While things have never necessarily been easy for the survivors on The Walking Dead, they're about to get a whole lot harder. When Season 6 of the hit AMC series ended for its midseason break, all of our favorite survivors had been scattered by the chaos of a walker horde, Alexandria lay in ruin, and we as an audience witnessed our first glimpse of the imminent threat of Negan and his Saviors. According to Greg Nicotero: we’ve only just begun to scratch the surface of what’s coming.
In a new featurette released by AMC, Nicotero explains how the world of The Walking Dead is about to expand and change in a never before seen way:
It’s a tremendously exciting juncture that we’ve come into play on The Walking Dead which is this crossroads, and that our story’s about to take a dramatic turn.
This really represents a major step for the world of The Walking Dead. Up until now the area outside of whatever stronghold the survivors happen to inhabit has remained relatively mysterious. Based on what Nicotero has to say, it’s fairly obvious that the show will expand this area and begin to flesh out (pun intended) the potential for danger. While the beginning of Season 6 brought back the walkers as a major physical threat to the survival of Alexandria, new characters will soon join the fight that present a more menacing, psychological threat to our heroes. Over the course of the season we’ve seen brief glimpses of various factions – each with distinct styles of operation – but now it seems that they will soon converge. The result? War.
Michonne herself, Danai Gurira, also appeared during the video to remark on how the show will move into new territory in the way it handles these threats:
They always have found ways to move forward and this is a whole new experience that they’re stepping into in the second half of the season.
Human threats have always been a major factor on The Walking Dead, from Joe and the Claimers, to the cannibals of Terminus, and The Governor’s colony at Woodbury. However, The Walking Dead has seldom fleshed out (pun still intended) these antagonistic forces in any meaningful way, and often removes the threat as quickly as it presents it. With the impending arrival of the Saviors – as well as whoever else happens to show up – The Walking Dead seems to be moving toward a more sophisticated form of storytelling which involves politics and conflict between various factions.
Check out the who AMC featurette to see what the rest of the cast and crew behind the sixth season of The Walking Dead has to say about what’s coming:
Only time will tell how much the game changes when The Walking Dead’s sixth season continues on February 14. As always, we will keep you updated on any and all Walking Dead related information as it becomes available to us. Stay tuned.
