Age of The Nerd
A major storm is brewing and we are gearing up to batten down all the hatches and park ourselves in front of our televisions, as AMC’s “Fear The Walking Dead” returns tonight, August 12th at 9:00pm ET/PT, for its’ mid-season premiere for season 4! On the all-new episode, “People Like Us,” Morgan tries to help Alicia and the fractured group of survivors as a storm brews.
The first half of season four began with one figure huddled around a campfire, and ended with nine. Characters who started their journeys in isolation collided with each other in unexpected ways and found themselves in one of the last places they ever expected to be…together. In the back half of the season they will explore who they are now – as individuals and as part of the greater group – and how they will forge ahead. They will find themselves pitted against new adversaries – human, walker, and even nature itself. Theirs will be a journey wrought with danger, love, heartbreak, loss, and ultimately, hope.
The series is executive produced by Scott M. Gimple, showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg, as well as Robert Kirkman, Michael Satrazemis, David Alpert, Gale Anne Hurd and Greg Nicotero, and produced by AMC Studios. The series stars Lennie James, Alycia Debnam-Carey, Colman Domingo, Danay Garcia, Garret Dillahunt, Maggie Grace and Jenna Elfman.
We recently had a chance to catch up with the cast and producers of “Fear The Walking Dead” at San Diego Comic for an incredibly informative and fun press conference to discuss what is in store for the second half of season four, and we are certainly all of the edge of our seats!
When speaking to newcomers to the series Maggie Grace and Garrett Dillahunt about what it was like joining such a close-knit group of actors on the show, Grace told us “It’s like moving to a new neighborhood. It was so warm and friendly and I will say a little shocking when we lost cast members very soon thereafter. I had no idea.”
Dillahunt added, “It’s not the first show I’ve joined mid-process. It’s the best introduction I’ve ever had.”
Actress Jenna Elfman then chimed in saying, “It’s been a big learning curve for me just in the mythology. I wanted to, it was really important to me, to make sure I understood it…Just artistically it’s been really stimulating and a really great adventure.”
When speaking about the overall theme or feeling for the second half of season 4, showrunner Ian Goldberg reveals, “I think there’s a few, we talked at the panel a bit about the end of the first half of the season ended with these characters sitting around a campfire brought together by circumstances they couldn’t imagine. There’s a lot to resolve, both within themselves, within the group, questions of who are they to each other, who will they be going forward, how will they carry on Madison’s legacy of hope, how will they bring light into this dark world. And I think redemption is a really big theme in the back half.”
We then asked Alycia Debnam-Carey about the very traumatic changes her character has had to endure during the series. She tells us, “It’s a been a really exciting journey for me because this character has had one of the major developments out of any character on this show. We’ve seen her go from a regular teenage girl to a fearless warrior in the apocalypse. She’s been destroyed by it and lost everyone she knows…All our characters have become orphans of the apocalypse. Everyone has lost everyone in their life, their family…If you thread it all together in one journey, it’s quite remarkable how much she’s changed. This season’s been really, really hard. I lost all the Clarks. I’m the only one left….What’s great though is that we now get to see Alicia now purely as her own character completely. She no longer has ties to her mother and her brother.”
We then jokingly spoke to Lennie James about any competition he may be feeling with “The Walking Dead”. He replies, “My kind of thing I try and do my best wherever I am and tell the story in the best way that we think it should be told. I don’t think there’d be any point in the crossover…if it wasn’t adding something or continuing the great work that was being done before, if it wasn’t broadening the storytelling. If it was just a gimmick, I’m not interested in a gimmick. ..That was the things that most interested me and most concerned me…I’m very protective and take a real responsibility for Morgan as a character…If we end up kicking the other guys’ ass, that’s a bonus.”
Of course, we had to know about any additional character or story cross-overs with “The Walking Dead” in the future. Scott Gimple says that they are not ruled out, however “That’s about all I got to say. It does not but I wouldn’t expect it all the time. Things could happen. You never know who might pop up on Fear the Walking Dead. That includes The Walking Dead and potentially people in the past from Fear the Walking Dead.”
We also wanted to know if Al’s tapes would still continue to be explored. Michael Chambliss tells us, “We will definitely be exploring more with those tapes and why they mean so much to Al in a couple of circumstances. She’s into them, why they mean so much, what’s on them…”
We then got into some very important and informative toilet humor with the cast, with the main question centering around whether or not zombies “poop”. With a laugh, Scott Gimple, says, “I think there’s a fermentation process that could result in projectiles. I don’t mean to spoil this half of the season.”
In closing Ian Goldberg discussed some of how The Walking Dead universe could continue to expand, saying, “I’m currently working on some things that answer that question so I shouldn’t answer it now. There’s a lot of stuff that’s cooking in the garage right now. The frozen walker battle continues! You never know where it could wind up. It could wind up on “The Walking Dead”, it could wind up on this show. There could be a half hour television show of just frozen walkers. … as the months go on we’re gonna have a lot to say about it.”
Well, this certainly left us with quite a bit of curiosity and we absolutely can’t wait to see the directions they plan to take the show, especially “Fear The Walking Dead” in the future, as with that series they basically have an open slate.
