The Walking Dead’s Most Shocking Scene: Comics to Screen Comparison

Warning: Spoilers ahead for tonight’s season finale of AMC’s The Walking Dead, titled “A.”

The most potentially-controversial scene in The Walking Dead‘s history aired tonight (for the second time in three weeks, yes) — one that even star Andrew Lincoln expressed reservations about.Of course, Lincoln admitted in Talking Dead tonight that he had no idea the scene was lifted almost completely from the comic book source material by Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard.How closely were the two taken? Well, check it out:The scene starts with “you f—ed up” in the comics, and the more TV-friendly “you screwed up” in “A.”Of course, in the TV series, they were talking to Rick, whom they blame for the death of Lou (the Marauder he had to strangle in order to escape in “Claimed,” and then left on the bathroom floor to reanimate and distract the rest of the group). In the comics, they were talking to Abraham.As a refresher for TV-only viewers, Abraham’s introdution to the group was a bit earlier and went a little differently in the comics. During this sequence, the group was intact but Rick, Carl and Abraham were going on an overnight supply run to Rick’s hometown, so that he could raid the armory and such. Some of that happened in “Clear,” the episode where Rick, Carl and Michonne returned to Cynthiana (the hometown), met up with Morgan and took most of his armory to face off against The Governor in Season Three.Some of those same guns, come to think of it, are probably the ones currently in a gym bag not far from Terminus. But that’s getting way ahead of myself.Anyway, in The Walking Dead #57, Marauders (here an unnamed group of street toughs who manage to catch Abraham off-guard, not anyone with a legitimate beef against Rick…and certainly not anybody we’ve spent a few issues following like we did with the Claimers) sneak up on the El Camino where Rick and Carl are sleeping while Abraham keeps watch.