‘Fear The Walking Dead’ Showrunners On Whether Alicia Will Return: “Definitely Something We Will Pay Off”

Fear the Walking Dead is back for its final run of episodes. And spoilers for tonight’s episode “Anton,” but it’s clear the series is bringing together a lot of threads… Most notably teasing that returning villain Troy (Daniel Sharman) may have killed Alicia Clark (Alycia Debnam-Carey), took her bone-arm off, and she’s out there wandering around as a walker.

So, will we see Debnam-Carey back — in some form — in these final six episodes?

“Let’s just say… what happened to Alicia is definitely something that we will pay off,” teased Fear co-showrunner Ian Goldberg to Decider.

For more on the episode from Goldberg and fellow showrunner Andrew Chambliss, including Victor Strand’s (Colman Domingo) new look, read on.

Decider: I know Colman is always very involved in things… Was it his choice to spend most of the episodes speaking in German?

Andrew Chambliss: [Laughs] No, we had that story element kind of from the inception of the episode. But he was involved early on, because we called him up and we said, “How’s your German?” And he very quickly started taking German lessons and working with a coach. We got him an early draft of the script so he could start learning it because it was a tall order to ask him to do an entire episode in a language he wasn’t that familiar with. And on top of that, he has to act and emote. He did all that amazingly. And he really worked hard to pull it off. So we’re very grateful. But he had a lot of fun doing it. And he had a lot of fun diving into creating a new persona. He actually is the one who came to us with the new hair. He sent us a photo and said “what do you think about this for Victor?” And so he really helped kind of craft some of the additional elements as well.

Over the course of the episode, we started in a place where it really feels like him trying to reconnect with the past, the hotel, and having a happy family… And by the end we have– I almost felt like it was an amalgamation of several different outfits he had worn previously. First of all, was I reading that correctly? And then second of all, by the end do we finally have this fully integrated, trustworthy Victor Strand? Or is Victor always gonna Victor? 

Ian Goldberg: Amalgamation is a really good word because we’ve seen Strand redefine himself over and over again over his journey on Fear. I think the question that always underlies all of it is, is Strand doing this for other people are doing it for himself? What’s motivating Strand in any given moment?

And in this case, what was really interesting to us and where it felt like it synthesized Strand and really brought him to a new place in his journey is… When we find him living with Klaus and Frank speaking German under a different name, he is lying about who he is, he has completely redefined himself, but it’s for a good reason. He’s doing it because he feels that’s the only way he can honor what he promised Alicia in season seven, because he doesn’t believe that anyone will accept him if they know he’s Victor Strand, and they know everything that he’s done in particular in season seven. So it’s coming from a good place, even though it takes him to some very tricky areas in this episode, in particular with how he interacts with Madison.

At that moment, at the end of the episode, where he’s facing death at Troy’s hand and he says to Frank, “I lied about a lot of things, but my love for you was real.” That felt like a new place for Strand which is, Strand has always played a little fast and loose with the truth. But he really has found a new family. And there’s real care for them. And so now, he has survived this, he has reunited with Madison. And so it’s about how he’s merging the Strand that he was, the Anton that he’s become, and he’s laying it all out there for Frank and Klaus and saying, “This is who I am. This is who I was.” And so this is really the beginning of a new chapter for Strand.

I don’t know how much you can tell me about this, but Troy claims to have killed Alicia and has her arm… Should we take him at face value there?

Andrew Chambliss: It’s a very good question and it’s one that people just have to watch to find the answer to.

Similar answer, probably. But you’ve essentially got Chekhov’s Alicia’s zombie wandering around at this point. Should we expect Alicia to show up in some form?

Goldberg: [Laughs]  I really like the Chekhov’s Alicia’s Walker. Let’s just say that Chekhov’s what happened to Alicia is definitely something that we will pay off.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Fear the Walking Dead airs Sundays at 9/8c on AMC and AMC+.