Jeffrey Dean Morgan enjoyed stepping into a completely different version of The Walking Dead universe for an upcoming Dead City episode, but one detail in the final edit left him frustrated.
The episode imagines a reality where the zombie apocalypse never happened, giving Negan and Maggie a very different relationship. It also brings back Emily Kinney as Beth Greene, making the installment a major departure from the franchise’s usual format.
Jeffrey Dean Morgan calls out a specific batting cage scene involving Negan’s iconic swing
One sequence places Morgan and Lauren Cohan inside a New York City batting cage. The setting also serves as a reference to Negan’s history with his barbed-wire baseball bat, Lucille.
According to Entertainment Weekly, Morgan’s complaint had nothing to do with the idea behind the scene. Instead, he felt the finished episode failed to show how well he actually performed at the plate.
“What you don’t see there is I hit every f—ing ball that was pitched at me!” Morgan said. “I never missed!”
The challenge went beyond simply connecting with each pitch. Morgan also had to deliver a lengthy monologue while continuing to swing.
“It pissed me off because I had this huge speech and I couldn’t miss,” he said. “I was hitting every f—ing ball hard.”
When Morgan eventually watched the scene, he realized viewers would not fully see that effort.
“I remember being really mad when I saw the cut of that,” he said. “I’m like, you can’t tell that I’m hitting everything! That was the only thing that upset me about the episode.”
Outside of that issue, Morgan praised the alternate-reality concept. After spending years playing Negan across The Walking Dead franchise, he said the new setting gave the character somewhere different to go.
The change even extended to his wardrobe. Instead of Negan’s familiar leather coat, Morgan got to wear a suit.
He also compared the episode to a Hallmark movie because of its different tone, though he stressed that Negan still creates trouble even without an apocalypse surrounding him.
For Morgan, the concept offered a way to explore Negan and Maggie without repeating storylines the franchise had already covered.
The Walking Dead: Dead City will air the alternate-reality episode Sunday at 9 p.m. ET/PT.
