Walking Dead: The Man Who Shot Rick Secretly Also Killed [SPOILER]

Warning! Spoilers for The Walking Dead comic book series below

The man who shot Rick Grimes in the first issue of The Walking Dead that left him in a coma actually made a surprise return in the series’ fifth issue, where he killed one of the survivors from the original group. In a full-circle moment, the walker that murdered Amy in The Walking Dead #5 was revealed to be the same person who put Rick in a coma, with a mobile game confirming a man named Reggie was responsible for both incidents.

In The Walking Dead comic book series, the iconic opening scene features police deputy Rick Grimes involved in a shootout alongside his partner Shane, as they’re trying to take down an angry gun-toting man who doesn’t want to go back to prison. When Grimes attempts to get an angle on the shooter, he’s hit with a bullet that puts him into a coma. Famously, upon waking up in the hospital, he’s surrounded by walkers, as a zombie outbreak occurred when he was recovering from nearly being killed. It turns out that the man who shot Grimes reappeared later in the series.

In The Walking Dead #5 by Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore from Image Comics, the survivors band together around a campfire when Amy briefly departs to use the bathroom. However, after briefly separating from the group, Amy’s attacked by a walker, who bites her neck, killing her. Rick Grimes and Shane shoot at the walker, taking it (and others) out as Amy succumbs to her injuries. While the walker might seem like a random zombie, the person who killed Amy was revealed to be Reggie, the man who shot Rick in the first place.

In The Walking Dead: Assault and The Walking Dead: All Out Miniature Games mobile games, it’s pointed out that the walker who bit Amy was the same person who shot Rick Grimes and put the hero in a coma during the series’ first issue. The latter game revealed his name as Reggie while confirming his role in shooting Grimes and biting Andrea’s sister. The look of the walker in the comics matches Reggie, as he is similar-looking to the man who shot Rick, albeit with more teeth as a zombie than he did when he was alive.

While the TWD game confirmed Reggie was responsible for shooting Rick Grimes and later biting Amy, it’s not entirely clear whether the mobile games are canon in The Walking Dead universe. Despite the question of continuity, having the man who shot Rick return as a walker to take down one of the survivors ended up showing the duality of threats they faced in The Walking Dead. Dead or alive, Rick Grimes and the group of survivors always had something to fear, as everyone, from the worst of the worst, can come back reanimated as a walker.