‘Fear The Walking Dead’: Some Fans Think Madison Will Return as Alpha on ‘The Walking Dead’

Madison Clark’s mostly offscreen death in the Fear The Walking Dead season 4 mid-season finale has a subset of fans believing — or hoping — actress Kim Dickens could resurface as villain Alpha on flagship series The Walking Dead.

Before his exit at the end of season 3, Fear co-creator and original showrunner Dave Erickson originally intended for Madison to be the last woman standing — and for the series to culminate with the mother of two emerging as a “full-on villain.”

“For me, Madison,” Erickson told THR last October when asked who would have lived through his version of the series finale.

“The thing that’s interesting to me, and one of the questions I asked myself and asked [co-creator] Robert Kirkman very early on was of the people in our group, who do you see becoming the Governor? Of our group, who could become a Negan? That’s interesting to me, to watch an evolution of a character and start with them as a hero, and bleed that into antihero, and bleed that into full-on villain. It would have been interesting. In terms of the final conflict within the family, it would have been key. For me, there’s a lot left for Madison specifically.”

In Sunday’s mid-season finale, ‘No One’s Gone,’ Madison ultimately went out a hero when she lit a flare and used it to lure a horde of invading walkers away from her fleeing comrades, namely children Nick (Frank Dillane) and Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey).

The episode also revealed what caused Madison’s shift in character: it was a run-in with Althea (Maggie Grace) that ultimately renewed hope in Madison, inspiring her to foster a community within the walls of a Texas baseball stadium.

When asked by ComicBook.com in November if she would like to play Alpha, Dickens offered an excited “yeah” before telling us she was “up for anything.”

“Ask my old showrunner [Erickson], I’m game for anything,” Dickens said. “Anything he wanted to me do!”

Dickens, who admitted she was “heartbroken” and “devastated” to learn Madison would be killed off halfway through season 4, said that was the direction the showrunners wanted to take this newest season — the first time the spinoff series would crossover with The Walking Dead.

In Robert Kirkman’s ongoing comic books, Alpha was a bald-headed villainess and leader of the Whisperers, a pack of savage nomads who move freely among the dead by wearing the skins of walkers as camouflage.

Because Madison’s death wasn’t fully shown — the camera burned up in a flash as walkers closed in and Madison set fire to nearby grass — some fans are theorizing Madison could somehow reemerge as Alpha and menace the survivors of The Walking Dead.

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Fear The Walking Dead returns with its mid-season premiere Sunday, August 12 on AMC.