiger) fit into this series.
As far as the panel goes, Chris Hardwick was once again on hand to keep things moving in humorous fashion, which was aided by Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman and showrunner Scott Gimple. The group of producers and directors (make-up guru and director Gregg Nicotero was sitting amongst the crew as well) were happy to talk just enough to highlight the anticipation for the next season and the continued creativity when it comes to new zombies to be seen.
After the trailer premiered, the cast came out on stage, which was met with all the applause you’d expect (especially for Norman Reedus). The highlight of this whole portion of the panel had to be Andrew Lincoln and Norman Reedus discussion the pranks they would play on each other, which included the use of glitter bombs. This was followed by Lincoln blowing a handful of glitter into Reedus’ face, only to have plenty land back on him and into his beard as well. Needless to say, the rest of the panel was always hilarious when the camera cut back to these guys and their shininess.
Putting the antics aside, it was very clear the cast has to be careful about spoilers and did not even hint about what they had filmed for the upcoming season. It’s okay to hear everyone play coy about the upcoming season, but at least Jeffrey Dean Morgan had a blast entering stage in character and swearing far more than he will be able to on the series. With little else to go on, everyone will still have to wait to find out what really went down at the end of last season and where that will take the remaining characters next.
The Walking Dead premieres Sunday, October 23. As usual, eight episodes will play in 2016 and eight more in 2017.
