If even a small portion of the rhetoric surrounding The Walking Dead season 8 holds true, then this year’s instalment will be talked about for years to come.
Coming out of the admittedly drab and lackluster seventh season, AMC quickly identified the areas in need of improvement, and we’ve learned from series showrunner Scott Gimple that season 8 will zip along at breakneck speed. Not only that, but it’ll bring a sense of closure to the all-encompassing war between Negan and Rick Grimes, which ought to negate any fears that AMC would milk the whole ‘Team Negan’ versus ‘Team Rick’ spiel for all it’s worth.
But with October 22nd fast approaching, NY Daily News (via ComicBook.com) caught up with both Andrew Lincoln and Jeffrey Dean Morgan to discuss The Walking Dead season 8, and it didn’t take long before the latter doubled down on Negan’s dark streak.
There’s a lot of blood this year. It’s gross. I don’t think I’ll forget this year because of how much fake blood I got on me… It doesn’t come out easily. There are too many nooks and crannies in the human body. And the blood finds them.
Elsewhere in the interview, Andrew Lincoln reaffirmed season 8’s accelerated pace, along with Rick’s fractured mindset. No mention of the hotly debated Old Man Rick scene, but it’s clear that Lincoln’s leader will want to exact his revenge on Negan over the course of the season.
We move quicker and cover more story per episode than we’ve ever done. The stunts, the explosions, the special effects have all jumped up a gear… I think that this season is a payoff to last year…It’s really cool to be reclaiming Rick who has been so demolished emotionally.
Expect The Walking Dead season 8 to premiere via AMC on Sunday, October 22nd. And when it does, it’ll kick off with the extended “Mercy,” which also has the honor of becoming the show’s historic 100th episode.
