There’s only one episode of “The Walking Dead” left, then it’s over. The 23rd episode from season 11 now hints at another possibility for a Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) return – which may not please all fans…
After twelve years and eleven seasons, the finale of “The Walking Dead” is actually within reach. In one week’s time, the 177th and final episode of the long-running zombie series will hit the screens. And the fact that we are on the home stretch is also made clear by the recently released 23rd episode of season 11, in which events are already coming to a highly dramatic head.
Pretty much all of the “Walking Dead” main characters have infiltrated the Commonwealth to save their children and overthrow the government of Governor Pamela Milton (Laila Robins), which is built on lies and injustice. But just shortly after arriving in town, there is a real shock moment: Rick’s daughter Judith (Cailey Fleming) pushes Maggie (Lauren Cohan) to safety during a firefight and is thus shot herself.
Daryl (Norman Reedus) and the others then desperately make their way through the Commonwealth streets overrun with soldiers and soon (climbing) zombies to carry the badly injured Judith to the hospital. In the final scene of the episode, the delirious Judith then utters a weak “Daddy?” on Daryl’s arm, her fate still left open.
DOES JUDITH REALLY SEE RICK?
The fact that Judith is talking about Rick here naturally makes “Walking Dead” fans prick up their ears, especially since the camera lingers for an unusually long time after the “Daddy” statement on the zombie horde that Daryl and she have just left behind. So is Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) actually hiding somewhere in the midst of the undead, rushing to the rescue? That is rather unlikely.
It will rather be the case that Judith, in her almost unconscious state, briefly believes Daryl, who holds her protectively and caringly in her arms, to be her father – and not entirely without reason, after all, the taciturn survival artist has helped look after Judith since her birth and has finally become a father figure for the girl after Rick’s supposed demise.
This is exactly how “The Walking Dead” showrunner Angela Kang explains the “Daddy” moment in an interview with the website TVLine, referring to the fact that Judith has been thinking about a possible reunion with her father and foster mother Michonne (Danai Gurira) all along anyway.
But even if this takes the wind out of the sails of a potential Rick Grimes comeback in said moment, the scene could already hint that and how we might see the former “Walking Dead” standout again in the big finale…
RICK ONLY AS HALLUCINATION IN “WALKING DEAD” FINALE?
há doze anos daryl dixon fazia sua primeira aparição em the walking dead, desde então se tornou não apenas um dos maiores personagens da série, mas também um dos mais queridos da televisão. pic.twitter.com/z4bDwYeEr0
– jão | 6 days to the end (@favssreedus) November 14, 2022
The Walking Dead is really ending next week. My favorite show for the last 12 years of my life is really about to end forever. ITS NOT FAIR… pic.twitter.com/9WIH3xcK94
– THE DOOR IS CLOSED!!! 🤌 (@__RahRah__) November 13, 2022
With the impending end of “The Walking Dead,” numerous fans are hoping that Rick, who was eliminated at the beginning of Season 9, will reappear in the very last episode of the series he once made such an impact on.
While some are hoping for the theory to come true that Rick could rush to the rescue of the Commonwealth and his former friends as part of a strike force of the Civic Republic Military (CRM), which featured prominently in the spin-off “The Walking Dead: World Beyond”, the Judith incident now opens up a completely different possibility for the comeback.
After the little fighter apparently already saw her father in front of her at the end of the current episode, it could be conceivable that we will get to see how she actually imagines him in her fight for survival in the next episode. Rick himself had a similar experience during his near-death experience in season 9, when he met his already deceased companions Shane (Jon Bernthal), Glenn (Steven Yeun) and Hershel (Scott Wilson) again in his dreams.
And who knows: Maybe Judith’s biological mother Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies) and her brother Carl (Chandler Riggs) will also be brought back temporarily this way. Something like that would be fitting for the end of the series, even if it would be a bit disappointing, at least in the case of Rick, if he only appears again as a figment of his imagination at the end.
The fact that the “Walking Dead” executives are taking such a route for the hoped-for Rick return doesn’t seem so unlikely either, since this way they wouldn’t get in the way of the narrative of the planned spin-off miniseries about Rick and Michonne. But of course, even with a Rick hallucination, it’s not impossible that the ex-cop will drop by in real life – but it’s possible that this will only be the case at the very end or even in a post-credit scene as a teaser for the aforementioned spin-off.
We’ll be smarter in a week’s time: The last episode of “The Walking Dead” will be released here on 21 November 2022 on Disney+ and ProSieben Fun. Viewers can then look forward to an extra-long episode for the finale, which will be a full 60 minutes long instead of the usual 45 minutes.
