Andrew moves on
The ‘Walking Dead’ actor discusses his time on the series, least favourite plot points and why the show is a story of hope, as he prepares for his next journey in the franchise
SPOILER ALERT: This interview includes spoilers
Turns out the walkers aren’t the only ones who are undead.
For months, The Walking Dead has hyped the departure of its central hero, Rick Grimes, breaking from its usual secretive shocking-death playbook to not only confirm rumours that Andrew Lincoln, the actor who played him, was leaving, but also to say exactly when he would go.
That moment came recently in a retrospective, mournful episode that matched the tone of the marketing around Lincoln’s exit. The episode took Rick through a series of fever dream encounters with old dead friends like Shane (Jon Bernthal) and Hershel (Scott Wilson), before marching him toward what seemed like an explosive final heroic sacrifice.
Until the end, when he came to on a river bank, very much alive, and was rescued by a helicopter. The story then jumped ahead six years to find Rick’s cohorts making do without him, his young daughter, Judith, assuming the mantle of the new zombie-slaying Grimes.
While Rick’s destination and eventual fate may be uncertain, it won’t be for long: The Walking Dead will resume his story with a trilogy of feature-length movies to run on AMC, with the first going into production in 2019. “Everybody thinks I’m a sociopath because I’m not breaking down at every interview,” Lincoln said in New York in October. “But the truth is that I know that there’s something happening next year.”
Unlike the series, the films will not be direct adaptations from the Walking Dead comics. The films will tell an original Rick Grimes story and have beefedup production values, said Scott Gimple, the chief content officer of the Walking Dead universe, who is writing the first film. “They’re not just longer episodes,” he said.
Lincoln preferred that his departure remain a secret until it actually happened. “The greatest regret I have is that people aren’t experiencing this fresh,” he said.
But the promotion has afforded a victory lap for the anchor of one of the most popular shows on television. Before The Walking
Dead debuted in 2010, the British actor was best known in the US for costume dramas (Wuthering Heights) and romcoms (Love Actually). But he brought remarkable physical endurance and emotional intensity to the tormented action hero Rick Grimes, the by turns bloodthirsty and idealistic, perpetually sweaty zombie fighter enduring loss after loss in a postapocalyptic hellscape.
In person, Lincoln is closer to the sweetly charming wielder of romantic poster boards in Love
Actually — an earnest conversationalist with an easy-going affability that belies his status as the centre of one of the world’s biggest pop culture franchises.
Over lunch at a bustling Gramercy Park trattoria and in a phone interview, Lincoln discussed his time on the series, his least favourite plot points and why, despite all the blood, bullets and human brutality, The Walking
Dead is a story of hope. These are edited excerpts.
What did you think of Rick’s exit? When Angela [Kang, the showrunner] pitched the idea to me, she said that we’ve been oscillating between anti-hero and hero for the last nine years, and I think we should probably finish with a heroic act. I said, “That sounds like a great plan. I’m in.” Will you be relieved to be able to stop pretending that you’re leaving forever?
It was a compromise because I didn’t want to be disingenuous to fans, but then of course, I didn’t want to give away the story. But yes, I’m very relieved that I can talk about it now.
I think most fans assumed you would be killed off, like others who have left the show. Are you concerned that some might feel like they’ve been hoodwinked?
It was a concern that we start saying one thing and people are anticipating a death, and we don’t give them that. You can’t please all people all of the time. That’s why I try to stay out of reading about things like that. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be able to get out of bed in the morning.
What can you say about the planned movies?
We talked about Unforgiven, the Clint Eastwood movie, which I admire greatly. There’s something about Eastwood, who he is as a gunslinger, as an iconic kind of American hero, rolling around in swill at the beginning of the movie. You know what he’s capable of, and I thought the idea of a character that the audience knows and has lived with — and who has oscillated between psycho and father for nine years — to start in a completely different place, was a really interesting, crazy place to begin. I want to know why we keep seeing helicopters flying around. What’s going on? What have the grown-ups been doing while
we’ve been scrambling around in the dirt?
You’ve talked about feeling afraid in the early days. How long did it take you to get past that?
I think by virtue of the story, it helped. You had an actor who was terrified, waking up into a zombie apocalypse. I’d just had a child, I’d had no sleep, so I looked perfect for it. Frank [Darabont, the original showrunner] was instrumental in trusting that I was doing the right thing. We had a very, very close relationship — I admire him enormously, and he’s a great friend. The DNA of the show was his, and continues to be his really.
Was it disappointing when he left? [Darabont was fired before the second season.]
Yes it was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to deal with professionally. And I made a deal then, because it’s his thing, that I would never really talk about it. But it was, yeah, as you can well imagine when the guy that gave you the gig was no longer captain of the ship. It was a very strange thing.
Was there a period of adjustment?
I think we’re still adjusting. Nine years. But Glen Mazzara stepped in and did an astonishing job. And then Scott Gimple came in and did an astonishing job. And now we’ve got Angela, and what she’s done in a relatively limited space is brilliant. I left it in a better place than I found it.
Have there been any twists or story points you didn’t agree with?
I regret Glenn going. Because Steven Yeun was such an important part of the rhythm of my years. If anything, it’s probably like being in a boy band — you only have each other as a reference point. And then they start taking them away from you.
What did you make of Glenn’s graphic end, with Negan bludgeoning him with the baseball bat until his eye bulged out of the socket?
I regret the manner in which it happened. We’ve been able to terrify people in film for 100 years without having to show an eyeball. When that happens, it diminishes what we’re trying to make, which in my mind’s eye is a family drama set in hell.
The violence is often extreme, though.
It is from time to time, with the zombies and the action sequences. I don’t discredit that. It’s part of the thrills of the show. But when we’re dealing with losing somebody — and a very brutal, human kind of death — I think it’s just taste. My taste is, I think it would be more disturbing just keeping the camera on Maggie’s face [Glenn’s wife, played by Lauren Cohan]. And maybe that’s why I want to direct, because I want to make what
I’ve been filming in my head.
Do you think The Walking Dead is an optimistic show?
That’s what
I’m gunning for. If we’re talking about being able to process and move through grief, and help each other, and unifying through a shared traumatic experience, then yes it is. And it’s also a story about people who have nothing in common, finding they have something in common.