The Walking Dead Season 10 Finale Ends the Whisperer War With Major Death

The Walking Dead silences the Whisperers in its Season 10 finale, "A Certain Doom," where villain Beta (Ryan Hurst) engages the final battle of the Whisperer War. Hellbent on revenge after the death of leader Alpha (Samantha Morton), who was murdered days earlier by Whisperer mole Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), Beta unleashes Alpha's walker horde on the survivors taking refuge in an abandoned hospital tower. Surrounded with no way out but to go through the ocean of the dead, a group of camouflaged heroes infiltrates the zombie swarm before Daryl (Norman Reedus) has his long-awaited rematch with Beta after escaping a near-fatal fight in Season 9.

Luring away a portion of the horde with a booming distraction to the tune of "Burning Down the House" by Talking Heads, the guts-covered heroes turn to fightin' fire with fire by slipping through the horde and picking off Whisperers. When Beta catches a glimpse of what appears to be Alpha — actually her disowned daughter Lydia (Cassady McClincy) — it's enough of a distraction for a masked Negan to set off Beta with a well-placed taunt.

The rage-fueled behemoth pins Negan but is blocked by a slash from Daryl, who plunges his pair of knives into Beta's eyes. A whisper turns into a scream, and Beta gives himself away to the walker horde that quickly devours him.

Embraced by his flock of "guardians," haunting memories from the past and the Whisperer pledge echo in Beta's mind: "We walk in darkness. We are free. We bathe in blood. We are free. We love nothing. We are free. We fear nothing. We are free … We embrace all death. … Now is the end of the world. We are the end of the world."

As clawing walkers tear away the fleshy mask that he never removes, exposing his real face for the first and last time, a euphoric Beta disappears into the zombie horde.

"Shit," says a surprised Negan. "You know who that asshole was?" Daryl growls back, "Yeah. Nobody."

Earlier episodes peeled back the nameless Beta's mask when revealing him as a famed country music performer. In the comic books, where Beta dies attacking Aaron and Jesus, the survivors recognize Beta as a famous professional basketball player.

After taking a peek at Beta early in the apocalypse in Season 10 Episode 2, "We Are the End of the World," Hurst hinted upcoming anthology series Tales of the Walking Dead would fully unmask Beta's traumatic origin story.

The Walking Dead returns with six new episodes in early 2021 on AMC. For all things TWD, follow the author @CameronBonomolo on Twitter.