Walking Dead Showrunner Defends The Existence Of Carl
There are a few months until AMC most popular TV series comes back on the air. The Walking Dead, love it or hate it, is a power juggernaut of pure genre TV. But despite the fans and overall positive critical reception to the TV series, there are still very questionable elements regarding plotting and character arcs.
The character of Carl (Chandler Riggs) has been at the top of the “just kill him already” list of most The Walking Dead viewers. His sheer stupidity has often led this small band of survivors into deadly encounters and sometimes causes the gruesome death of main characters.
In an interview with the Los Angeles Times, Glen Mazzara one of the showrunners of The Walking Dead talks about what the atmosphere is like in their writer’s room and the existence of Carl.
What’s the biggest argument you’ve had in the writers’ room?
Mazzara: We will have different opinions, and there’s a lot of debate about, you know, would a zombie do that? I wrote a scene in which a zombie climbed a ladder and everybody told me I was an idiot because zombies can’t do that. I was, like, if I wrote it down it happens. And they’re, like, no, no, no. So we cut that [...]
We had a debate about the young boy, Carl. And everyone wants to know why Carl’s not in the house. Well, it’s boring to sit in a house. And he’s a little boy and he wants to mix it up and stuff. And he’s walking through the woods and finds a zombie trapped in the mud and he starts doing what any Huck Finn would do and starts throwing rocks at the monster. And then later that is the same zombie that pulls itself free and kills Dale. And the writers were very nervous about that, you know? It feels earned, but it’s a risk. Because Dale is a beloved character and if this other character is involved and responsible for that death, is the audience going to now hate Carl? But I thought the story was worth the chance.
Many fans and viewers of The Walking Dead really want Carl to die a horrible death at the dead hands of a walker, along with his mother Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies). They often appear as the most annoying and nonsensical of all of the characters on The Walking Dead. The actor who plays Carl, Chandler Riggs, is just terrible and the older he gets, the more ridiculous it’s going to be to see him play with toy cars in the background. An open suggestion to showrunner Glen Mazzara, kill off Carl or put a gun in his hand and let him grow up.
