We have not seen Dwight, the character played by Austin Amelio, since the eighth season finale of The Walking Dead, when Daryl banished him from Alexandria for killing Denise during the events of the All-Out War. The fact that Dwight eventually turned on Negan and allied with Rick and Company was the only reason his life was spared. Of course, the reason he turned on Negan was that he no longer felt compelled to side with the Saviors, which he had only done to protect his wife, Sherry, who had managed to escape.
After Dwight left Alexandria, it was assumed he’d attempt to track down his wife, who had left Dwight a note with an infinity symbol — a secret symbol between the two — encouraging Dwight to find her. In this week’s episode of Fear the Walking Dead, we discover that that is exactly what Dwight has been doing for the last year: Tracking Sherry halfway across the country, following a trail of notes she left behind with the infinity symbol scrawled on them until the trail went cold. His pursuit of Sherry eventually brings him to Humbug’s Gulch in Texas, an old saloon town built for tourists and the old stomping grounds for John Dorie, a trick-shot gunslinger. John and June had taken refuge there during a windstorm and also to restock on guns and ammunition.
It wasn’t exactly a friendly encounter, at first — Dwight tried to shoot John, John shot Dwight in the arm, Dwight held a gun to John’s face, and June knocked Dwight out — but they eventually found common ground and a blossoming friendship. Earlier this year, Scott Gimple suggested that Dwight’s entrance into Fear would be built around “a very interesting commonality, this story strand that’s gonna be furthered on this show that started on The Walking Dead.”
That commonality should have been obvious, but it didn’t register for me until it was right in front of my face: Dwight’s search for Sherry mirrors John’s previous search for June, and that’s exactly how Dwight, John, and June become fast friends. In fact, John talks Dwight out of taking his own life, encouraging him to continue searching for Sherry because she may still be out there, just as June was still out there for John to find. As part of June and John’s mission to help people, they also agree to help Dwight search for Sherry.
At the end of the episode, after the entire group meets up, Morgan and Dwight encounter each other for the first time since Alexandria, and the reunion is only briefly awkward. Dwight tries to explain to Morgan that he’s not the same person that he was in Alexandria, but Morgan cuts him off, saying he doesn’t have to explain himself. Morgan quickly welcomes him into the group, asking him how he got to Texas. “Did you take the 20?” Morgan asks. “Yep. Then 85,” Dwight responds, like they’re in a “The Californians” skit.
Meanwhile, the search for Sherry continues, but now Dwight has a new crew to help him along.
