There’s a new face among the cast of Fear The Walking Dead, and he ought to be pretty familiar to those of you who have kept up-to-date with AMC’s core Walking Dead saga.
We are, of course, referring to Morgan Jones, the fan-favorite survivor who’s a mere two weeks away from becoming the connective tissue that binds Fear The Walking Dead with its sibling series – a sibling series that’s now on the verge of its own nail-biting finale.
In a clever marketing move, both episodes are set to air back-to-back on Sunday, April 15th, which will no doubt ease Morgan’s transition from one series to another. Speaking of which, Lennie James recently sat down with ComicBook.com to preview the road ahead for his seasoned survivor.
I had a week between the end of seven months in Atlanta and the beginning of seven months in Austin so it’s a little bit of a blur and this is usually the time when I’m recovering from seven grueling months and I’m not. So, it’s a little strange but I’m kind of enjoying it, it’s exciting. All the reasons I said ‘yes’ to doing it are kind of here and being manifested, it’s exciting, it’s a new group of people, it’s a different aspect of Morgan and who he’s been and what the potential is of who he’s gonna- what could happen to him. It’s a very weird situation to be in, associated with a character as long as I’ve been associated with a character and then have that character reborn, in a way.
On a more personal level, James admits to being slightly overwhelmed by the whole ordeal, and told CB that he initially wondered if there was another character better suited to AMC’s planned crossover.
When the whole thing was suggested, I tried to think of another character in television history who’s about to do the journey that my character is being offered and I can’t think of one. If you can it’d be really helpful cause I’d like to find that person and figure out how it all kind of went. But I couldn’t think of anybody else, and that in itself what kind of exciting.
Of course, history tells us that Lennie James eventually agreed to the unique gig, as he’s excited to see the ways in which Morgan Jones adapts to his new surroundings – not to mention his new allies, chief among them being Madison Clark.
I mean, it’s the only reason I said ‘yes’ was the expiration of the character. It wasn’t really for any other reason other than what would be the possibilities of bringing Morgan into the heart of a different collection of people, where he had a different set of history and different connections and see who he can end up being. For an actor, having already been associated with a character for eight years, that’s a hell of a gift. It’s literally very rare. So that was what was exciting.
Fear The Walking Dead makes its long-anticipated return on April 15th, which will forever be known as Survival Sunday. Indeed, AMC is planning a one-night event in select theaters across the States, meaning zombie fans can catch The Walking Dead season 8’s finale and FTWD‘s premiere back-to-back on the silver screen.