Fear the Walking Dead Might Have Killed Off a Fan-Favorite in "Welcome to the Club"

Sunday's Fear the Walking Dead suggests an unfur-tunate fate for Skidmark, the cat companion of owner Daniel Salazar (Rubén Blades). The Pioneers separated Daniel from his feline friend in last year's season finale, "End of the Line," when Virginia (Colby Minifie) ordered Morgan's (Lennie James) group of zombie apocalypse survivors be disbanded and dispersed across her western settlements. Some five or six weeks later, in "Welcome to the Club," Daniel is reunited with old friends Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey) and Victor Strand (Colman Domingo) inside the fortified town of Lawton, Oklahoma. The pair are surprised to see a domesticated Daniel kept on a figurative tight leash by Virginia, who makes use of the former barber under threat of catastrophic consequences.

When Alicia and Strand take notice of a bruised Daniel's uncharacteristically subdued demeanor, Virginia explains he was "just hellbent on getting that darn cat of his."

"Things got ugly because he wouldn't stand down when it didn't go his way," she says. "Everybody's gotta contribute. So just be grateful he still knows how to give a decent haircut, or he'd be cadaver chum right now."

Was Skidmark turned into cat-flavored Fancy Feast and fed to zombies? Daniel, seemingly amnesiac and traumatized from whatever happened since the separation, says he doesn't recognize Alicia or Strand and has no memory of Skidmark.

After bonding with Charlie (Alexa Nisenson) over an appreciation for the Traveling Wilburys, she presses Daniel about his forgotten boobytrap-disarming cat. Daniel can only ask if she's a friend of Ofelia (Mercedes Mason), the zombie-bitten daughter he put down in Season 3 episode "El Matadero."

It's not until Daniel ditches one of Virginia's Rangers outside Lawton that (spoilers) he drops the act. When a familiar face steps out of the darkness, Daniel recognizes him immediately: it's Morgan, and he could use a haircut.

Whether or not the cat clawed his way out of Virginia's clutches with some of his nine lives intact, Fear showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg are considering a Skidmark-focused episode for coming anthology spinoff Tales of the Walking Dead.

"A Skidmark the Cat episode does not necessarily need to be animated. We've had lots of Milo and Otis-style conversations for a while," Scott Gimple, executive producer of Fear and creator of Tales, said during this year's virtual New York Comic Con. "No, we have had serious conversations about a deeper dive into Skidmark."

Follow the author @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for all things The Walking Dead Universe. New episodes of Fear the Walking Dead premiere Sundays at 9 pm ET/8c on AMC.