(Spoilers from The Walking Dead shows will be found below.)
The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon delivered an emotionally lush season finale this week with Norman Reedus’ freshly washed, crossbow-wielding survivor sticking around in France after all. That detail wasn’t too surprising, since Season 2 is currently filming abroad, which let everyone know that Daryl doesn’t immediately return to The Commonwealth as he previously had hoped would happen.
Instead, he is apparently persuaded not to hop on that boat. This (of course) has to do with Laurent, and maybe Daryl will continue proving himself different than his own father. And on the subject of family, we got to see Daryl stop by his grandfather’s gravesite, which is quite a feat for a character who had never traveled outside Georgia when TWD began. Meanwhile, his “family” back home is looking for him, meaning that Melissa McBride’s Carol is now worried that Daryl didn’t show back up as promised. She has no idea that he ended up on a capsized little rowboat and washed ashore in Europe, but she might be getting a clue soon.
As the final scene of the finale revealed, Carol forced a dude into a car trunk after realizing that he had Daryl’s bike. She also appeared in a Season 2 teaser that aired after the episode.
Where did this take place? Well, there’s a French flag (also as noted by Comic Book) within frame during that finale scene, which may have clued Carol into something seriously amiss with Daryl’s whereabouts. Storywise, the scene was supposed to have taken place in the U.S., but it was aimed in France, as revealed by showrunner David Zabel to EW:
That was in France. We filmed everything in France. So Daryl’s whole backstory in episode 5, that’s all filmed in France. It was interesting because all of a sudden our brilliant French production designers and costumers and everything, all of a sudden we’re like, “Okay, now you’ve got to make it look like America.” So it was a little tricky at times.
Zabel also told EW that Carol will be on a “dual track” (which has something to do with whomever mysteriously returned to The Commonwealth) in Season 2, which includes an “internal story” in addition to looking for Daryl. Does she officially end up in France, too? Zabel isn’t telling, although there are paparazzi photos floating around out there of McBride and Reedus on a set together. So, Caryl will ride together again, either metaphorically or literally, and Season 2 will formally be subtitled as The Book Of Carol. No complaints there.
The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon‘s full first season can be streamed on AMC+.