AMC – Gene Page(LOS ANGELES) — (SPOILER ALERT) After last season’s gut-wrenching cliffhanger that left us wondering who fell victim to Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s Negan, fans finally bid farewell to not one, but two heroic favorites on Sunday’s premiere of The Walking Dead.
Just like the fans this morning, Danai Gurira, AKA Michonne, is in mourning. She stopped by Good Morning America today to discuss the shocking outcome, plus the aftermath of saying goodbye two beloved cast members on the show.
Sunday night’s episode revealed that Michael Cudlitz’ Sgt. Abraham Ford was defiant to the end, even after he was struck the first time by Negan’s barbed wire bat, “Lucille.”
However, even though his death was forecast in the comics, the death of Steven Yeun’s Glenn came as a shock — it was Negan’s swift punishment for Daryl’s punching the bat-wielding baddie in the face after he murdered Abraham.
“Maggie, I’ll find you,” were a mortally wounded Glenn’s devastating last words to his pregnant wife, Maggie. Much of the episode’s closing focused on Lauren Cohan’s character processing the loss.
“The heart and soul of the show, to lose them, I thought it was very important to see and to feel that loss because that loss transforms everybody,” Gurira said. “It’s devastating and I thought it was beautiful that we walked through it together, though it’s the most horrible thing to walk through. … Everyone’s response is utterly valid.
She added: “It was horrifying to sit through that experience … the transformation that it causes us as a group couldn’t really have been experienced unless you walked through that experience with us.”
Gurira said the audience will see a change in her character, Michonne, in the wake of both characters’ deaths.
“The loss upon loss and then what almost happens to Carl, to her it was the most devastating thing because she’s doing the math as she’s sitting there,” she said. “She cannot help in any actual way. She tries everything she can do.
She talks to Negan and tries to talk him down, which she’s the only one who tries that tactic because that’s how desperate she gets. But there’s no way around it and to be that disempowered, and that helpless to her this is a woman who gets up and gets it done.”
At the end of season 6, Michonne develops a romance with the group leader, Rick Grimes.
Gurira said the introduction of Negan as the show’s newest villain could affect the relationship between Michonne and Rick.
“We’ll have to see what the aftermath will be for these two,” she said. “They are very much in a committed, love-filled relationship. They fell in love as best friends but they are in a moment of complete and utter transformation and what will happen as they pick up the pieces. Nothing’s the same.
“This man [Negan] has changed everything. He’s walked in their lives and everything they knew and everything they thought they knew is completely transformed.”
The Walking Dead returns next Sunday night at 9 p.m. Eastern time on AMC.
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