When filming a show on location, surprises are bound to happen. A plane flies overhead, an unexpected rain shower…a car coming around the bend at an inopportune moment. It”s that last one that fans of The Walking Dead are trying to figure out in the wake of the mid-season premiere. If the vehicle cresting the hill was an accident, everything is okay. If it was a well-hidden clue, Daryl (Norman Reedus) might be in big trouble.
WARNING: SPOILERS AND SPECULATION FOR UPCOMING EPISODES OF THE WALKING DEAD BEYOND THIS POINT.
First noticed by UPROXX, when Daryl finally used Chekov”s grenade launcher in the mid-season premiere, there may have been witnesses. While the lead Savior (Christopher Berry) terrorized Sasha (Sonequa Martin-Green) and Abraham (Michael Cudlitz), a car was barely visible in the background. Check it out.
Car in the background… Neegan? #TheWakingDead #TheWalkingDeadMidSeasonPremiere #TWD pic.twitter.com/znSIZ00qkH
– Vinnie Gorham (@VinnieGorham) February 15, 2016
Did you see it? In the split second just before the explosion? Let”s zoom in!
ENHANCE!
The only definitive thing you can say about this blurry image is that it”s definitely a car. But why does it matter if it”s there on purpose or just a production vehicle/local accidentally getting into the shot? Because if The Walking Dead put a car full of Saviors in the background, there were witnesses. If there were witnesses, Daryl might be getting a face full of Lucille (Negan's baseball bat) in the season finale.
From the comics, we know Negan is a big believer in redundancies. Why send one group to shake down a terrified outpost when you can send two? Leave one in the background in case the sheep get any delusions of grandeur. It would be perfectly in line for there to have been more Saviors around the bend as backup. We also know the season finale of The Walking Dead shook the actors up pretty bad. In Entertainment Weekly”s recent coverage, Andrew Lincoln (Rick Grimes) had ominous words:
“I felt sick to my stomach when I read the script. It was the first day in the whole six years of working on The Walking Dead that I was late for work because I woke up in the middle of the night and I couldn”t get back to sleep. I was so angry and frustrated and I felt sick. And that was just after reading it.”
You could say Lincoln was upset to lose Steven Yeun (Glenn Rhee) as it”s his character Negan takes his aggression out on in the comics. But Glenn”s many run-ins with death are beginning to feel like a red herring. The AMC show has deviated from the source material in the past and – if that car wasn”t an accident – why would Negan pick a random member of The Group when the man who killed his scouting party is right there? The leader of the Saviors is not a forgiving man.
On top of that, rumors were flying last year that Norman Reedus was selling his Atlanta home. In a video interview, Reedus denied the house plastered all over the tabloids was even his…but didn”t deny he was selling his house. Could be nothing, could be the Word Game™.
What do you guys think? Will Negan exact revenge on Daryl in the Season 6 finale? Or has Glenn finally run out of lives?
The Walking Dead airs Sunday nights on AMC at 9/8c.