When ‘Fear the Walking Dead’ returns on August 21, the survivors are split apart for the first time and trying to make it on their own…
By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer
When ‘Fear the Walking Dead’ came to an end of the first half for season 2, Celia’s compound was in flames and she was dead. It certainly appeared like Daniel was going to die as well and the rest of the survivors were scattered to the wind in the aftermath of this latest catastrophe.
Now when ‘Fear the Walking Dead’ returns for the second half of season 2 on August 21, it looks like the survivors are very much on their own as if everybody has been split apart and fractured from the original group that started the show.
A trailer for the second half of ‘Fear the Walking Dead’ season 2 debuted at San Diego Comic Con, which you can see below, but here are a few more details to get you ready for what lies ahead for the final episodes of the season.
ACCEPTING REALITY
There was a certain level of frustration among many fans who watched ‘Fear the Walking Dead’ that it took so long for the group to finally realize that the zombie apocalypse was happening and the people who have been turned aren’t going to return to humanity.
It sounds like as the second half of season 2 starts, reality has finally set in and the survivors realizes that this is the new world they are living in and there’s no going back.
Plus the second half of the season introduces the group splintering into different factions with Nick going his own way, Travis taking his son Chris on their own journey while Strand, Madison, Alicia and Ofelia are off on their own adventure.
“For the first time we’re going to see our characters really learning how to survive in the apocalypse,” show runner Dave Erickson teased.
“On top of that, they’re going to be separated and really doing it on their own.”
LOCATION
‘Fear the Walking Dead’ will remain in Mexico for the immediate future with the Baja region still serving as the backdrop for much of the location but executive producer Gale-Anne Hurd also revealed that at least part of the group would be landing in Tijuana during the second half of season 2 as well.
TRAVIS AND CHRIS
As we saw at the end of the first half of season two, Travis decided to go after his son Chris when he disappeared from the compound following an incident where he was standing over his stepmother and stepsister with a knife.
Chris is clearly teetering between his own sanity and completely falling apart, but as much as he tried to abandon his family, Travis wouldn’t allow his son to venture off into the unknown by himself.
According to Cliff Curtis — who plays Travis — he’s obviously the person who has struggled the most to adapt to this new world, but once he partners up with his son and they are on their own, things will get very real in a hurry and he’s forced to make some difficult decisions.
“Travis is very attached to his idea of honor and moral code,” Curtis said. “He’s probably the slowest to adapt. I think we’re going to see things happen in the start of the season that might get a shock out of you what Travis is capable of. I think he’s going to be a bad-ass dad.”
Chris has certainly evolved from the timid kid who started the series to the point where he’s killed hostages and he’s literally taking people’s lives into his own hands. It seemed at some points during the first half of season 2 that Chris might have enjoyed taking a human’s life just a little bit too much, but he’s also still just a kid.
Curtis says in many ways — and obviously to a big extreme — Chris is looking for attention because he’s still grieving for the loss of his mother and there’s not much time to deal with the reality of dying when death surrounds you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
“He just lost his mom and he’s not getting the attention of any normal teenager needs to feel like he’s loved and cared for,” Curtis said.
So Travis and Chris go on a camping trip and where they end up is still a mystery to everybody.
NICK
Just when Nick started to connect with Celia during season 2, his mother Madison orchestrated her death and the entire compound went down in flames.
So now Nick is trying to find his way in the world while still trying to grasp what and who the dead are to him exactly. It was clear Nick started to adapt to Celia’s way of thinking that the dead weren’t really mindless monsters but instead some sort of evolution of humanity.
As the second half of season 2 picks up, Nick is on his own but it’s not long before he runs into another group of survivors (led by the charismatic Paul Calderon), who also view death in a very different way.
It’s there Nick runs into Luciana — a new character joining the show played by Danay Garcia — who is a bad ass soldier and “a orphan of the apocalypse” by choice just like Nick.
From the look of the trailer and the brief scenes shown for the second half of season 2, Nick gets in deep with the group right away but it’s clear these people may be far more dangerous than anything Celia ever represented.
STRAND, MADISON, OFELIA AND ALICIA
After Celia’s compound burned, Strand gathered Madison, Alicia and Ofelia in a truck and they made their way out of the area but now seek new shelter in Mexico.
The group ends up finding a hotel that appears to be abandoned but it isn’t long before they run into even more survivors who are trying to make it in this scary new world.
Strand is still trying to face the fact that the man he loved is now dead and he’s truly alone in the world while Alicia is looking for her own alone time — although she won’t be jetting off on a solo adventure like her brother Nick.
Ofelia is in a very dark place as the second half of season 2 picks up because now she’s lost her mother and presumably her father (although there’s still not real indication that Daniel didn’t somehow survive) and she’s quite depressed.
As for Madison — she’s now without Travis for the first time and there’s no one around to really question her judgment. There were teases that Madison has a much different view on the apocalypse than her other half ever did and now that she’s not tied to him (at least for now) it will be interesting to see how she handles things.
“I think it is indicative of what we’re going to see this side of her but I also think it’s indicative of where she’s come from,” Madison’s portrayer Kim Dickens said about the character’s attitude in season 2.
There are still eight episodes to go in ‘Fear the Walking Dead’ season 2 so it looks like plenty is yet to happen before the finale in October.
‘Fear the Walking Dead’ returns to AMC on Sunday night, August 21 at 9pm ET.
