The Reapers Attack in The Walking Dead’s Explosive Talked About Scene

One of the Reapers ambushes Maggie (Lauren Cohan) and Daryl (Norman Reedus) in the explosive talked about scene from Sunday’s extended Season 10 premiere of The Walking Dead. “Home Sweet Home” reveals there’s a pack of killers hunting Maggie’s people after razing the village where Maggie and son Hershel (Kien Michael Spiller) lived until recently with Cole (James Devoti) and Elijah (Okea Eme-Akwari), who are targeted by the same sniper that takes out five of Maggie’s friends. When Daryl and Kelly (Angel Theory) help her apprehend the lone Attacker (Mike Whinnet), he mutters a cryptic message to Maggie before blowing himself up: “Pope marked you.”

Who Pope is, or why this person has marked Maggie and her people, are revelations that are still to come when the Reapers return in future episodes of The Walking Dead.

“This Attacker they meet in the woods, we know that this is part of the backstory of what Maggie’s been up to up until this point. There’s a lot of clues there about who this person is, even though he’s mysterious and doesn’t say much,” showrunner Angela Kang said during Sunday’s Talking Dead. “But clearly [he] has a high level of training, is an excellent fighter — there’s a moment where he is shot with a bolt and he just snaps it off and keeps going — and this is one guy in the woods that takes out multiple people. He gets Maggie and Daryl, who are two of our strongest characters, into a bind in a really dangerous situation.”

When Maggie revealed pieces of that backstory to Daryl, she couldn’t bring herself to tell him everything about what happened during her years away on the road with the now-missing Georgie (Jayne Atkinson). But the past has come to haunt Maggie, who is left to question who marked her — and why.

“Maggie doesn’t know what that means, we don’t know what that means, but it’s really creepy,” said executive producer Denise Huth on the virtual Talking Dead. “I think it’s really interesting to see characters like Maggie, and Cole, and Elijah — they’re afraid. And for characters as strong and as good as fighters as they are, for them to be afraid, this is a whole other level of what they’re going to be up against.”

Huth teased, “And unfortunately, baddies never stay away. They always rear their ugly heads, so it’s probably only a matter of time before we’ll see a lot more of the Reapers.”

Follow the author @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for all things TWD. New episodes of The Walking Dead extended Season 10 premiere Sundays at 9 pm ET/8c on AMC.