One year after Carl Grimes revealed a fatal walker bite, former The Walking Dead star Chandler Riggs has made peace with moving on.
“It wasn’t just Carl dying, it was also me leaving the show and kind of moving on to other things,” Riggs said at San Jose Fan Fest when asked about filming his death scene, which came after a tearful goodbye to parents Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) and Michonne (Danai Gurira).
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“So in many ways it was pretty symbolic just for the cast and crew, just for me to be leaving the show in the first place, it was a pretty big deal for all of us. And yeah, it sucked, and it was many long days, but I’m really happy with how it turned out and I’m really happy with my performances and I’m happy with how I left the show.”
The 19-year-old actor has since established a music career, relocating to Los Angeles and producing electronic music under the handle ‘Eclipse.’
Being killed off the show after nearly eight full seasons “opened up so many doors to so many more opportunities,” Riggs added.
“Over the last year I’ve just spent a ton of time refining my craft and my acting, and I’m so excited to go on and do more projects where I can really showcase what I can do.”
On watching The Walking Dead after being off the show, Riggs admitted it was “kind of weird at first, not really knowing what’s gonna happen.”
“But I kind of like it because it’s interesting not knowing what’s gonna happen every week and kind of being in it with you guys, it’s kind of fun and speculating and guessing on what’s gonna happen, it’s a lot of fun,” he said. “It’s cool, I like it.”
Riggs previously said it would have been “really interesting” to have explored Carl without the elder Grimes, who has since departed the show for good in favor of an in-the-works TV movie trilogy.
“I was actually really excited for the rest of Carl’s story arcs,” Riggs said of taking on his comic book counterpart’s comic book storylines. “But it will be interesting to see what they fill that gap with.”
The Walking Dead Season Nine returns with new episodes Sunday, February 10 on AMC.
