Warning: There are massive spoilers ahead for "The Walking Dead."
"The Walking Dead" returned Sunday to AMC.
Monday, episode director and executive producer Greg Nicotero and Michael Cudlitz, who plays Abraham, spoke to reporters in two separate conference calls to learn more about the gut-wrenching premiere.
From the movies which inspired the episode to the fact that the entire cast knew exactly who was going to be killed for a year, the two revealed more about the making of the anticipated episode.
INSIDER was on both conference calls. Here's what we learned.
Michael Cudlitz, who plays Abraham, was told he was going to be killed off the show a year and three months ago.
The actor said he's just been traveling and lying to most people he would run into. He has continued to dye his hair and keep his long mustache so fans wouldn't grow suspicious. The only people he told were his wife and kids because otherwise they would wonder why he was home all the time.
You can read more about what Cudlitz had to say about his character's death here.
The cast and crew all knew who died more than a year ago too and they have been lying about it ever since.
Cudlitz said the death scene in the finale was filmed about a year ago. All of those reports about no one knowing and finding out later on were all just rumors made up and spread to make it easier on the cast and crew to keep the secret.
"One of the good things was that we were able to spread a rumor that not even the cast knew what was going to happen,"said Cudlitz. "They were going to find out when they got back. They said they filmed everybody's death scene just in case and they said they were re-doing contract negotiations for some of the cast and we weren't sure who it was going to be. All of that was a lie."
The reason two characters were killed off in the premiere instead of one was so Negan could really break Rick Grimes emotionally.
"Part of the whole show is we really needed to drive Rick and Negan's story throughout the season and we felt that one death would do the trick, but the second death — Glenn's death — really, really propelled us into a very different direction," Nicotero said. "It's really about Negan laying down the law and saying, 'Listen guys, the bottom line is, if you listen to me, you'll be fine. But if you step out of line, that's not gonna fly.'"
You can read more on Nicotero's response here.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider