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‘The Walking Dead’ Season 7 Spoilers: Scott Gimple Says Don’t Expect Show To Be Comics

By Nick Younker
Published on: 09:06 PST, Sep 3, 2016

The Walking Dead Season 7 is just around the corner, coming up with an October release for the massive AMC show. There is a good chance that the whole nation, or at least the entire viewing audience, will be tuning in to that first episode of Season 7 of The Walking Dead, considering how Season 6 left off with the biggest cliffhanger since Dallas fans wanted to know who shot J.R.

But the biggest difference between The Walking Dead and Dallas is that there is a source material for potential spoilers, and that is The Walking Dead comic books for which the show is based on. Producers of the show are very aware that The Walking Dead AMC show could be spoiled by the comic book and fans everywhere could drop off from their viewing audience if they do things just like they did in the comics. So that means The Walking Dead showrunner, Scott Gimple, has his work cut out for him to develop content for the show that shares the spirit and creative direction of The Walking Dead comic book by creator Robert Kirkman, yet still make it surprising enough that fans would never see the events coming.

That is where the big cliffhanger comes in, riding the coattails of Season 6 of The Walking Dead. Now, Gimple, Kirkman and the entire Walking Dead crew have to find some way to make it work for the audience and still deliver an enormous blow without fans getting spoiled.

In The Walking Dead comic book, Glenn is the one who died at the hands of Negan. But according to Scott Gimple, via an interview with Entertainment Weekly, the show is not going to duplicate the comic book, but it will still remain in the same universe as.

“It was all about expectations,” The Walking Dead showrunner Scott Gimple told Entertainment Weekly. “People were like, ‘Oh, well, here’s what happens when Negan arrives on the scene.’ And the expectation was, ‘Oh, it’ll be this way and that’s the way it should be and that’s the way it is in my head.’ And I understand that. But it’s also a question of trying to do things that fulfill the spirit of the story and the spirit of the comic, without it being exactly the [same as the] comic.”

One thing that is especially true about The Walking Dead is that it is by far the biggest show on television. It also seems weird because The Walking Dead had three things working against it upfront.

First of all, it is a cable television show. Historically, cable TV shows are much lower rated than broadcast TV shows from the Big 4 (NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox). Next, there is that whole “horror TV” thing that used to hold many shows back from big ratings. But the biggest thing that The Walking Dead had going against it is was that it originated from a serialized comic book that had spoilers all over the place and could have turned viewers off from the surprise factor.

But Scott Gimple rose to that challenge for The Walking Dead, following the game plan laid out in the beginning by famed Hollywood producer/director, Frank Darabont.

“I feel some of the [Walking Dead comic book] readers were like, ‘Oh, this is going to happen, this is exactly what it is.’ And we wanted to give them a new experience, and to give them an experience of suspense and fear, because they don’t know what’s going to happen.” Scott Gimple said. “What’s actually happening on the show to characters… we want them to feel it. We want them to be surprised.”

The Walking Dead returns to AMC on October 23.

[Image via AMC]

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