The finale of Season 6 of The Walking Dead ended on a doozy of a cliffhanger when somebody in Rick’s not-so-merry band of survivors was beaten to death by new bad guy Negan. The episode rather cruelly didn’t show us who got the face full of Lucille, so we’ll have a long hiatus of wondering which of the characters has been murdered and/or will be murdered in the near future. Creator Robert Kirkman recently decided to give us even more reason to go crazy with speculation when he revealed a list of who should be dying by the end of The Walking Dead series. Here's what he had to say:
Rick, Carl, Michonne. In the show, Daryl Dixon, eventually Abraham, Rosita. Rosita’s already dead in the comics. Jesus.
Robert Kirkman dropped this list of names during an appearance on a panel at a Hawaii Comic Con. He was responding to a question from a young fan of The Walking Dead. He didn’t exactly soften his response for the youngster, either. Assuming that the kid's most beloved character isn’t Carol or Morgan or Eugene, he probably just found out that his favorite main character is going to die before the show comes to an end. Kirkman didn’t give us a timeline for when each of these characters is going to bite the dust. We’ll just have to wonder and wait.
We presumably won’t have to wait too long into Season 7 to see if one of these characters was the one beaten off to that great zombie apocalypse sanctuary in the sky in the final moments of Season 6. Rick and Carl are likely to survive Negan’s first attack, and Jesus wasn’t even present for the scene, so we can presumably rule those three out for the big death early in Season 7. Otherwise, a slew of people could have bit the dust. Rosita isn’t the only character on Robert Kirkman’s death list that is already dead in the comics, and Daryl doesn’t even have an on-page counterpart. Kirkman may have spoiled some big deaths, but he wasn’t very helpful in narrowing down who might be dying sooner rather than later.
Fortunately for those of us who just got some very bad news about our favorite characters, The Walking Dead likely has a long future ahead of it. The ratings are still phenomenal, and we’ve had long enough to get truly invested in the survival of Rick and Co. The fact that seven characters have now being slated to die doesn’t mean that they are going immediately; in fact they could still be around for seasons to come.
Of course, Robert Kirkman didn’t say that these seven characters are the only ones who will be dying on The Walking Dead. If anything, he may have deliberately left off the name of the person who will be dying next to throw fans off the scent. Glenn and Eugene are almost certainly still on the table to be revealed as the big death from the end of Season 6. Maggie already looked on the verge of death without Negan bringing a barbed wire baseball bat into the mix, too.
We still have a wait ahead of us before The Walking Dead Season 7 reveals which one of these ill-fated seven characters is the one to die first. Check out our summer TV premiere schedule to see what shows you can watch in the meantime.
