Kim Dickens Returns for Fear the Walking Dead Seasons 7 and 8

No one’s gone until they’re gone: Kim Dickens will return as Madison Clark on Fear the Walking Dead. Gone from the Walking Dead Universe since Madison’s apparent death in the Season 4 midseason finale in 2018, Dickens is confirmed to make her first appearance when The Walking Dead spinoff’s second half of Season 7 airs April 2022 on AMC. Revealing Madison’s return live on Talking Dead following Sunday’s midseason finale, “Padre,” AMC Networks also announced Dickens continues as a series regular in an officially renewed Season 8 of Fear the Walking Dead.

“If there were a Mt. Deadmore, Kim Dickens’ face would be on it. Madison Clark is a foundational character to TWDU — heroic, complex, an everyperson who becomes a warrior and then a force of benevolence,” said Scott M. Gimple, Chief Content Officer of AMC’s The Walking Dead Universe. “Kim Dickens’ raw talent, strength, and brilliance will electrify TWDU once more and we couldn’t be luckier to have her back.”

Dickens’ unexpected exit as the leading character was in Fear‘s fourth season episode “No One’s Gone,” the midway point of a revamped season installing Morgan Jones (Lennie James) as series lead in a crossover with The Walking Dead. 

Madison appeared to die in a fiery blaze saving children Nick (Frank Dillane) and Alicia Clark (Alycia Debnam-Carey), her sacrificial last stand happening inside the walls of a stadium overrun by walkers.

Madison’s fate was confirmed at the time by showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg, the duo who took over from original showrunner and series co-creator Dave Erickson in Season 4. Erickson envisioned Madison’s evolution into a villain through Season 7, but it was a “story decision” by Chambliss and Goldberg that killed off Madison Clark midway through the fourth season of Fear the Walking Dead. 

Dickens did not ask to be written out of Fear and was “devastated” to learn Season 4 hinged on an already-made decision: Madison’s death. Like Madison’s message of “no one’s gone” to her children, Dickens later hinted her character could return because the apparent death occurred off-screen. 

After Alicia in Season 6 reunited with survivors of the stadium fire (Season 4’s recurring Sebastian Sozzi, Rhoda Griffis, and Kenneth Wayne Bradley) thought killed in “No One’s Gone,” Chambliss and Goldberg teased of Madison, “We never saw her body. And Madison herself said, ‘No one’s gone until they’re gone.’”

Fear the Walking Dead Season 7 returns Sunday, April 17, on AMC. Follow the author @CameronBonomolo on Twitter and ComicBook’s @NewsOfTheDead for TWD Universe coverage all season long.