The Walking Dead Fans Shocked by Major Death

The Walking Dead fans react to the latest major casualty to reach the zombie drama in Sunday's 1012, "Walk With Us." Set after the Whisperers' attack that left the Hilltop in ruins and its survivors scattered, "Walk With Us" finds Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) tasked with gathering "guardians" — Alpha's (Samantha Morton) given name for the undead — when he comes across Alpha's daughter Lydia (Cassady McClincy), who swears she'll "never walk with" the Whisperers. Promising to deliver her to Alpha, who aims to "free" herself and her daughter through death, Negan marches Alpha to a shed holding the captured Lydia — when she finds it empty, she realizes too late she's been betrayed.

Negan then slices Alpha's throat, killing her. Meeting with the culprit who freed him from jail, Negan dumps out Alpha's decapitated head. "Took you long enough," says Carol (Melissa McBride), finally winning her vengeance against the woman who murdered her son.

The death is pulled almost exactly from the comic books, where Negan similarly gains Alpha's trust before murdering her and claiming her decapitated head. He then presents her head to Rick Grimes, a scene remixed for the show.

Alpha's death is one of the rare instances where a character on the television show receives a matching fate from the comic book.

"In the 8 years I've been writing for The Walking Dead, character deaths on the show have rarely matched their fates in the comic," showrunner Angela Kang previously told Deadline. "There are many reasons for that: the divergences in story on the show may lead to different outcomes for characters, we want to keep things fresh and surprising for our fans who are readers of the books, and there are sometimes other special circumstances which we rarely discuss publicly."