‘The Walking Dead’ Season 6: Could Negan And The Wolves Be Connected?

UPDATE: The Wolves and the Saviors have been confirmed as not being related at all. This Inquisitr article explains how.

Comic book fans of AMC’s television version of The Walking Dead are starting to speculate that series bad guy, Negan, is set to appear in Season 6 of the show. Let’s have a look at the likelihood of that happening.

SPOILER ALERT: This article contains information about AMC’s The Walking Dead as well as the comic book series it is based on. Please proceed with caution if you are not currently up to date on both.

If television fans of The Walking Dead thought the Governor was horrible, or that the people at Terminus were beyond human, Negan will look like a fun walk in the park compared to the previous threats Rick’s gang has encountered during the previous five seasons of The Walking Dead. Negan, according to his description on Wikipedia is the following. And, for fans who have read the Walking Dead comics, this description is entirely accurate.

“Negan has a unique personality; a purer form of sociopathic typification than the Governor, who had psychotic tendencies and often engaged in emotional outbursts… Brutal, foul-mouthed and possessed of a twisted sense of humor, Negan carries a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire he named Lucille.”

Recently, a casting call went out for a character called Orin. While the name indicates it is not Negan, it is very common for AMC to use different names in their casting calls thanks to the unique prospect of spoiling upcoming seasons due to the fact fans can link the casting call names to actual events in the comic books series their version of The Walking Dead is based on. The description of a “physically imposing, charismatic, brutal, smart, ferocious, frightening, hilarious, inappropriate, oddly friendly, fun loving sociopath that is both a leader of men and a killer of men,” is a strong suggestion that Negan is on his way in season 6 of The Walking Dead. However, no official confirmation has been made to say whether this casting call is definitely Negan or not, but when TVLine asked Walking Dead showrunner, Scott M. Gimple about this casting call, he came up with the following answer.

“I can neither confirm nor deny. It’s not the worst guess in the world. It’s difficult to get around your logic here.”

Which is the closest thing fans will get to an answer short of Negan turning up in season 6 of The Walking Dead. Also interesting to note in the casting call is the fact this character is required for Episode 16 of season 6, meaning, if this is Negan, it could be a season 6 finale cliffhanger not unlike the way in which Michonne turned up in the season 2 finale of The Walking Dead.

In the comic books series of The Walking Dead, Negan is the leader of a group called the Saviors. While there has been absolutely no mention so far of this group in the television version of The Walking Dead, there is another group that has been mentioned in season 5; the Wolves. Could the Wolves, in fact, be the group that Negan is the head of? While it doesn’t seem likely when they are compared to each other, something interesting to note of late is the fact that there have been a few interviews popping up with Lauren Cohan (who plays Maggie Greene) in which she discusses the Wolves.

To TV fans of The Walking Dead, this makes no sense, but to the comic book fans, it is an interesting thing as they know that Maggie’s boyfriend, Glenn (played by Steven Yeun in the TV series), is killed by Negan. So, could these interviews offer some insight into the appearance of Negan in season 6 of The Walking Dead as well?

Recently, when E!Online asked Lauren Cohan about the Wolves, she said, “Like their name suggests, they are feral and they are heartless.” While it doesn’t really tie the group to Negan, it does suggest similar characteristic traits. “Unbelievably, they are actually humans, but there’s nothing human about their behavior, which is bad, bad news,” she followed up with.

In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Lauren described the Wolves as “the beginning of the end.” She also went on to explain that the Wolves will arrive at a time when the people of Alexandria are in a vulnerable position, which kind of sounds very similar to the way in which the Saviors and the Alexandrians first met in the comic book series.

“…The group is weakened. And it’s just at that moment when the Wolves come to attack us and it really does seem hopeless to protect the town from these guys.”

She also talked to E!Online of Maggie and Glenn’s relationship, stating that the couple will continue with a solid relationship into Season 6 of The Walking Dead. When the suggestion of Maggie falling pregnant in Season 6, however, she was cryptic in her answer; “[She and Glenn] stay in the moment and they take things one day at a time, but nothing’s off the table.” Of course, for comic books fans, the general consensus is that if Maggie falls pregnant to Glenn, then the potential is that Glenn will die at the hands of Negan, just like in the comic book series. In Season 4 of The Walking Dead TV series, there was talk of Maggie being pregnant that turned out to be unfounded, but it certainly laid the groundwork of a future pregnancy for this couple. Also by ways of future groundwork already laid is the image released in Season 5 of The Walking Dead. As Cinema Blend pointed out, one of the buildings has a remarkable resemblance to the industrial sanctuary that Negan’s group live in.

The Walking Dead returns to AMC with Season 6 on Sunday, October 11, 2015.

What do you think, will Negan show up in Season 6 of The Walking Dead? Let us know your thoughts by commenting below!

[Image credits: AMC]