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Andrew Lincoln Responds To ‘Walking Dead’ Season 7 Premiere Criticism

By Gregory Wakeman
Published on: 09:48 PST, Oct 25, 2016

The premiere of Season 7 of The Walking Dead was easily one of the most talked about episodes of television of the last decade. But the bloody and gory antics that unfolded in “The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be” have provoked the ire of some loyal fans, who have criticized the show for going too far.

Andrew Lincoln, who portrays The Walking Dead’s protagonist Rick Grimes, has now responded to these claims, insisting that he stands by the show through thick and thin even though he doesn’t actually watch it himself.

Warning: There are some spoilers ahead for The Walking Dead’s Season 7 premiere, “The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be.” So if you’ve somehow managed to stumble onto this article and still don’t know who was killed by Negan and want to keep it that way, then you should definitely move on.

Andrew Lincoln responded to the deaths of both Abraham and Glenn on The Walking Dead on Sunday while chatting to Comic Book. The English thespian opened up, though, by confessing that he’s never watched the show because he can’t quite stand to see himself on screen.

“The problem is, I don’t watch the show,” Lincoln admitted. “I’m kind of allergic to my face so don’t watch the show and I haven’t watched it.”

However, despite this slight problem with his personal viewpoint on the show’s violence, Lincoln insisted that he has full trust in the creative individuals behind The Walking Dead, declaring that they don’t take the goriness of the program lightly.

“But I do know that the people who are responsible for making the show take the violence extremely seriously,” Lincoln continued. “I know that unless it advances character and story, it doesn’t belong in the show. I know that these are good friends of mine that steer the ship and I know that they take it seriously.”

Lincoln did have some good news for the people who found themselves disgusted by The Walking Dead’s premiere for being too heavy and bloody to the point that it was unenjoyable, as he revealed that future episodes will indeed feature a bit more humor.

“I do think that the show without humor and without and hope and friendship and joy is not our show,” Lincoln explained. “It’s a real mixed bag this season, it’s a very different season.”

Lincoln then went on to explain that the upcoming episodes are “very bold” and see the show take some “very big risks.”

There were quite a few individuals who found themselves balking at the risks The Walking Dead’s latest episode took. In fact, AMC found themselves being slapped on the wrist by the Parents Television Council shortly after Sunday’s episode aired.

Tim Winter, who is the president of the Parents Television council, insisted that the sight of Negan bashing in Abraham and Glenn’s heads with his baseball bat draped in barbed wire was too extreme for its Mature Audience rating.

“This certainly raises questions of if there should be an even more severe rating than TV MA,” Winter told the Hollywood Reporter. “I understand violence is inherent to the storytelling here but the manner in which the depictions were made… it crossed the line.”

By airing at 9 p.m. on AMC, The Walking Dead is allowed to get away with showing more guts, gore, blood, and death than other television shows. However, it is still an hour shy of being able to utter a certain four-letter word that starts with f.

This is only the beginning, though, because the latest episode of The Walking Dead’s seventh season will air on Sunday on AMC at 9 p.m., and the record viewing figures of over 17 million for last week’s “The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be” suggests that, despite what you’re saying now, quite a few of you will still return to watch it.

[Featured Image by AMC]

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