The Walking Dead: Lance Hornsby’s Fate Revealed

Warning: this story contains spoilers for The Walking Dead Season 11 Episode 20. With the flip of a coin, Lance Hornsby (Josh Hamilton) decided the fates of Oceanside, Hilltop, and Alexandria. But on Sunday’s episode, titled “What’s Been Lost,” it was Daryl (Norman Reedus) and Carol (Melissa McBride) who determined the fate of the Commonwealth Deputy Governor ousted by Governor Pamela Milton (Laila Robins). Carol cut a backroom deal to throw Hornsby under the bus for the crimes of the governor’s spoiled rotten son, Sebastian Milton (Teo Rapp-Olsson), jailing Hornsby for the dozens of Commonwealth citizens he disappeared without a trace.

But that deal went out the window when Eugene (Josh McDermitt) caused the accidental death of Sebastian to save girlfriend Max (Margot Bingham), whose secretly taped recording exposed Sebastian just before Hornsby’s spies unleashed zombified Commonwealth workers on the Founders Day crowd. With Eugene facing trial for Sebastian’s death, Pamela ordered Daryl, Carol, and their friends rounded up and disappeared from the Commonwealth.

The Walking Dead Season 11 Episode 20 Recap

Daryl and Carol’s only option to find their friends was to bust out Hornsby, who knows all the “dark sh-t” that goes on inside the Commonwealth’s walls — and how to get out of the city. Pursued by the Commonwealth’s army, Hornsby led the way to a supply train that would take the three of them to Daryl and Carol’s people. Only they didn’t need Hornsby anymore.

“I helped build the Commonwealth. Together, we can make it better. A place where everyone can truly have a shot,” Hornsby said, trying to talk his way out of a dead end. “I can see the campaign for it: ‘Here, you aren’t defined by who you were but what you can become.’ It’ll signal a new day has come, a new age where everyone, all of us, can start again.”

“Not everyone,” Daryl told him. “Not you.” Daryl and Carol would give him a chance to run, but that would be all he gets: a chance.

“I won’t make it out here,” Hornsby stammered.
“Good,” Daryl grunted. Said Carol: “You’re a smart guy, Lance. You might survive.” 50-50 chance, like two sides of a coin.

Hornsby seemed to accept his fate as an exile of the Commonwealth, only to suddenly lunge for a trooper’s gun he turned on Carol and Daryl. Carol then fired an arrow through Hornsby’s neck, leaving him to choke on his blood and die in the dirt outside the Commonwealth’s walls.

Lance Hornsby Death, Explained

“Carol completely believes that Hornsby’s just playing games and is trying to get in with her. She thinks he talks too much and she thinks he’s full of sh-t,” showrunner Angela Kang explained on AMC+’s The Walking Dead: Episode Insider. “I think the truth is more complicated. I think he believes the things he’s saying. I really do. He is not just pure, mustache-twirling evil. I do think [that] he thinks that there should be some thought towards the future. It’s just that the methods he’s willing to use to get there are not the same methods that maybe our heroes would choose to use.”

Ultimately, Hornsby foreshadowed his own death. As he told Carol after the jailbreak: “You’re always thinking 10 steps ahead.”

“Carol and Daryl give him this chance to walk away, because in some ways, they feel a little sorry for him. And I do think that they see that there are times where he has tried to do the right thing,” Kang said. “However, as he walks away, they’re both thinking, ‘This idiot’s gonna turn around and try to do something.’ And it’s almost like they’re waiting for that to happen. That’s really how we kind of tone the scene.”

Kang added: “Carol completely is ready for him to turn around and try something.”

Follow @CameronBonomolo and @NewsOfTheDead on Twitter for TWD Universe coverage all season long. New episodes of The Walking Dead‘s final season premiere Sundays on AMC and AMC+.