‘Fear the Walking Dead’ Star Lennie James Looks Back at Long Journey in ‘Walking Dead’ Universe (Exclusive)

Lennie James has been part of The Walking Dead universe since the franchise’s first episode in 2010. After appearing in a total of 35 episodes in the first eight seasons of The Walking Dead, James moved over to the spinoff series Fear the Walking Dead in 2018 where he has been a series regular ever since. PopCulture.com caught up with James who looked back at his journey in The Walking Dead universe. He was asked if he expected to be part of the franchise for more than 10 years. 

“No, but I’m not alone in that, no one did,” James told PopCulture. “And I’ve kind of said this in past interviews when we first started out in doing the first season of The Walking Dead, anybody who says that they envisaged or even hoped or to hope that we would actually end up where we were ending up is not telling the truth. It was a punt, it was a hail Mary and we’re all grateful for AMC for taking that punt. But no, we never expected to be here and I, more than most, never expected to have this kind of association, both with the character and with the universe.”

In The Walking Dead comics Morgan dies in the 82nd issue which is equivalent to the fifth or sixth season of the AMC series. After leaving Rick Grimes and his group on The Walking Dead series, Morgan becomes the leader of the group in Fear the Walking Dead. But with a nuclear bomb hitting the Texas area at the end of Season 6, the group is now separated and Morgan is doing everything he can to survive with Grace (Karen David) and baby Morgan. 

Along with being the star of Fear the Walking Dead, James has worked behind the camera as well, as he directed the second episode of Season 6. “I had a ball,” James said. “I directed an episode last season and that was the first one I did. And I had to do another episode to see what I’d learned and what I would do differently. 

“And luckily I got the opportunity to do that, and I had an absolute ball. They gave me a really lovely episode, really kind of, strong episode. And, I’m going to say it again, I had a ball doing it and, I may do it again, I may not. But if I don’t, it won’t change what the experience what I’ve learned from it.”