‘The Walking Dead: Dead City’ Showrunner Officially Reveals Bold Plans for Season 4 and Maggie and Negan’s Future

Editor's note: The following contains major spoilers for The Walking Dead: Dead City Season 3. Summary Season 3 of 'Dead City' experiments with sitcom beats and alternate realities while staying true to what 'The Walking Dead' is known for. Maggie will never forgive Negan, but they grow closer and form a fraught, pragmatic partnership. Showrunner Seth Hoffman vows more boundary-pushing in a possible Season 4, exploring Maggie and Negan's working conflicts over rebuilding the city. The Walking Dead franchise kicked off on AMC in 2010, and after 11 seasons and a variety of spin-offs, it’s still going strong, 16 years later. But that doesn’t mean the cast and showrunner of Dead City didn’t want to shake things up in Season 3, deciding to experiment and take chances with elements that haven’t been explored previously. Whether it was pushing the character dynamics in different directions, showing an alternate reality of life without the apocalypse and walkers, or letting us see what a sitcom in this world would look like, things have definitely felt different this season. One thing that is exactly the same is that Maggie (Lauren Cohan) and Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) are fighting walkers to keep their community safe while human enemies often become an even greater threat to their survival. After watching the season finale, Collider got the opportunity to chat with new showrunner Seth Hoffman, who previously worked on Seasons 4, 5 and 6 of the mothership series, about his approach to Season 3 of Dead City and how he’d like to continue to experiment moving forward in possible future seasons. During the interview, he discussed doing new things with the series while still making it feel like classic The Walking Dead, his hope to keep doing things that haven’t been seen in the franchise previously, clearly defining Maggie and Negan’s relationship, and how this new partnership between them could play out in Season 4. ‘Dead City’ Wanted To Shake Things Up for Season 3 While Still Feeling Like Classic ‘The Walking Dead’ "The way I solved that puzzle was to go, 'Okay, let’s bring these characters back to who they were.'" COLLIDER: When I spoke to both Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Lauren Cohen about this season, they talked about how exciting it was to be trying some new things and experimenting a bit with characters that they thought they couldn’t know any better than they already did. Why did this season feel like the right season to shake things up in that way? SETH HOFFMAN: I think for a couple of reasons. When I came on, in talking to the network, they wanted to know, “What can we do that’s new?” And some of the producers wanted it to feel like classic The Walking Dead. It was a puzzle. It was about, “Okay, how do I make it feel classic, but also make it feel new?” The way I solved that puzzle was to go, “Okay, let’s bring these characters back to who they were." Let’s bring back a version of Maggie that is the hopeful, optimistic version of herself that she was in Season 2, 3, and 4 of the mothership. Let’s bring back the version of Negan that is unpredictable and a little bit of a live wire, who the audience fell in love with in Season 7 and 8 before he got thrown in jail and before he got put under the thumb of the Croat and the Dama. Let’s put those versions of those characters back center stage, and those versions of those characters have never interacted with each other. In that way, it can feel like classic The Walking Dead, but by them engaging with one another, it will feel new and fresh. That was the hope for Season 3. Is that where the alternate reality episode came from, and even just the little snippet of the sitcom that we get at the beginning of the finale? HOFFMAN: Yeah. It was, “Here are two characters, and they’re going to be driving us through this season. The concept for Episode 6 was less of a micro decision. I want to push this franchise that I love and that I worked on for three years and that is one of the highlights of my entire career in new directions. I want to see what the limits are for what a Walking Dead episode can be. When I came up with the idea for that episode, when I pitched it to the network, it was, “The Walking Dead does stories where people feel dread, and these people are going to feel dread in this episode because they’re going to be worried that Maggie and Negan are going to hook up. It’s a horror romantic comedy.” I wanted to push the episodes in different directions, so there are all these little micro decisions like, “How far can we push that scene in the top of the finale towards sitcom and make it still feel like The Walking Dead?” In Episode 5, when we’re introducing the characters in The Dead Squad, that isn’t necessarily a cinematic choice that we’ve seen in The Walking Dead before, but can that be part of The Walking Dead’s language? There were lots of ways in which I was trying to push and make it feel fresh and new while also making it feel like The Walking Dead. Do you still have some ideas for that kind of experimentation for another season? Like how much have you thought about what a Season 4 could be and what more you could do with it? HOFFMAN: If we’re lucky to get a Season 4, I will continue to push the envelope. People will see things in a Season 4, if we’re lucky enough to get it, that they’ve never seen in The Walking Dead universe, but also, they will feel like The Walking Dead stories. ‘The Walking Dead: Dead City’ Season 3 Clearly Defined Maggie and Negan’s Relationship so They Can Move Forward Together "In a Season 4, that would be a really exciting dynamic to explore." Image via AMC There’s a moment in the finale that feels like it’s been a long time coming when Maggie says to Negan, “You’ve got me. We’re forever connected. We are outright chained to one another.” She’s never going to forgive him, but they’ve moved past it and they’ve gotten closer. What do you love about that moment between them and about how Maggie humanizes Negan? HOFFMAN: It was important for us to really clearly define Maggie’s relationship towards Negan. I think Negan’s relationship towards Maggie is pretty clear. He kills for her. He wants to protect her. She is so important to him. Maggie’s feelings towards Negan, for a long time, were very defined by, “I hate you, you killed my husband.” In this season, she has let some of that go. So, where is she? We worked hard to really parse the language in that scene to make it clear that she’s not forgiving him and she will never forgive him. She isn’t happy about the fact that Negan, in some ways, makes her a better person. She probably really hates the fact that Negan makes her a better person, but he does. That’s where they are right now. She could fight against that and try to move away from him and live her own life. Part of what we were trying to say in Episode 6 is, “If you do part, then maybe you’ll fall into old patterns that aren’t necessarily the best version of yourself. Let’s see what happens if the two of you actually do work together for the greater good.” I think, in a Season 4, that would be a really exciting dynamic to explore. Airing that out also opens it up for Hershel to work with them as a little trio, which you couldn’t have gotten to if that hadn’t happened. HOFFMAN: A hundred percent. To think about where the two of them were at the beginning of this season versus where they are at the end of this season, it’s a monumental change. Now that these two characters are where they are, it would be incredibly exciting to explore what their next step would be. ‘The Walking Dead: Dead City’ Season 4 Would See Maggie and Negan Having New Conflicts "They'll be in conflict about that." Image via AMC At the end of the finale, Maggie hands that badge to Negan so that he can lead security while she’s in charge. What do you think that new partnership between them could be like? How do you see that dynamic working out? HOFFMAN: A big thing that we’ve done this season is to give both of them something that they care deeply about. They cared deeply about this community, and they want it to thrive. Everything the Croat said in Episode 1, this city has everything to rebuild society in. Both of them, by the end of the season, have really embraced that. This is home. They’re moving into a working relationship, which they’ve never had before. They have different worldviews, they have different strategies, they have different tactics, and they both want the best for the city, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the same thing. Maggie might think one thing is the best, and Negan might think a different thing would be the best. And so, they’ll be in conflict about that, but their conflict won’t be rooted in the fact that Negan killed Glenn. It’ll be rooted in present-day circumstances, which is something both of them really want. That is where their relationship would live in a Season 4. The Walking Dead: Dead City airs on AMC. Release Date June 15, 2023 Network AMC Showrunner Eli Jorne, Seth Hoffman Franchise(s) The Walking Dead Creator(s) Eli Jorne Seasons 3