‘Fear The Walking Dead’ Showrunner on What’s to Come, the Salazar Family and More

Fear The Walking Dead‘s second episode premiered last night and fans got to see the outbreak spread even more, observe how the public is responding and meet a new family.

Travis and Madison were separated when Travis went to get his son and his son’s mother, so that everyone could safely escape from the city. Unfortunatley, due to protests and civilization basically beginning to go to hell, getting back home proved difficult for Travis (while staying home proved equally difficult for Alicia).

Showrunner Dave Erickson chatted with The Hollywood Reporter about some of the reactions we saw the public make last night, from police officers stocking up on water, to neighbors that refused to cancel a party and paid for it in the end. See what else Dave had to say below.

On what’s ahead for the next episode

“When we end episode two, Travis has found Chris and Liza and is holed up with Salazars. Across town, Madison is home and has secured Nick’s medicine. Alicia is worried about Matt and has no idea what’s happening and hasn’t reached his parents. Going into episode three, it’s a question of can Madison and Travis be brought together and reunite the family? One of the ironies of the show is two people trying to form this blended family and the only reason it happens is because the world falls apart. We’ll continue to see the unraveling as Tobias says, when civilization ends, it ends fast and we’ll see more elements of that. We’ll see more elements of the fall and we will hopefully see Madison and Travis find each other. The circumstances will be very horrific, if not apocalyptic.”

On the purpose of the Salazar family

“The Salazars will become hugely important. They’re El Salvadorian and came to the U.S. in the ’80s following the civil war in El Salvador and there’s an interesting story that will accompany that. Ofelia (Mercedes Mason) grew up here and when we first meet them, she’s the caretaker of her parents. She sees them as being a bit backwards and of the old country; they haven’t assimilated; her mother really speaks no English at all. Ofelia prides herself as being their guide and defender and as things turn, she will realize that her parents are far more reliant and stronger than she ever knew. They’ll learn some things about each other over the course of the season.”

On how we’ll see people respond to the outbreak as it spreads

“The way people are going to react is essentially a fight-or-flight mentality. For Travis and Madison going into episode two, they want to flee the city. They realize that something really awful is happening and people are becoming violent and they need to escape that. If they were able to gather everybody within the first act, they would have headed out to the desert and waited it out. You see different versions of that. The [next door neighbor] character who we see in episode two is packing and getting ready to go and we have interesting things happening with him down the road. The neighbors across the street know something is going around but they are where Madison and Travis were in the pilot — they know something is off but they don’t quite understand what it is. Episode two, to a certain degree, is about everyone getting on the same page and reaching a place where they recognize that things are falling apart and not going to get better anytime soon. People are trying to get out; the freeways are jammed and there are some, by the time they realize what’s happening, it’s too late for them to get anywhere.”

For the rest of Erickson’s interview, head on over to THR.

Let us know what you thought of last night’s episode of Fear The Walking Dead in the comments below.

Photo Credit: AMC

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