Norman Reedus isn’t aware of plans to join Walking Dead co-star Andrew Lincoln on the big screen, saying the story of the Rick Grimes movie trilogy is “up in the air.” Reedus, who next appears in the 24-episode Final Season of The Walking Dead and the announced Daryl & Carol series with Melissa McBride, reveals he knows nothing about Lincoln’s feature film spin-off set in the years after Rick’s Season 9 disappearance from the flagship show. Speaking to ComicBook‘s Brandon Davis ahead of The Walking Dead Season 11 panel at virtual San Diego Comic-Con on Saturday, Reedus shared his hopes for a Daryl and Rick reunion on the big or small screen:
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“I don’t think anybody knows what’s going on with the movies now. I hear different answers from different groups,” Reedus said. “So I think it’s kind of still up in the air what the movie thing is going to be. I think it’s…changed perspective a couple of times. I don’t know anything about it. I’m just going to leave it at that.”
In Seasons 9 and 10, Daryl spends six-plus years searching for Rick’s body after his apparent death in a bridge explosion. Whenever or wherever it happens, Reedus said, “I want a Rick and Daryl reunion.”
“I don’t want it to be for nothing. I don’t want it to be cheap. I want it to be a real thing,” Reedus added, calling the brotherhood between Rick and Daryl “one of the most powerful relationships on the show, and for me personally, one of my most favorite relationships to play.”
TWD Universe chief content officer Scott Gimple, who oversees the franchise and scripts the movie trilogy with Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman, previously said of a Daryl-Rick reunion: “I can’t rule that out.”
“The kind of stories that we can tell, the canvas is getting much, much bigger,” Gimple said from Hall H at Comic-Con 2019. “The sky is the limit for The Walking Dead, and all of these characters are going to have rich stories, and we’re going to tell them in all sorts of ways.”
In 2018, Reedus and McBride each inked a rich three-year “franchise/universe” deal with AMC Networks allowing them to “move freely” throughout TWD Universe and appear in off-shoots of the main show, including films. By September 2020, AMC revealed Reedus and McBride would reunite with current Walking Dead showrunner Angela Kang for the road-show spin-off in the works for an expected 2023 premiere on the network.
The Walking Dead Season 11 premieres August 22 on AMC. Follow the author @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for all things TWD.