‘The Walking Dead’ Recreates Comic Moment in Mid-Season 9 Premiere

The Walking Dead recreated a moment from the comics in its Mid-Season Nine premiere on Sunday night.

While the AMC series has made some strong deviations from its comic book source material, moments of blatant homage to Robert Kirkman’s original work still pop in from time to time. Now, in Episode 9×09, a tribute to the cover of The Walking Dead issue #135 has recreated a moment where Lydia is interrogated. In the books it was Maggie and Jesus who stood beside Lydia, asking her questions about the Whisperers. On the TV series, it was Tara and Michonne. While the characters had to be rearranged because Maggie and Jesus are not around anymore, the framing of the moment was nearly identical.

Check out the comparison of The Walking Dead issue #135’s cover and a scene from Episode 9×09 of the AMC show in the tweet from Skybound’s Twitter account below!

Though the series is barred from recreating moments from the comics with certain characters, showrunner Angela Kang is proud to be recreating certain story beats as a major fan of the source material.

“The Whisperers story in the comic is one of my favorites from the comic,” Kang told ComicBook.com. “That storyline was coming out in the comics as I was working on the show. We were literally reading – we get the individual issues in the office and we were reading them and were like, ‘What is he doing? What’s happening? What’s happening?’ We were literally, ‘What’s happening? Could this be it?’”

Of course, she is fully aware of the inevitable deviations which have also been a part of the show all along the way. “I think because the array of characters we have on the show is so different from the array in the comic,” Kang said. “And then we have characters like Daryl, who never existed in the comic. It’s always little bit of – there’s going to be some story that is not the comics because it can’t be. But at the same time I think the comic has served us very very well as being the spine of the series. It differentiates us from the Fear The Walking Dead which is its own story completely.”

The Walking Dead airs Sundays at 9 pm ET. Fear the Walking Dead will return for its fifth season in 2019. For complete coverage and insider info all year long, follow @BrandonDavisBD on Twitter and watch ComicBook.com’s After The Dead each Sunday night following new episodes.