When it was first announced that characters from AMC's The Walking Dead and its spin-off series Fear the Walking Dead would be crossing paths in the upcoming fourth season of Fear, the conclusion a lot of fans came to was that Michael Cudlitz, who played Abraham on The Walking Dead, would be joining the cast of Fear. It was the choice that made the most sense – Fear's characters looked set to be in the Houston, Texas area, Abraham was from Houston, and since Fear was still set years earlier in the zombie apocalypse timeline than TWD, the show could give us a glimpse of what he was up to before he appeared on the other show (and long before he was killed off at the beginning of The Walking Dead's seventh season).
When the identity of the crossover character was revealed, it was one of the least likely choices imaginable: Lennie James's character Morgan, whose whereabouts have been pretty well accounted for during the apocalypse, and he wasn't in Texas. Obviously, we weren't in on the plan new showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg had for Fear the Walking Dead – the plan to have the show's story jump ahead in time and catch up with the timeline of The Walking Dead. As a newly released trailer shows, Fear is no longer a prequel show. Its events are now happening concurrently with The Walking Dead's, and when the current season of The Walking Dead ends we will be following Morgan right into the new season of Fear.
This time jump is confirmed by Morgan himself, who talks about having just been through a "big fight", that being the "all-out war" of The Walking Dead season eight.
I'm not really enthusiastic about this time jump, I would rather Fear had remained earlier in the timeline than TWD and would have rather gotten a prequel story with Abraham than a current story with Morgan, but I'll be giving this crossover a fair chance.
In season four of Fear the Walking Dead, we will see the world of Madison Clark and her family through new eyes — the eyes of Morgan Jones, joining the story from the world of The Walking Dead. The characters’ immediate past mixes with an uncertain present of struggle and discovery as they meet new friends, foes and threats. They fight for each other, against each other and against a legion of the dead to somehow build an existence against the crushing pressure of lives coming apart. There will be darkness and light; terror and grace; the heroic, mercenary, and craven, all crashing together towards a new reality for Fear the Walking Dead.
Lennie James joins returning Fear cast members Kim Dickens, Alycia Debnam-Carey, Frank Dillane, Ruben Blades, Colman Domingo, Danay Garcia, and Ray McKinnon in the show's new season, along with fellow new additions Evan Gamble, Kevin Zegers, Maggie Grace, Garret Dillahunt, and Jenna Elfman.
Fear the Walking Dead's new season premieres at 10pm on Sunday, April 15th, immediately following the season eight finale of The Walking Dead.
The season four trailer can be seen below, and it has some audio issues at first.