Walking Dead: Alpha's Head Now Decorates Producer's Front Gate
The Walking Dead producer Greg Nicotero reveals that Alpha's severed head now decorates his front gate. Over the course of its decade-long run on AMC, TWD has featured more than its fair share of human villains who ultimately turned out to be far more terrifying and destructive than any rampaging zombie.
The first major villain on the show was of course The Governor, who ruled over the post-apocalyptic town of Woodbury with an increasingly deranged iron fist. After that character was vanquished, the next Big Bad to make a big impression was Negan, a character so brutal that many fans actually abandoned the show because of him. Season 8 saw Negan finally receiving his comeuppance and being imprisoned, leaving a void in the TWD main villain slot that was eventually filled by Alpha. The leader of the mysterious band known as The Whisperers, Alpha turned out to be arguably the show’s most horrifying and complex baddie of all. But like the Governor and Negan before her, Alpha was eventually conquered, as Negan himself gained her confidence and killed her, delivering her head up to a vengeful Carol.
On the show, Alpha’s head may have ended up on a stick in the woods (before winding up in Beta’s possession, so he could skin it and add half of Alpha’s face to his Whisperers mask) but in real life it resides on the front gate of producer Nicotero, as he revealed in a recent Instagram post. See Nicotero’s grim picture in the space below:
Turns out, Nicotero has quite a collection of heads adorning his front gate, there to ward off the coronavirus as he says. The collection is indeed a nice trip down TWD memory lane as it features the heads of the zombies Michonne used as her “pets,” a head Carl collected early in season 3, the head of "Bicycle Girl" - the first zombie Rick Grimes encountered, whose backstory was featured in a TWD Webisode - and the head Nicotero and his effects team crafted for The Governor's fish tank as an homage to Jaws character Ben Gardner. This of course is just a small sampling of all the heads that have been featured on the show over the years (not to mention all the other body parts that have been crafted in order to keep the show’s gore factor appropriately high).
Nicotero’s grisly display may not in fact ward off coronavirus, but it should serve to scare away any unwanted visitors to the producer and VFX master’s front gate (or possibly attract a brave fan looking to steal a quick souvenir). As for The Walking Dead itself, sadly fans will have a long wait for the final episode of season 10, which was of course delayed. Before going on hiatus, the season had built to what looked like an explosive climax, with Beta and his horde about to attack the hospital where many had taken refuge after the previous battle with The Whisperers. And of course Maggie was set to make her return in the season finale as well. Hopefully, the real world won’t get any more like The Walking Dead, and things will soon return to normal so folks can get back to being entertained by fake plagues.
Source: Greg Nicotero/Instagram