Back when AMC's The Walking Dead was looking to cast its Negan, one actor who was gunning for the role was Garret Dillahunt, an excellent character actor I was first introduced to through his roles on the television series Deadwood and in the remake of THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT (in which he took over the role of Krug from David Hess). With rumors swirling around about his involvement with the show, Dillahunt took to Twitter to confirm that he was a Walking Dead fan and wanted to be Negan… but he understood that the powers-that-be would make the best choice for the show, and if he didn't get to play Negan he was looking forward to doing "something else someday" in the Walking Dead world.
That was two years ago this month. Jeffrey Dean Morgan ended up being cast as Negan, but now Dillahunt's "someday" has arrived.
Dillahunt has signed on for a role in the fourth season of The Walking Dead's companion series Fear the Walking Dead, which will reach AMC airwaves sometime next year. Details on his character have not been revealed, but he will be a series regular and the actor has said, "We got some pretty cool stuff planned!"
Set years before the events currently playing out on The Walking Dead, Fear the Walking Dead isÂ
a gritty drama that explores the onset of the undead apocalypse through the lens of a fractured family.
The show got off to a rocky start for me, but I found that it improved greatly over the course of its third season. The fourth season will be guided by new showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg (picking up where former showrunner Dave Erickson left off), with The Walking Dead showrunner Scott M. Gimple also joining the series as executive producer.
Dillahunt's co-stars on Fear the Walking Dead will include Kim Dickens, Alycia Debnam-Carey, Frank Dillane, Ruben Blades, Colman Domingo, and Ray McKinnon.