The Walking Dead Season 7 premiere featured the brutal deaths of some beloved characters. However, we ultimately think the losses will make for a better show overall. While fans continue to dry their tears, here’s why we think it was for the best.
SPOILERS about the deaths are coming! Those that haven’t watched episode 1 have been warned.
1) The Ladies Move Forward: The Lucille victims were paired up with two of The Walking Dead’s leading ladies, and now their plots are able to move forward in some pretty aggressive ways. With Maggie, for example, her relationship with Glenn frequently kept her hanging around camp at times when she could have been doing more. The baby might also have that effect later on, but birth hasn’t happened yet. Without her husband, there’s a real chance for Maggie to become the fearless woman that battled Gregory at the Hilltop earlier this year. That will eventually be a big win for viewers.
Sasha, on the other hand, just seemed to be in a pretty flat place. She had been scarred from the death of her brother and had found new life in her feelings from Abraham. The latter’s passing will push that story forward in huge ways. Will she become even more of a danger to herself? Will this tragedy actually create a sense of inner peace? These are interesting questions that only Negan can bring.
2) New Characters Are Introduced: With every character death, The Walking Dead has historically introduced a batch of new faces to fill in for the lost ones. Without saying more than we need to, the source comics tell us that the personalities that emerge after Glenn’s death are super interesting.
Since he’s already been in trailers, the arc of the great king Ezekiel should be mentioned here. Played on the AMC series by Khary Payton, Ezekiel becomes one of Rick’s most trusted allies and is one of the most unique characters Robert Kirkman has ever created. With him arrives a group of survivors that breathes totally new life into what was becoming a slightly stale Alexandria dynamic.
3) Existing Characters Get Fleshed Out: The Walking Dead season 6 did right by fans by bringing beloved characters like Jesus and Heath into the narrative, but both of these intriguing partners were criminally underused. With Glenn and Abraham now deceased, Rick will need more strong survivors that his community can trust. These two seem like pretty promising candidates.
Because of the premiere’s deaths, Heath and Jesus will likely become the amazing people that comic readers know them to be. Both will assumingly contribute to the war ahead in massive ways, and that might not have been true if the previously arranged cast was hogging the spotlight. Viewers will finally learn just how important those silenced support roles truly were.
4) Negan Is Made All The More Evil: As much as Sunday’s deaths were painful to watch, they did wonders to position Negan as the most demonic adversary Rick and company has ever encountered. It’s easy to make comparisons between Negan and the Governor at face value, but, with the brutal way the premiere was handled, we’re able to see that he’s on an entirely different level of bad.
If Negan were to take out a less prominent character like Spencer or Aaron, his entrance wouldn’t have been as impactful. In the comics and on the show, there’s a clear plot that emerges before and after Negan establishes himself. As we said in a previous article, there’s so much more to come. He shatters everything Rick thought he knew about life in the apocalypse. You can’t get a truly clear vision for the terror that comes next without some major deaths first.
5) Some Stale Arcs Get Cleaned Up: We touched on this already, but it’s a point worth reiterating. Glenn and Abraham were in the perfect position for death because their characters had mostly run their course. As much as we love Glenn, when was the last time his story was ever truly necessary? Because his plot mostly exists in Maggie’s belly, he wasn’t exactly needed. Abraham probably could have grown more, honestly, but his romantic failures just weren’t prompting much discussion overall.
Now, we can get rid of those stories and replace them with something better. Negan has forced Alexandria into a position of complete servitude for the first time. Will Rick head to war immediately? Will he hang back and quietly recruit allies? The revenge for episode 1’s deaths is so much more interesting than anything Glenn or Abraham could have added.
The Walking Dead season 7 continues Oct. 30 on AMC.
What did you think of the premiere deaths? Will The Walking Dead be better without Glenn and Abraham? Tell us in the comments section!
