The Walking Dead's Josh McDermitt: "In Your Face, Football"

In its fifth season, The Walking Dead continues to be a colossal hit beating even Sunday Night Football in the ratings.

None could be more happier about that than Josh McDermitt who plays Dr. Eugene Porter on the popular AMC series.

"That's supposed to be the premiere game of the week and The Walking Dead is beating it," McDermitt said in a recent interview with Access Hollywood. "It's a little bit of justice for me just because I kind of rode the bench when I played football, so I'm kind of like, 'Yeah! In your face, football.'"

McDermitt explained that he and fellow cast-mates stay focused on the work at hand.

"Honestly, we don't really talk about it that much," he said. "We think it's great and we'll get an e-mail from one of our executive producers saying, 'Oh my gosh, you guys, you're shattering records!' and we're like, 'Wow this is awesome,' but like you said, we have so much work to do, it's the last thing on our mind," he continued. "We're not doing it for the ratings, we're not doing it to try and boost the visibility of the show… That's awesome, we love it, but really we don't pay attention to it. If we did, the show would suck."

When asked why he believes the show is so popular, McDermitt revealed he had a few theories.

"We do talk about kind of why it's a popular show, and I don't think anyone knows," he said. "We all have theories, but at the end of the day I think we just got lucky. We're putting together a show that people love. It's got the human element to it. It's not just a show about zombies. I was a huge fan of the show, but I'm not a fan of the horror genre, and zombies especially, because I get scared, but I watched this show because it wasn't about zombies, it was about survival and the biggest threat is your fellow human. So there's that."

McDermitt added, "It's a very emotional show. It's very intense. It's just very real. It feels like it could happen, and I think that's what people kind of identify with, not just people who love the zombie genre, but just people who don't are gravitating towards the show."