Norman Reedus Promises Daryl and Carol Will Reunite: “Their Journey’s Not Over”

The end of The Walking Dead is not the end of Daryl and Carol. In September 2020, AMC announced that longtime Walking Dead co-stars Norman Reedus and Melissa McBride would return in a spinoff following the eleventh and final season of the flagship series. The series, co-created by showrunner Angela Kang and TWD Universe chief content officer Scott M. Gimple, would follow the friends on a road trip through the walker apocalypse. But in April, McBride dropped out of the Daryl & Carol show, which will now film and take place in France with Reedus riding solo as Daryl Dixon.

But Daryl won’t be going it alone for long. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Reedus confirmed the fan-favorite characters would reunite somewhere down the road. 

“Their journey’s not over,” Reedus said. “They will meet down the road. You can pretty much bet all your money. I read all these people whining about it, and I have to just keep my mouth shut, but there will be a lot of foots in a lot of mouths at some point.”

Reedus and McBride’s co-star Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who plays Negan, called out “toxic” Walking Dead fans who blamed Reedus for McBride’s exit from the spinoff series set to launch in 2023. 

“Attacking norm for crap he has NOTHING to do with? Melissa made a call that was hers alone. She wants/needs a break. Respect that,” Morgan tweeted in April. “Factors involved that are nobody’s business. Norm, who’s given more than anyone to you all. Just SHITTY.” In a follow-up tweet, Morgan added, “Nobody [was] more gutted at Melissa’s decision than norman. Rumors aren’t from crew. They’re from some asshat who’s never seen a set before. I was there. It was hard on both of them because they do love each other. Y’all make assumptions that are really hurtful. Stop it.”

In May, Reedus explained McBride is “taking time off” after The Walking Dead wraps up its eleven-season run. 

“Twelve years [of The Walking Dead] is a grueling schedule, and she wanted to take some time off,” Reedus said on The Tonight Show. “So she’s doing that, and she deserves it.” In the meantime, Daryl will embark on a mission overseas against the “Variant” walkers seen on The Walking Dead: World Beyond. 

Kang, who has served as showrunner of The Walking Dead since Season 9, exited the untitled Daryl and Carol spinoff shortly following McBride’s departure. The network said in a statement that McBride is “no longer able to participate” in the spinoff as “relocating to Europe became logistically untenable for Melissa at this time,” adding: “We very much hope to see Carol again in the near future.” 

Asked about Carol’s future in her first interview since dropping out of the Daryl/Carol spinoff, McBride told EW, “I feel like Carol has more story to tell. I’ll leave it at that. I think she’s got some more story.”

The untitled Daryl Dixon spinoff is expected to premiere in 2023 on AMC, joining a lineup that includes The Walking Dead: Dead City (starring Lauren Cohan’s Maggie and Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s Negan) and the as-yet-untitled Rick/Michonne spinoff (starring Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira). 

The Walking Dead: The Last Episodes begin airing Sunday, October 2 on AMC and AMC+. 

Follow @CameronBonomolo and @NewsOfTheDead on Twitter for TWD Universe coverage all season long.