SPOILERS for TWD, FTWD, TWD: WB, and a slight reference to TWDG Final Season, but not technically a spoiler.
WARNING - I will be delving into a fair bit here to make my point as easily understandable as possible. I've waited a while to give my thoughts, but I never had the right time to deliver them, and now that my brain can't stop theorizing the future of this franchise, I just have to get my thoughts out. I swear, this will start sounding like a Marvel theory by the end of this, but I have reason in my thinking! If you don't have time on your hands, don't read this because I will be laying out everything in one big post. Most of this theory comes from a youtube video I watched, I cannot remember the creator or the video itself. If this sounds familiar or you've seen the video I'm talking about, please credit them for me!!
Let's be 100% honest here. Rick's exit in the walking dead raised more questions than who Judith's real dad is (I think it's Shane). And as an exit for such a big character in the show, the last thing you'd want is confusion and questions all up in the air. The reason I'm bringing it up now is that the three spin-offs are right around the corner, and I've yet to see the CRM in any promotional and bts footage/photos. When they ended TWD and had Rick return for that beautiful speech about the dead, I was relieved, sure, but yet again the writers just opened themselves up to more confusion and questions from the fans. Where has Rick been? What's he been doing for god knows how many years? Why are his grippers out in the mud? Where did he get that flash jacket? Sure, giving us bits and pieces make us invested to find out more, but at some point, you just gotta ask yourself "Am I creating excitement for the future? Or am I just edging these poor bastards until we release a train wreck of a show?" I'm here to give my 2 cents about where I think the writers SHOULD go with the plot, but feel free to disagree or prove me wrong.
Let's start from the beginning. Rick's coma. Rick's coma was taken directly from the comics, with very few - if any at all - changes. Rick gets shot (twice?) and lands in the hospital. The next scene we see is him waking up, and the whole world has ended. We know the scene. It's very hard to forget such an amazing opening to what is arguably one of the greatest long-running Television series of its time. Now I've seen a few theories revolving around Rick's confusing revival from the coma - one of the most popular being that it's all a dream. But one of my favorites is actually about Rick's blood in relation to the coma. We know that he was out for roughly 40 days, and in that time the Walker virus (we're calling it that for now) took over and infected every living human on the planet as far as we know. What the theory suggests is that because of Rick's perfectly timed introduction to his hospital bed, he actually avoided getting infected by the virus completely. Now for the theory to work, we have to make a few assumptions on how the virus operates/spreads, and don't expect any concrete answers. The origins of the virus have always been muddy (comics and show alike), but thanks to World Beyond, we at least know it was man-made in the TV Universe.
They believe Rick is "immune" because while everyone was fighting and killing over a pack of cigarettes, Rick was chilling in a deep slumber in a hospital - the safest and most sterile place to be in this scenario. The theory was backed up with "evidence", saying that Rick actually fought off the Walker virus after the Prison got blown to bits in season 4. Carl and Rick are locked up in some house and Rick immediately passes out. It's assumed he's out for a few days (in the comics, it's roughly 3-4 days) and at one point Carl almost shoots Rick, thinking he's turned. Rick then makes a swift recovery, and onto Terminus they go. Not concrete evidence, but I can see where they were going with this. The second piece of "evidence" - and I use this term lightly - is the famous bridge scene in season 9, where Rick gets impaled, slips in and out of consciousness, then blows up a bridge to save the communities from a herd. Many agree that it was borderline impossible for Rick to have survived this, but somehow he's still awake when Jadis sees him and calls in the CRM helicopter. Now that's what I call plot armor. Moving on. The theory suggests that Rick doesn't die/turn into a walker because rather than his brain dying and only slightly coming back to give life to basic motor skills (refer to CDC plot in s1), his brain actually fully recovers, making him halfway immortal.
While I like this theory, the "evidence" surrounding it is not very concrete, and can easily be brushed off as Rick just being an absolute tank of a human - and they'd be right. I also hate the idea of Rick being able to "come back to life" so to speak, and because we never get concrete footage of Rick "dying", it becomes hard to believe. What I do like about this theory however is that it makes one think about the "purity" of Ricks blood because of the coma, and what the original intent behind the virus actually was. We know that humans created it, and it had to have been for a specific reason, and we also know that the CRM is searching for a cure in certain individuals, however terrifying those methods may be.
Alright. Now that we have the explanations and theories out of the way, let's look at the facts real quick. Jadis was part of the CRM. She was part of the trash people community (i don't think they ever explained why she was out there to begin with) and she occasionally traded people for resources. This is why she had a landing pad for helicopters in their base. we know this because she admits it, and we know it's the CRM because at one point she eats out of a can with three circles on its lid. This version of their canned food was clearly in early development, as World Beyond shows us more food cans, but the logo and cans themselves look slightly different. It's clear that the CRM was just a half-built idea at this stage, but they needed SOMETHING to give Rick a banging exit. She mentions A and B, and later we discover A is a dead and recently turned human, while B is a human who is still alive. She convinces the CRM to take Rick as a B, even though she promised an A, and we see Rick fly off in that damned helicopter. The CRM does not make another appearance in the main show until the last minute of the finale. Literally.
Onto the finale. Oh, the finale. There are plenty of things I have to say about this episode but lets stick to the point. Rick is seen in a CRM jacket, writing something in his diary before a helicopter alerts Rick and he throws all his belongings on a boat. The same boat Michonne later discovers (or previously discovered in her final scenes if we're basing it episodically. Don't get me started on this timeline) A voice then appears over radio saying "Come on Rick. It's like we told you, there's no escape for the living." A LOADED sentence, I know. But let's unpack its significance. I promise the theories, the history lesson, all of this will make sense. Just bare with me here. This is where things get a bit hard to keep up with so I will lay it out as simply as I can.
"Come on Rick. It's like we told you, there's no escape for the living." DUN DUN DUUUUN. The big bad villains have been revealed, but they also gave us a bit more insight into the relationship between Rick and the CRM. For this to make sense, you have to have seen up until about s7 e11 of Fear The Walking Dead. Remember Al and her girlfriend? Yeah, they actually play a BIG role in understanding how the CRM operates, and possibly why they're treating Rick differently.
Al runs into Isabelle (or Ground 17) a CRM soldier and it is made clear from their very first interaction that because Al has seen Isabelle, she has to die. Yep. Just die. The CRM operates in extreme privacy, and their biggest rule while out in the wasteland is "Destroy any evidence that you were here", and that includes human beings too. If anyone runs into a soldier, sees their gear, helicopters, or even a symbol on a can (I'm assuming) they become an immediate threat to their privacy, and these individuals are to be executed swiftly. Hell, the CRM is so paranoid about being discovered that they wipe out the entire Campus Colony in WB, all because a teenage girl gave a speech about not being able to fully trust them yet. Now obviously, Al and Isabelle's interactions go differently, and the two actually meet up a few times after that, but every time Isabelle states in clear spoken words. "If I tell you what we are or what we do, I have to kill you." Pretty heavy words coming from your apocalypse crush. This threat not only applies to survivors coming across the CRM but also to soldiers who abandon their stations or escape the CRM. In fact, these individuals take priority in being hunted down and killed, as the CRM stands the most to lose if a soldier spills their secrets.
Notice how when the helicopter found Rick in the finale of TWD, their immediate reaction wasn't to shoot the deserter? Rather than eliminating an escapee with their secrets, their mission is to capture and return. At least, that is their intent based on their actions. Even the words that the officer speaks to Rick possibly hint that this isn't the first time Rick has made a run for it. Everything from how calmly he delivers those words, to Rick's rage on his face suggests that Rick has been running off since he got there. But why spare him? Why keep the search up time and time again? If this "soldier" is so set on leaving and is clearly causing pain to grow in one's neck, why even bother keeping him alive? Maybe it has something to do with a search for their cure. Remember the theory about Rick's "pure" blood? Oh yeah, we're going there!
But I can't jump straight into that rollercoaster without supporting that claim. Now, in full transparency, I haven't finished World Beyond. I know that it's the show with THE MOST information on the CRM and how they operate, but did they really need to focus on such one-dimensional teenagers to accomplish that? Hell even an Al-inspired docuseries about them would've been more interesting than that shit. Actually, now that I mentioned it, I wouldn't mind a Mockumentary version of TWD: WB. It'll be more of a creative take than that one stupid episode from Tales of TWD. Anyway, I'm losing focus here. Point is, the only things I've seen from WB are the first few episodes, a few scenes here and there involving Jadis, and the post-credit scene. I do plan on finishing WB, within the next few weeks in fact, but ill leave that for a day when I want to melt my brain. What I DO remember, however, is a conversation between Jadis and another woman. One where she said she "saw the strongest man she's ever met in a vulnerable position and took advantage of it." clearly referring to Rick, and another conversation where she admits to how she got accepted back. "I gave them someone. Something valuable." Valuable? The only thing Rick's good at is doing stuff and thangs. (you didn't think I'd leave that joke out, did you?)
My point here is, WHY is Rick so valuable to the CRM? It can't be his leadership skills, he earned those by doing right by his people. Sure, he could lead a division in the CRM, but that would be extremely risky. Plus, all their leadership roles are filled. He's good at surviving, sure, but he's not military. At least not when we last saw him. He knew how the world worked, how to lead, and how to survive, but the same can be said for many characters in this universe. So why is Rick so valuable that they would rather retrieve him than kill him? Maybe I'm reading into it a bit too hard here, but the only explanation I can think of is that Rick has something EXTREMELY VALUABLE to give in regard to their search for a cure. That's their priority apart from expanding after all. And that's how we land on Rick's "pure blood" theory.
I'm assuming the price of admission into the CRM is a blood test. If you're running such a large-scale military/government, it would make sense for a blood test to at least be required before entering the community. And what happened when they discovered that Rick's blood was different (because of his isolation in the coma)? Jadis got promoted, and Rick became their most valuable asset. Now the theory doesn't end here. I don't believe Rick's blood just hands them a cure. No. It's an indication that this individual has not been affected by the virus and therefore stands much to give in the FOUNDATION for a cure. And while we're on the topic of blood tests, I'm aware that in s1 the whole group had to agree to a blood test before entering the CDC. Now one could claim that the doctor there would've noticed Rick's unique blood, but let's remember here that he had about two months' worth of research, while the CRM has had roughly 10 years. Im not discrediting his skills, but a lot was unknown about walkers at that point in time.
Let's take a pause XD
So...Rick's blood provides a foundation for a cure, and the reason behind this thinking is his (roughly) 40 days in a coma during the outbreak, and the CRM breaking protocol by capturing Rick, a "deserter" or "escapee", rather than killing him. We think it's his blood because Jadis admits that Rick is very valuable to the CRM, and she even got promoted after handing him over. We know the virus is manmade and originated in France thanks to the WB end credit scene, and we also know that Dr Brenner from s1 was in contact with the French before Rick and the group showed up to the CDC. How does this affect Rick's future?
We're gonna take a quick step back to the finale of TWD. In the middle of the episode, Judith accidentally blurts out that she can't die because "mom's gonna find dad," in front of Daryl. Can we take a moment and applaud this scene because I was starting to think they had forgotten about that whole plotline? And in front of DARYL? Tears formed in my eyes when I saw his eyes light up. immediately I knew that no matter how the Commonwealth arc resolved, Daryl would be on his bike by the end looking for Rick. And then they did it. and I facepalmed. Because why oh why, can't we just leave this to the professionals? Clearly, Michonne knew what she was going, but Daryl is just flying off in whatever direction, hoping to do some "tracking" or something? Okay TWD writers. Sure. ANYWAY. By the end, Daryl admits to Carol that he can't stay because now he knows that both Michonne and Rick are still out there. Carol accepts it and Daryl promises to bring them home. The reason I bring this up is that the only reason he leaves is because he's going to find Rick and Michonne. And then the writers tell us that the Daryl spin-off is set in France.
Yup. France. With all the running variants, the source of the outbreak, a decaying Eiffel Tower, and Rick? Yeah, I believe that Rick will be taken to, or at the very least was taken to and then brought back, from France. Now the writers and even Norman Reedus himself confirm that Daryl does not go to France willingly. He is taken there. And sure, this is their opportunity to show the outbreak outside of the states, but it is also an opportunity to explain France's relationship with the CRM. If I'm not mistaken, the WB end credit scene confirms that there are three "teams" involved in the outbreak, and I can't help but think that that is what the three circles in the CRM logo represent. Now why would Rick be taken to France? Well, let's assume Rick holds the foundation for a cure. The CRM, as far as I can tell, has not laid a finger on Rick. we only know that he's being held there against his will. Maybe it's because they were waiting to transport him to France, where they have better equipment to make use of Rick. The CRM in the States might be tasked with finding individuals who hold potential for a cure, hence Jadis' people trading skills, while the CRM in France is tasked with actually developing and breaking down this cure. Now that's a big stretch, but I repeat, Daryl leaves with the sole purpose of finding Rick and ends up in France. I don't know what to make of this information.
We know Maggie and Negan will most likely have a run-in with the CRM as well, purely because it's stated in WB that there is a CRM base in New York, but they never intended on looking for Rick. Will it be the main focus? Im not so sure, it's hard to really tell what was going through the writer's mind during the process of coming up with these spinoffs. For now, I'm almost certain that even if Daryl doesn't find Rick in France, there has to be a connection there, otherwise, why send him overseas? It's not too difficult to imagine that Rick was transported to and from France if you look at how well-equipped the CRM is in regards to ammo, helicopters, humvees, etc.
How does Michonne fit into all this? I can't tell you to be honest. Michonne being a part of this whole thing is the hardest thing for me to figure out purely because we have no clue who the people were that she joined in her last episode. They were big, sure, and many people believed that the herd of walkers she runs towards in the finale is actually the CRM leading a herd somewhere, as they're known to do this, but she is the biggest mystery to me in all of this. Maybe that's why she's my favorite. But back on track.
Rick's future in the TWD universe.
Do I think Rick is immune to the Walker Virus? Nope. I believe that if he ever got bit he would eventually turn, but it might take longer than others. Do I believe Rick will turn into a walker if he's killed any other way? No. Because of his "pure" blood, if Rick dies, he will not come back as a walker. In fact, if they wanted to make this impactful, Rick's death could possibly signify a true new beginning. Rick gets shot, stabbed, sick, whatever, and dies surrounded by his family. One of them has to drive a knife into his head to stop him from turning but no one can. It's too painful. they just got him back. At this stage, a few CRM soldiers/doctors have given up their posts to join him and tells his family that they shouldn't stab him. Not yet. Rick was special to the CRM and these ex-members want to see if they were ever on the right track with him. So they wait. And wait. Nothing. Rick is dead, but he does not come back as a walker, and it becomes a bittersweet moment as the group realizes there might be hope. A future without walkers. This not only furthers the cure plotline but gives the survivors true hope and reason to continue.
I do think that Rick will die in his spinoff. Unless Andrew Lincoln decides he wants to jump back into the game, it feels like the Rick and Michonne spinoff is more of a close to his story, rather than a continuation. It would be a nice shock too, especially if he doesn't turn. But this is obviously heavily speculated. The way I like to view this spin-off comes from this moment in the final Walking Dead Game where Tenn says that he believes humanity is going through the "Walker Age" similar to an Ice Age and that eventually, humanity will come out on the other side, free from the undead burden.
But that's just my thought on the future of Rick Grimes. As I stated before, it's hard knowing what's going through the writers' heads but this, to me at least, makes the most sense. I like playing puzzles like these. Sometimes I think the fanbase delves deeper into the story than the writers do XD
Please feel free to let me know what you thought of all this, if it made sense, or if you even agree with me at all. It's my first Reddit post too, so any feedback is appreciated. I probably didn't need to go THAT DEEP into my theory but I love The Walking Dead and it's universe, and I couldn't pass up the opportunity to talk about it. I will be immensely embarrassed if these spinoffs come out and I completely missed the mark
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