The season 6 finale of AMC’s The Walking Dead left us with one of the biggest cliffhangers in the entire series. Who does Negan kill? Fans may find out when the 7th season debuts this Sunday. But keep in mind that the showrunners may wait a few episodes to reveal who dies and instead focus on another storyline or backstory.

Entertainment Weekly recently spoke with showrunner Scott M. Gimple about the upcoming season. And according to Gimple, this death will be different than all the others. When asked to explain, Gimple said “well, this isn’t somebody being attacked by a Walker, it isn’t random, it’s purposeful. It’s extremely purposeful. Negan said in the finale that this is him showing them what the consequences are if they won’t do what he says. Not only do they have this terrible loss, but they lose their autonomy. They’re under someone’s thumb now, in every way. And the consequences of that, of trying to defy him, are laid out in front of them in just the most horrible way. They’re powerless, they lose all of their power. At every opportunity up to this point, they’ve been parlaying that power. And their power was fighting together. That’s what episode 609 was all about. That was the great victory that they had, last season. They went, ‘Holy crap, if we do this all together, we can do anything!’ But that isn’t true. It’s a bigger group and they are fertile and they are relentless and ruthless. And the death is evidence of that. But they’re moving into a whole new reality. And it’s not the reality they want to live in but they have to.”

The Rolling Stone recently learned that the 8th season of The Walking Dead will feature 16 episodes. In regards to the cliffhanger, AMC president Charlie Collier said “Eeny, meeny, miny, more (referencing Negan’s taunt in the cliffhanger). What a joy to partner with Robert Kirkman, Scott Gimple and some of the hardest-working people in television to bring The Walking Dead to the fans. And, most important, thanks to those fans for breathing life into this remarkable series right along with us.”

Kirkman added “We knew that people might be upset, but come on! Everybody wants to see what happened. That’s what a cliffhanger is. I’ll probably get crucified for this, but I feel like there’s a culture of instant gratification now: Netflix, social media, everything is on demand at all times. Nothing is withheld. You can’t do 52 episodes a year. It’s just not feasibly possible. If you can do something that has people talking about your show in that gap between seasons, that’s great. We just ask that if you’ve enjoyed the show so far, just know, Season Seven is going to be pretty great.”

There you have it folks, plenty to look forward to! Stay tuned for the latest news on The Walking Dead!