‘The Walking Dead’: Alpha Actress Samantha Morton Isn’t Playing a Villain

The Walking Dead newcomer Samantha Morton doesn’t see Whisperers leader Alpha as a villain.

“To me, I don’t see that I’m playing a villain at all. I’m playing somebody with absolute determination and conviction in her beliefs, and in a way, almost kind of evangelical with it,” Morton tells EW in her first Walking Dead interview.

“And I think her opinions and her beliefs about how society should be — to her, they’re no-brainer. It doesn’t make any sense to go back to the way things were. It doesn’t make any sense, you know? The future that we have should be the way she sees it, and so I see her as an incredibly powerful, awe-inspiring woman, with so much courage and strength and love, weirdly. But it’s how she shows that love is not as we would expect anyone to.”

Alpha is the mask-clad pretend walker introduced in the closing moments of Sunday’s mid-season premiere, who captured an unsuspecting Alden (Callan McAuliffe) and Luke (Dan Fogler) by producing a shotgun and an equally dangerous warning: “Trail ends here.”

Though comic book readers are familiar with Alpha’s heinous acts ahead, the vicious Whisperer leader doesn’t consider herself a villain, and as Morton tells it, “I’m not playing in mind that she’s a villain.”

“She doesn’t think she’s a villain. Just don’t mess with her. You know? You look at lots of politicians all over the world right now, and war, and how things happen, and how things can escalate, and I think she’s just incredibly strong minded,” she says.

“I haven’t played any scenes whereby it’s about pleasure, and I think that when you look at psychopaths, they get pleasure from their actions, whereas Alpha, it is just what this is about. She is leading an army, and she’s clever, and if somebody crosses her, then it’s different.”

Director Greg Nicotero, who helmed the Season Nine return premiere and Alpha’s introduction, said previously Morton’s performance is “chilling” and promised one scene revolving around Alpha is “one of the best scenes we shot all season.”

Sunday’s episode, ‘Omega,’ will unmask Alpha and act as an origin tale for her and daughter Lydia (Cassady McClincy), the captured Whisperer currently jailed at Hilltop.

“How many women get to play a badass like this? How many women get to do these parts? They just don’t exist,” Morton says of this newest formidable foe to reach The Walking Dead.

“So you think of the comics, and what [creator] Robert Kirkman’s done in making this character, it’s a dream come true. I often look at films, some really good films in the male parts, and I go, ‘Oh, Dirty Harry. I’d love to play Dirty Harry,’ but obviously he’s amazing, and those films are whatever, but it’s very rare that the women get to take that on. That they get that responsibility.”

The Walking Dead Season Nine premieres new episodes Sundays at 9/8c on AMC.