SDCC Exclusive: Lauren Cohan Discusses Returning For The New Season Of ‘The Walking Dead: Dead City’
The Walking Dead: Dead City dropped by San Diego Comic Con this past weekend for their annual visit. During their visit, star of the series, Lauren Cohan spoke with BB, and fellow press, about her excitement for the new season and continuing the amazing Walking Dead universe.
From your character’s perspective, which character from the original The Walking Dead series would you like to see return:
“I think it would be really nice if Rick came back, too. But I loved that episode I did with Melissa when we went to the satellite station. She’s got it all. She’s strong. She’s a strategist. She’s funny. I’m talking about Melissa and Carol. There are too many, too many.”
What can Maggie and Negan [Jeffrey Dean Morgan] create together that neither of them could build separately in Season 3:
“It’s really funny because I was thinking about just the original, the first series, season of The Walking Dead. We’re all already dead inside, and it’s not like the virus begins in season one. It’s the message that we are walking through life disconnected, not dead. If you can break bread with your supposed enemy and you can begin to bring life back into your heart and a new perspective back into your world, I think what we’re doing now and what we hope to do in the next season is to live.
I’m so over finding the cure. I’m so over the hope to do that. I think the message of The Walking Dead is realizing that you can walk through your life without being connected to it. I’m connecting here with somebody who, for all intents and purposes, I should have no business connecting with. And what can come of that? I think that’s the new world we’re going to get to explore. Change is so uncomfortable and so difficult. From 2011 to 2026, we’re doing something different. So you have to tune in and find out what that means.”
What is your favorite personality trait of Maggie, and what is something you appreciate about how she has changed:
“I think the capacity to change is one. We saw it with Hershel [Logan Kim] and Maggie at the end of Season 2. The lengths that he would go to try and get his mom to open her heart and let go of her rage because of seeing her in pain, but also because he needs to believe in a life worth living. And you know how hard it is to say, ‘Okay, my dear sweet child, who my only job is to protect, you can stay here and live with this woman.’ It’s a really terrible idea, but doing it led to cracking the sky open.
Making amends with Negan, moving forward, meeting Aimee [Garcia] and Raúl’s [Castillo] characters and saying, ‘Maybe we’re not done trying. Maybe there is still a reason to go on.’ I think we both changed to work together. He’s so on the dark side in Season 1 of Dead City, and there’s so much darkness for Negan. Then he actually decides to bring his best to something bigger than himself. We have so much fun this season. It’s so rewarding. I’m just really glad we’re written opportunities where we can change and that the characters are dynamic.”
How physically demanding has the show been, especially with the running and action sequences:
“There’s so much more running in the show than you think there’s going to be, and that’s the part that gets you winded when you haven’t been doing it for a while.”
The Walking Dead: Dead City debuts new episodes from season three every Sunday on AMC.
*This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Photo Credit: Robert Clark/AMC