'The Walking Dead': How the Big Cheese Teased Morgan's Martial Arts Teacher

Now we know a little bit more about those bo staff skills of Morgan’s: He learned them post-apocalypse, as he told Rick in the Season 6 Walking Dead premiere, and he learned them from “a cheesemaker,” as he told Father Gabriel in this week’s episode, “JSS.”

That’s too tantalizing a clue for us not to get a whole lot more backstory on Morgan’s more recent past, and TWD showrunner Scott Gimple did promise that Morgan’s story would have a cheese connection when he appeared on AMC’s Talking Dead Season 6 preview special back in August:

In a clip shown during the special, Morgan portrayer Lennie James discussed how obsessed he’s become with practicing the bo staff skills his character possesses — so much so that, even during trips to the grocery store, he said he imagines how he’d use the weapon on his fellow shoppers.

“I’m figuring out how to break their heads as I’m looking for my cheese,” James laughed.

Back in the studio, host Chris Hardwick asked Gimple if we would find out when and how Morgan acquired his new skill set.

“We will, and I’m not making a joke, for real, it has to do with cheese,” Gimple said. “There’s a cheese component to the story … and that was not planned, as far as like, I had no idea there was going to be [James’s] cheese B-roll.

“There’s a small component of cheese to the story. I hope not cheesy… actual cheese.”

When Hardwick asked if the cheese would have its own arc in Season 6, Gimple said yes, but that the arc would last just one episode.

So… a cheese backstory, coming soon to The Walking Dead Season 6.

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