'The Walking Dead' Producers Didn't Tone Down the Violence Despite Previous Claim
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In contrary to what executive producer Gale Anne Hurd said before, EPs Scott M. Gimple and Greg Nicotero claim that they wouldn't change a thing after receiving backlash for the season premiere.

AceShowbiz - Someone from "The Walking Dead" must have been lying. Executive producer Gale Anne Hurd said earlier this month that they would tone down violence in the remaining episodes of season 7 after receiving backlash from viewers due to the gruesome killing scene in the season 7 premiere. But now two other EPs, Scott M. Gimple and Greg Nicotero, insist that they wouldn't change a thing despite the criticism they had received.

"The violence in the premiere was pronounced for a reason," Gimple, who serves as showrunner, explains to EW. "The awfulness of what happened to the characters was very specific to that episode and the beginning of this whole new story. I don't think like that's the base level of violence that necessarily should be on the show. It should be specific to a story and a purpose, and there was a purpose of traumatizing these characters to a point where maybe they would have been docile for the rest of their lives, which was Negan's point."

He adds, "But I will say again, the violence in the premiere was for a specific narrative purpose and I would never say that that's the baseline amount of violence that we would show on the show. If we're ever going to see something that pronounced, there needs to be a specific narrative purpose for it."

Nicotero, who has directed some episodes of the show, answers with a flat "No" when asked if anything was toned down as a result of fan feedback on the season opener. "As brutal as that episode 1 was, it's still part of our storytelling bible, which is what the world is about," he echoes Gimple's statement. "I don't think we would ever edit ourselves, and I think - even after looking at that episode 1 again - as tough as it was for people to watch, I don't think we would have done it any differently. I don't think we'll ever pull ourselves back. There is definitely a difference between violence against walkers and human on human violence, but truthfully, we're serving our story."

In episode 7 of the season, when Negan put an iron to the face of one of the Saviors as a punishment for hooking up with his former girlfriend, the scene cut to show other characters instead of staying on the brutal moment. Asked if the show's producers made the decision as a reaction to the fan feedback, Gimple says, "Specific to that scene, I guess specific to everything, no."

"Greg Nicotero is the greatest makeup special effects guy in the world, but... what you don't see sometimes can be so much more horrible than what you see, what you imagine. And with the iron, that's a really good example," he claims. "That's something that I think the audience should do a little bit more of the work on. Also because as far as that kind of moment, the reality of what that would look like is strange looking. We've been in fist fights when we were kids on the playground and there's amalgams to that violence, but that kind of strange burn, the audience doing that in their head, even hearing it, it's just a different moment."

"The Walking Dead" returns Sunday, February 12 at 9/8c on AMC.

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