We got to know Chandler Riggs as a boy who survived the zombie apocalypse in the hit horror series The Walking Dead. Before his tragic end in the eighth season (and even after), his Carl Grimes, the son of the lead Rick Grimes, lingered for a while on the list of characters the producers were considering for a spin-off. A series that would have delved into a fundamental and missing piece of Carl’s emotional journey, as Riggs revealed in a recent interview with Screen Rant.
The Walking Dead: What Would the Carl Grimes Spin-Off Have Shown?
In The Walking Dead we watched Carl, a boy forced to grow up in a world in ruins, transform into a young man tempered by experience. Riggs said he had pitched Scott Gimple, the franchise’s head, an idea that would explore the transition of his character toward a convinced pacifism. “There was a moment when we discussed the possibility of Carl’s return—not in the form of an hallucination or via a flashback, but through a story dedicated to him,” the actor explained. “I even put pen to paper, sending it to Scott: the idea concerned the period between seasons seven and eight, during which Carl isn’t exactly bloodthirsty, but is ready to kill, ready to do whatever it takes to eliminate others… only to move from that state to absolute pacifism, arriving at: ‘No, we won’t kill anyone anymore’.
According to Riggs, the spin-off could have filled some gaps, offering fans details about the reasons that pushed Carl to change his mindset. “I think there is an opportunity to explore what he endured during that month, enough to lead him down this path,” he added. “What did he see? What did he witness, or what did he feel, to arrive at the thought: ‘Well, no, we’ll find a way for all of us to live together’?”
The disappearance of Carl remains one of the most significant deviations of the TV series from Robert Kirkman’s comics, in which the character actually reaches the conclusion of the story. Discovering that fate for Carl “was definitely a nice surprise for me – and I think for anyone else -, but, in the end, it was good for both my career and the storytelling,” Riggs said. After leaving the series, the actor continued to work in television with a role in ABC’s drama A Million Little Things. He also appeared in the film The Viper’s Legacy. The The Walking Dead franchise, on the other hand, has focused on other characters for the spin-offs, notably Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus) with The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, on Maggie Greene and Negan (Lauren Cohan and Jeffrey Dean Morgan) with The Walking Dead: Dead City, and on Rick Grimes and Michonne (Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira) with The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live. To these are added the other spin-offs that arrived after his departure, The Walking Dead: World Beyond and Tales of the Walking Dead.
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