'The Walking Dead' Postmortem: Norman Reedus on the Fallout From Daryl's Forest Adventure

Warning: This Q&A contains spoilers from the “Always Accountable” episode of The Walking Dead.

Still no Glenn resolution in this week’s episode of The Walking Dead, but “Always Accountable” was a fan-pleasing Daryl adventure, and an especially welcome one, since Norman Reedus’s motorcycle-riding tracker/recruiter had been seen a little too infrequently for any fan’s taste so far in Season 6. Daryl was back in his element in this one, using his tracking skills to get himself and (new couple?) Sasha and Abraham back on the road to Alexandria, after a less-than-successful first effort to recruit new survivors into the safe zone.

Reedus, who will also be starring in his own travel series for AMC next year, talked to Yahoo TV about how Daryl’s interaction with the people in the woods is going to have serious, immediate, and far-reaching blowback for him and his friends; how we should be paying attention to every little detail in the storylines this season; about his upcoming Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid-ish episode with Andrew Lincoln; and about his plans to clone his castmates and have them serve him cucumber salads every day. Because… Norman.

Oh, and that guy who asks Daryl for help at the end of “Always Accountable”? Not who you think it is…

This is such a great Daryl episode. It’s such a great throwback to Daryl being in his element, where he really thrives.
Yeah. There was a storyline [last season] where Daryl builds a motorcycle, and he wants to go out and try to find people. He’s down for that. [Earlier this season,] Rick says, “I don’t think we should find anybody else.” Daryl says, “I think we should.” It turns into Rick saying, “You know, you’re right. Let’s go find people.” This is the first sort of recruiting mission that I did on my own. It took a lot out of me, I think, to make that decision. The circumstances that I made the decision in seemed right at the time. I don’t know that [Daryl] made a bad call. I think those were good people, but good people do bad things and stupid things in this world to survive. It was kind of a big deal. That decision comes back in a huge way, and it just never stops. We’re at a thousand miles an hour now.

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You said recently that viewers should be paying very close attention to the details this season. Things always pay off in this show if you pay attention, and that’s one of the great rewards of watching. But are you saying that’s true even more this season?
Starting right now. [Laughs.] [Showrunner] Scott [Gimple] has things mapped out so far in advance, and there’s no wasted screentime on this show. If you see something, it’s going to play later. I mean, down to like the little carved statue I demanded [the guy in the forest] give me, just to be a jerk. Every single thing that happens, from here on in, is just like we just jumped off a cliff.

About that carved statue: Was there another reason Daryl demanded it? It didn’t seem that random.
Yeah. Daryl sees the insulin in the bag, and he knows they need that. It kind of explains why and how they’re operating right now. It was like, “Here, I brought this back, but give me something. I came all this way. I’m not going to do this for nothing.” It showed that I’m a nice guy, but not a super nice guy. You know what I mean? He doesn’t care if his grandfather taught him how to whittle. "Just give me something. I’m scavenging you right now.” If he’s taken the time to whittle this, it’s personal. It’s like, “I’m just going to take that little bit that’s personal away from you, right now.” It might hurt him a little bit.

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When Daryl sees the cooler of insulin, does he make the decision at that point that he might recruit these people? It makes him realize, as you said, there’s more to their story.
When he makes the decision to ask the three questions… how those people answer those questions, it tells a lot about them. The guy’s digging a grave when I’m asking him those questions. I’m helping him dig the grave. It seemed like the right thing to do, and I really wanted it to be difficult for those words to come out of Daryl’s mouth. I don’t know those characters’ backstory, and I’m putting everyone at risk by bringing anybody back at all. It’s a big deal to recruit people. I wanted it to be difficult for Daryl to say those lines, especially knowing what’s going to happen at the end of the episode, because it’s got to hurt Daryl personally that they screwed him over.

I think even when they say "I’m sorry,” and Daryl says "You’re gonna be,” it’s half "I’m gonna rip your face off when I find you,” and it’s half “If this is the way you go about surviving in this world, then you’re going to die even if I don’t find you. There’s safety in numbers, and you’re two scared rabbits running. You’re making a huge mistake right now.” It couldn’t be super bravado, like “I’m going to…!” I can’t yell that line at them. I have to say it with double meaning. I had to go in there and ask those three questions and kind of swallow my tongue a little bit. It couldn’t have been like, "We have this. Come and join us.” It’s like, I know in the back of my head that I might be making a mistake, but I’m putting myself out on a limb for this. When they’re driving off on my motorcycle and have my crossbow, a lot of what’s going on in my head at that moment is: “I let Rick down. I let the group down.” It’s an internal failure. When I get back, I might not be the type of person that tells anyone this story. It’s going to mean something.

Greg Nicotero told me those earlier Season 6 scenes between Daryl and Rick, when Daryl disagrees with Rick about recruiting, sparked a conversation amongst all three of you and leads to an episode later this season that is heavily focused on Daryl and Rick. Will Daryl’s experience with the forest people factor into that, too?
Absolutely. It absolutely factors into it. The episode that Greg’s talking about is coming up in a little while. That episode’s completely different. Things happen in that episode that are huge. I remember before we shot that, Andy [Lincoln] came over, and we watched Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. He’s so Butch Cassidy, and I’m so Sundance Kid. Everything about the two of us, on-set and off, is like that. I texted Robert Redford afterwards and said, “Hey. What’s up?” It’s really a super cool episode.

That’s an episode coming in the second half of the season?
Yes, ma'am.

That voice on the radio when Daryl, Sasha, and Abraham are driving back to Alexandria in the truck: You know who we all want that to be…
Not Glenn. The only thing I’ll say is that it’s not Glenn.

What can you say about the rest of the season? As you said earlier, it’s going a thousand miles an hour, and there are only two episodes left this year.
I filmed last night until 7 a.m. and got in my car and drove back to my house with the sun coming up. I’ll say, I was very sticky. I talked with Andy the whole drive back. We’re so excited about the quality of stuff we’re doing right now. It’s seriously reached a whole new level. It just keeps jumping to higher plateaus. At the end of filming days and nights, everybody wants to stay around and talk about it. We have a huge crew, and they’re all so invested in the show, and they’ve been watching it since day one, six years now. If it’s seven in the morning and the whole crew is still there for an hour talking about what we shot today, and we’re still talking like that, I’m really excited for viewers to watch it. Honestly, it’s like an avalanche is falling. It’s so loud. It’s really mind-blowing, what we’re doing.

And about your other show, the upcoming AMC motorcycle travel series Ride with Norman Reedus: Have you filmed any or all of the episodes yet?
We filmed a pilot, which was more of a test for us just to see what it’s like. We rode through the Blue Ridge Mountains, into North Carolina. It was more about the journey than the destination, to be honest. We’re kind of doing like an Anthony Bourdain thing, where the common denominator is food. It’s more about meeting people and going on these journeys to these amazing places and hearing people’s stories, becoming a part of their journey.

It’s a lot of fun, I have to say. It’s not just for motorcycle riders. It’s kind of a man on his horse, out there roaming the world. It’s a dream job for me, obviously, for a billion reasons. My first job was working in a motorcycle shop, ages ago. I never thought I would come full circle and still be doing stuff on motorcycles. It’s really, really fun for me. We’re going to have really cool guests that will go with us. We’ll go find new things and learn about things. Hopefully, the viewers will feel like they’re on the bike with us.

Will any of your TWD castmates be joining you?
Maybe. We’ve got a bunch of riders on the show right now, so maybe. Steven [Yeun] and Austin [Nichols] drove over to my house yesterday on their bikes, up through Atlanta. Everybody wants to be on it. It sounds like fun. It will be cool. It’s going to be a blast.

Okay, an update: Is Andy Lincoln’s beard still in your refrigerator?
Andy Lincoln’s beard is still in my refrigerator, and not only that, I just added Hershel’s ponytail to the mix.

You’re going to have the official Walking Dead Hair Museum in your refrigerator.
I’m cloning everybody.

The show really can go on forever, then.
No, no, no. It’ll be a new show. I’ll just have manservants around my house, with all our cast walking around bringing me cucumber salad and stuff. It’ll be fun.

The Walking Dead airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on AMC.