Negan Before Lucille: Jeffrey Dean Morgan Reveals His ‘Walking Dead’ Backstory
As the old saying goes, those who can’t do, teach. And those that can’t teach, teach gym. And if neither of those work out for you, wait until the zombie apocalypse and you can become a murderous gang’s psychopathic leader who wields a barbed wire-wrapped baseball bat. At least that’s the backstory for Negan, The Walking Dead’s new big bad who has swung onto the scene by killing two beloved characters.
In Interview Magazine, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who plays the charismatic killer, spoke about how someone at Comic-Con suggested that he would be perfect for the role, which prompted him to start reading the graphic novel that the AMC series is based on, and how “five years later, I was doing The Good Wife and got a call one night from my agent who said, ‘The Walking Dead is offering you the role of a villain.’ I said, ‘Well, what’s his name?’ And they were like, ‘You know, they won’t tell us, it’s a secret.” And I knew immediately—I knew because I watched the show and knew where we were—and I’m like, “It’s fucking Negan! And I’m going to fucking do it.”
Despite the character’s long history in the comic, a TV audience is getting their first looks at what Morgan can bring to the role, which inspired creator Robert Kirkman to write a prequel issue about Negan’s backstory — “He became this P.E. teacher and ping-pong coach, married to a woman named Lucille… you see him teaching ping-pong, and he’s swearing up a storm… I think he was just a bully, probably in high school, that had a cutting sense of humor and that’s just carried over… I think that molds him into the guy he is today, where you’ve got to follow his rules or you’re going to get a baseball bat to the head type of thing.”
Morgan also isn’t intent on replicating the comics frame for frame, “I needed a little bit of room to breathe, and there’s also stuff in the TV series that isn’t in the graphic novel. That gives me a little bit more space to put my spin on it.” Perhaps his fresh take on Negan can include killing less characters that we’ve come to love? Or maybe not…
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Tell us what you think! What did you think of Morgan’s portrayal of Negan? And did you see the double deaths coming? Hit us up on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram or leave your comments below. And check out our host, Khail Anonymous, on Twitter.
