It’s been five episodes since a major character on The Walking Dead — two major characters, actually — has been killed. That’s an eternity for this show. There are only two episodes left before the winter finale, the disturbingly optimistic “Hearts Still Beating,” but fans of AMC’s hit zombie series are pretty certain they know who Negan and Lucille’s next victim is going to be.
Chandler Riggs, who plays long-haired Carl Grimes (seriously, kid, take five minutes to get a haircut), recently tweeted, “ayy i just got accepted into auburn.” The Alabama university isn’t too far away from Georgia, where The Walking Dead films, so there’s nothing to worry about there… unlike Riggs’ father captioning a photo on Instagram with, “Completed 7 years on TWD! #freedom.” The De Havilland Law stipulates that actors can’t sign contracts longer than seven years — that’s how long Riggs has been killing Walkers, and now he can either ink a new deal, or walk away and focus on college.
Riggs’ dad also posted this now-deleted message on Facebook:
7 year contract completed! Grateful to AMC, Cast & Crew, TWD fan base, and especially Chandler for always being 100% dedicated. Whether is [sic] was getting up at 4 AM, working in the freezing cold past 2 AM, leaving his friends and carefree kiddom behind, scrambling to make up missed schoolwork, he has done it without complaint and always made me proud & amazed to be his dad!
So, Carl (who is creator Robert Kirkman’s favorite character) and Enid’s blossoming relationship isn’t long for this world, huh? Happiness rarely lasts on The Walking Dead, after all. Well, not so fast. Jesus himself, Tom Payne, told the Huffington Post that he believes “Carl is the future of the show. I mean, is the future of the comic books, I think. At the end of the day, I think Carl is the guy at the end on the last page. And I don’t know if they’ll go that way on the TV show, but I think it would be a logical place for them to go.”
In the comics (potential spoilers follow), Carl hides in one of the Savior’s trucks to kill the big bad Negan by himself. Sound familiar? His plan is thwarted, but Negan is impressed by Carl’s balls and takes him under his wing. At one point, Negan taunts Carl into showing him his missing eye. When the boy starts crying, Negan displays a shred of remorse and actually apologizes. The series hinted it might be heading this way in the season seven premiere, when Negan tells Carl, “Sh*t, kid. Lighten up. At least cry a little.”
But if Carl is trying to kill Negan, he better work on his aim.
You come at the Negan, you best not miss.
(Via the Huffington Post)
