The Walking Dead: The Most Terrifying Variant Revealed

The Walkers are not just Walkers!

A brief discussion of The Walking Dead was based on a comic book series that followed the survivors of a zombie apocalypse. The first season was aired in 2010, followed by 10 more series, and now in 2022, it is airing its 11th season, not to mention its innumerable spin-offs.

Just when everybody thought that the walkers would remain the survivors' worries, a new evolution of infected brain-dead monsters has revealed themselves to participate not just in chasing but also in breaking, smashing, climbing, and whatever else they can contribute to the misery of our beloved characters.

Rosh Marquand, playing the role of Aaron in the Walking Dead series, revealed how terrifying the new variant of zombies is in the remaining episodes. Marquand labels the new variants as 'Smart Walkers,' describing them as zombies that can climb and open doors.

The Walking Dead series is known for its consistently inconsistent zombies. In every spinoff, zombies are given nicknames based on their behaviors, whether they be walkers, biters, or toe-taggers. In Season 11 of The Walking Dead, though, the return of the different zombies comes with a scary twist.

The new variant was revealed in Episode 19, entitled 'Variant', when Aaron, Jerry, Lydia, and Elijah camp out for a mission to get back to Alexandria from the Commonwealth. Little did they know, a variant Walker had led a bunch of zombies to their hideout and attacked the refuge. However, the characters notice that this attack is not the usual attack of the walkers as the variant displays enough intelligence to break into doors, climb ladders and pick up rocks. At first, the team believed that the ones attacking them were not the variant zombies but the gone-mad Whisperers or humans wearing zombie skins. The realization forced Aaron to peel off one of the Walker’s faces. To his surprise, what was beneath was not a hidden human face but red rotten flesh that became a clear representation of yet another type of danger.

'When they actually become really somewhat intelligent and are able to figure out basic motor skills and motor functions, that is a terrifying concept to grasp, and I’m just excited to see what people think of that,' Marquand stated in an interview.

The latest seasons of the series primarily revealed the different walker variants. The turning of Morgan Jones's wife in The Walking Dead Season 1 has already shown that zombies can open doors and seem to have a memory of their own. Though they might not be seen often, the existence of this variant seems to have been established long ago.

The interview with Marquand clarifies the threats of this new variant, which, moreover, appears to play a major role in the show's upcoming spinoff. A post-credits scene for The Walking Dead: World Beyond depicts fast, violent zombies lurking in France. With the arrival of Daryl Dixon during his spinoff show, comes a whole terrifying experience of running and killing for his life. Rest assured that The Walking Dead’s remaining 5 episodes will reveal more danger with a more twisted plot.