‘The Walking Dead’s Norman Reedus Explains Why Daryl Can Say Things to Rick That Others Can’t

Daryl Dixon star Norman Reedus says his real life brotherly bond and exclusive rapport with Rick Grimes star Andrew Lincoln allows the characters to clash in ways others can't.

"Andy and I are always on the same page on a lot of stuff. We've been doing this a long time together, we shared a trailer for a decade," Reedus said on Talking Dead.

"Like Andy in real life, I, Norman, can say things to Andy that other people can't say 'cause it's crossing a line. But 'cause we're like brothers in real life, I can be like, 'Yo, you're such an a—hole, and this is what you did.' And he'll be like, 'I did?' And he'll do the same thing to me. But if someone else said that to me, I'd be like, 'I'm gonna kill you right now.'"

A schism has developed between Daryl and Rick after the Alexandria leader made the unilateral decision to spare the life of former Savior leader Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), leading to Rick's attempt to integrate the former enemy camp into the new beginning now being cultivated by the coalition of survivors.

Daryl has since aired his grievances with Rick's misguided leadership, and their relationship will come to a boil in Sunday's episode, "The Obliged," as Rick tries to intercept Maggie (Lauren Cohan) from reaching Alexandria to unsheathe her wrath on the jailed Negan.

"He and I can do that as characters as well, which is a lot of the voice that Daryl's now having. A lot of that is, 'You're not listening to me. You're blinded by this, you're blinded by that.' Which has been a running theme for a couple years," Reedus said.

"I haven't said much the last two years of the show, so I'm much more tired than I was last year already. But it's great, it's really, really good."

Reedus previously equated the cracked relationship between Daryl and Rick to that of a bone fracture, saying the widening divide has "been a slow fracture for a while now."

"And it's sort of built up to a tension," Reedus told EW. "The interesting part about that is, that fracture and that bone that's been slightly breaking for a long time, when it snaps, it actually opens up the doors to heal itself."

The Walking Dead 904, "The Obliged" — Rick's penultimate episode of the series — premieres tonight at 9/8c on AMC.