Say what you will about the quality of storytelling in season 8 of The Walking Dead, you can’t deny the show is introducing some compelling new elements in the form of flashbacks, flash-forwards, and dream sequences. For the first half of season 8, the show kept on tossing us random glimpses of a grey-haired Rick Grimes hobbling around with a cane. It wasn’t until the end of the mid-season premiere that we learned these were nothing more than Carl’s visions of a bright and peaceful future.
That’s not the only mysterious Rick that’s been popping up. Also regularly seen during the season: quick shots of what fans are calling “Red Eye Rick.” How he fits into the grander scheme of the show is still unclear. All we know is what we’ve seen, which is Rick sitting under a tree with a nasty looking wound and a million-mile stare.
But The Walking Dead may have finally given us the keys to this particular puzzle in episode 11. During the episode, Negan comes up with a plan to coat all the Savior weapons and ammo with walker guts. Now even the smallest of wounds is as good as a death sentence. It’s no more Mr. Nice Negan now. The show ends with the Saviors preparing an assault on Hilltop, and Negan makes it clear that he wants as many slow and painful deaths as possible to send a message.
Now bring in Red Eye Rick, sitting under a tree cradling a wound and an expression like he’s as good as done for. At this point in what we now believe is the not-so-distant future, Rick knows about the Saviors and their poison weapons. He’s probably seen a number of his group die in a similar fashion to his son. He knows what this injury means. He knows he’s dead meat.
But would The Walking Dead really kill Rick like that? His plot armor has been pretty thick over the years, and the fanbase is still in a state of near revolt over the recent loss of Carl. Fortunately, there’s a way for this to happen without Rick dying, and it’s already laid out in the comic books.
*Comic book spoilers ahead*
While The Walking Dead television series regularly makes big departures from the comics, a lot of what we’ve been seeing during the All Out War storyline comes directly from creator Robert Kirkman’s original plot. Negan poisoning Savior weapons is a straight lift. In a later issue of the comic Rick does gets injured by what he thinks is a poison arrow. Fortunately for him, it was fired by double agent Dwight, who used a normal arrow instead.
So the comics also seem to line up with this theory of what Red Eye Rick’s deal is. But knowing The Walking Dead, we’ll have to be prepared for more curveballs and surprises along the way. Who knows, maybe they’ll even go ahead and let Rick get poisoned for real. Considering showrunner Scott Gimple recently teased “a new era” was coming, anything feels possible these days.
