Glenn Rhee is one of Walking Dead's most iconic characters, with his grotesque death cementing the foul-mouthed Negan as the franchise's greatest villain. However, Walking Dead writer and co-creator Robert Kirkman feels that the jaw-dropping death scene could have been improved, wishing he'd done one thing to make the moment "way better."
Walking Dead's Creator Wishes He'd Misled Readers More About Glenn's Death
He Finally Got His Wish in the TV Adaptation
In Walking Dead Deluxe #100 (Robert Kirkman, Charlie Adlard, Dave McCaig and Rus Wooton), fans see the debut of Negan, the brutal leader of the Saviors. In order to make an impression on Rick Grimes' group, Negan chooses a member to kill at random, selecting Glenn in a heart-rending, no-holds-bar scene where the character is beaten to death while calling out to his partner Maggie. Glenn was one of Rick's first allies, introduced in The Walking Dead #2, making this a major loss for fans. However, Kirkman admits it would have landed even harder if he'd given more of an impression that a different character was about to die.
Kirkman's role on AMC's TV adaptation gave him a chance to act on his Walking Dead regrets.
Walking Dead's Creator Admits It Was Too Obvious Glenn Was About to Die
In the creator notes for the issue, Kirman admits that Glenn's optimism and his developing relationship with Maggie make it "obvious" who is about to die once Negan declares his intentions, pointing out, "We even have Rick saying he's going to miss the hell out of Glenn. Yeesh. Laying it on pretty thick, Robert!" Kirkman states that while he had "a solid plan for constantly making the reader think characters were goners," he failed to follow up on it, and that "it could have been way better if I landed those moments."
Some traces of Kirkman's plan remain, for example Rick thanking Michonne for her support in a scene that emphasizes how vital their friendship has become to the group. Likewise, there's a moment where Rick warns Carl to put on his seatbelt that could be read as foreshadowing about his safety. However, as Kirkman notes, Glenn's plan to move to a new community with Maggie make him the clear target for death. When Kirkman got a second chance on TV, he made a genius new decision to obscure Glenn's doomed status.
Abraham's Death Was a Giant Mislead for Comic Fans
Walking Dead Wrong-Footed Everyone Who Knew Negan Killed Glenn
As well as co-creating the franchise alongside artist Tony Moore, Kirkman was also an executive producer and writer on AMC's TV adaptation of The Walking Dead, where Glenn is played by Steven Yeun. In The Walking Dead Deluxe #91, Kirkman revealed that in recreating the comic death, he pitched also killing Michael Cudlitz's Abraham so as to misdirect comic fans, who already knew what was coming. Kirkman states that he wanted fans to think, "Oh, whew! They're not killing Glenn!" only for Jeffrey Dean Morgan's Negan to turn around and carry out a second execution following the comic storyline.
Walking Dead's creator originally planned for Maggie to kill Negan, but the series' artist had a better idea.
In the original comics, Abraham is shot through the eye with an arrow by Saviors member Dwight, continuing his conversation for a while until the angle changes to show his horrific injury. Kirkman was never happy with the way Abraham was killed off, so in the TV show he handed off the horrifying image to Merritt Wever's Denise, instead making Abraham another Negan victim. The smart change effectively answered Kirkman's regrets from the comics, both in terms of killing off Abraham and misdirecting fans as to Glenn's fate. Interestingly, this wasn't the last major change to result from Negan killing Glenn.
Walking Dead Originally Planned to Have Maggie Kill Negan
But the Series' Artist Thought Redemption Was More Interesting
Negan's murder of Glenn was originally intended to lead to his own death at Maggie's hands, avenging her former partner and the father of her child. Kirkman had planned out Maggie's revenge when - per an interview with Insider - artist Charlie Adlard contacted his collaborator, lamenting that so much Western fiction buys into the idea of "eye for an eye" despite seemingly being morally above this idea. Adlard described how interesting it would be if Negan "the baddest of bad guys" was allowed to live, making a major statement about the type of society that Rick's group were creating.
Kirkman loved the idea, having Rick commute Negan's death sentence into life imprisonment, condemned to watch as the survivors disproved all his ideas about humanity and the need for violent control. By the end of the series, Negan is totally won over, admitting that Rick was right and living out the rest of his life in exile, atoning for his crimes. Meanwhile, in the final issue's flash forward, readers learn that Glenn's son Hershel grew up to found his own traveling zombie circus, despite the risks it poses to other survivors, showing how he became arrogant and embittered after growing up without his father.
Glenn's death at the hands of Negan is one of The Walking Dead's most iconic moments, and yet writer Robert Kirkman has long believed he could have done it even better by implying other characters were facing death - something he eventually managed in the TV adaptation by actually killing Abraham, all to make longtime fans think that Glenn was finally safe.
