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The Walking Dead Nearly Killed Off Even More Of The Cast

Date: Mar 21, 2012 | Author: Josh Tyler | Category: Sci-Fi

If you saw the season finale of The Walking Dead this past weekend, or even any of the episodes right before it, you know the show ended in a total bloodbath. The walkers have been very well fed but, showrunner Robert Kirkman says they almost ended even more of the cast.

Read no further if you haven’t seen the season finale yet. You’ve been warned…

Kirkman tells EW that they’d originally planned to kill off Hershel, the elderly veterinarian and farm owner who joined the show in its second season. What’s strange is that he wasn’t going to be eaten by zombies in that final, massive walker assault on the farm. Instead they were going to let Randall, the briefly imprisoned interloper, kill him in that same episode where Rick and Shane have their final showdown.

Kirkman explains, “”So we were going to lose Hershel, Randall and Shane all in one episode, which I felt was really cool.”

I’m not sure it would have been cool. They’ve killed off so many characters this year, another might have been too much. It sounds like the show’s team agrees with that sentiment. Says Kirkman, “At the end of the day we had so much story to tell with Hershel, and he had such a central role in the ensemble, and Scott Wilson is such a phenomenal actor that we felt like it was overkill.”

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Comments

  • Amy Eyrie

    This is where you can tell these are comic geeks and not directors.

    Rules to live by: Do not kill all your good actors.

    • http://www.facebook.com/christopher.paris1 Chris Paris

      Comic geeks have actors?

      No entiendo.

      • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=775500400 Sasha Fitzgerald

        Yeah Kirkman is the writer for the comics and a director for the show. 

  • Amy Eyrie

    This is where you can tell these are comic geeks and not directors.

    Rules to live by: Do not kill all your good actors.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=775500400 Sasha Fitzgerald

    After reading the comics, you kind of understand that every character is going to die, the only questions are when and how, and what struggles and hard decisions they will go through beforehand. 

    I’m glad Hershel stayed alive though. He’s a great actor and definitely adds interest to the show. 

    I’m so excited for the group to meet Michonne!!

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000515070192 Samuel Watkins

    They had to keep Hershel because they killed off Dale Horvath. I read that this was because Jeffrey DeMunn decided to follow Frank Darabont ,which means that we will probably see him in Frank’s new show L.A. Noir, or that he was gotten rid of because he is considered one of Frank’s actors. A regime change basically. Dale basically acted as the conscious of the group. Hershel’s character will now fill this role/trope.