Negan (TV Series)

"Hi. You're Rick, right? I'm Negan. And I do not appreciate you killing my men. Also, when I sent my people to kill your people for killing my people... you killed more of my people. Not cool. Not cool. You have no idea how not cool that shit is, but I think you're going to be up to speed shortly. Yeah... you are so going to regret crossing me in a few minutes. Yes, you are."

- Negan to Rick Grimes

Negan (pronounced NEE-gan) is a main character and an antagonist as well as a survivor of the outbreak in AMC's The Walking Dead. He is the leader of the Saviors and serves as the main antagonist of the second half of Season 6 and Season 7.

Personality
"A physically imposing, charismatic, brutal, smart, ferocious, frightening, hilarious, inappropriate, oddly friendly, fun loving sociopath that is both a leader of men and a killer of men. He has both a practical and emotional intelligence, he's a brilliant strategist, he's pure, dangerous, murderous, often gleeful, that still has both discipline and a code. And he has a temper that can vaporize people. He's truly one of the strongest personalities ever."

Pre-Apocalypse
Almost nothing is known about Negan's life prior to the outbreak other than he was a used car salesman. He may have lived somewhere in or near the state of Virginia.

Post-Apocalypse
At some point after the outbreak, Negan formed a group of survivors he named 'The Saviors' which mainly consisted of thugs and bandits who operated under his command. This group gained renown for acting ruthless and uncompromising. Throughout the following years, Negan and his group grew in power and strength, began to terrorize other communities, and subjugated them to their will.

Negan and his group soon discovered a community known as the Hilltop Colony. Immediately after the farming community's walls were built, Negan dispatched a group of Saviors; upon meeting the community leader, Gregory, the Saviors demanded half of the community's resources. In exchange, they promised not to attack or kill anyone. Though the Hilltop was reluctant about the deal, the Saviors showed their true motives by demonstrating their power, killing Rory, a 16 year-old boy, as a display of superiority, claiming that the Hilltop "needed to understand... right off the bat".

"Last Day on Earth"
After Rick Grimes's group is captured by the Saviors following several roadblocks and a failed diversion en-route to the Hilltop Colony, Negan steps out of their RV and confronts them, introducing himself as the Saviors' true leader. Pacing back and forth before the group, he lectures them on their actions against his group and the "new world order", explaining that Rick's people owe Negan's men their supplies and that he will personally deal with them if they refuse.

He goes on to inform Rick that he is keeping his group alive as he intends to make them work for him - however, in retribution for Rick and his people killing many Saviors, Negan warns that he will have to "beat the holy hell" out of one member of the group. He begins pacing up and down the line-up while considering his choice, and introduces Lucille, a wooden baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire, as his weapon of choice.

Unable to decide who to kill, Negan ultimately comes up with an idea and begins pointing at each survivor with Lucille, chanting "eeny, meeny, miny, moe". Going up and down the line-up, he eventually stops on one survivor at random - as this is seen from the victim's perspective, the identity of the survivor is left ambiguous. As the rest of the group begins to yell in protest, Negan warns the group not to interfere lest he bring more harm to them, before bringing the bat down hard on the victim's head, causing them to bleed heavily. Negan is seen standing over them as they recover from the first blow, amazed at their endurance to the heavy damage before bringing the bat down a second time, blackening their vision. Negan is then heard mercilessly beating them over and over as the episode ends.

Season 7
Negan will appear in this season.

Killed Victims
This list shows the victims Negan has killed:


 * Rory (Caused)
 * Marsha (Caused or Direct)
 * Tim (Caused or Direct)
 * Ethan (Indirectly Caused)
 * At least 20 unnamed people
 * 1 unknown member of the Alexandria Safe-Zone
 * Numerous counts of zombies and unnamed people (Caused and Direct)

Dwight
While it is unconfirmed why Dwight and his wife fled from the Saviors, he likely fled because of Negan's frightening ways of leadership. When he and Honey are somehow caught, Negan possibly punished Dwight by burning the left side of his face, either by himself directly or by his men. Their relationship has presumably been severed from that on. However, it is assumed that Negan still trusts Dwight somehow, since Dwight led a group of the Saviors deep into the woods, and likely became one of his high ranking members.

In "Last Day On Earth" Dwight is shown to be very loyal to Negan, going as far as almost killing Glenn for desperately jumping towards Negan in fear of Maggie dying. Negan orders Dwight to get Glenn back in line, which he does without question.

Bud
"Your property... now belongs to Negan."

- Bud to Daryl Dixon, Abraham Ford, and Sasha Williams about Negan

Bud was never shown onscreen with Negan, although it is evident that he was loyal to him and more than willing to rob and kill other survivors for their supplies on behalf of Negan. It is possible he was one of Negan's close associates, as he was shown leading a small fraction of Saviors during their run in with Daryl Dixon, Sasha Williams, and Abraham Ford. Negan personally kills a member of Rick's group as revenge for the deaths of his people, which includes Bud.

Paula
Paula was never seen with Negan on screen but it is pretty clear she was devoted to him as she and Molly covered Negan's true identity from Carol. It is also possible she could be an important member of The Saviors as shown when she was leading the remaining Saviors after Rick Grimes and his group attacked their outpost. Later on, Negan personally kills a member of Rick's group as revenge for the deaths of his people, which includes Paula.

Gregory
Gregory is shown to be fearful of Negan and becomes submissive to his demands, giving him half of his community supplies, after Negan and the Saviors killed a member from the Hilltop. Negan takes advantage of Gregory's cowardice and begins demanding more supplies. After some time, he can't keep up to the amount that Negan wants, so Negan kidnaps Craig and sends Ethan to kill Gregory for failing to follow his orders. After the attempt of taking Gregory's life fails, the leader of the Hilltop decides to make a deal with Rick Grimes's group to eliminate Negan and the Saviors once and for all.

Paul Rovia
Jesus and Negan have not shared any on screen time yet, however it is clear that Jesus dislikes and fears Negan because of the actions of him and his men. He was also willing to kill his men in order for him to stop demanding supplies and possibly killing more people from Hilltop.

Rick Grimes
"Just stop this!"

- Rick roaring at Negan

Upon being informed of Negan, Rick clearly despises him for the actions he has committed both towards that of his group as well as the Hilltop Colony, following this Rick personally organized his group to kill Negan on behalf of the group's survival as well as that of the Hilltop Colony. Rick also expressed a vengeful willingness to find him. However upon being captured by The Saviors alongside his group during his first personal encounter with Negan, Rick displays immense fear of his wrath and superiority. Negan clearly despises Rick for killing his men and personally kills an unknown member of Rick's group in revenge for his actions.

Carl Grimes
Although they've shared very little interaction thus far, Negan has shown a level of amusement from Carl. Negan kneels down to Carl's height instead of looking down to him as he did the others and states that he has one of their guns. In contrast to his father and most of the group who were struck with fear in Negan's presence when captured, Carl instead shares a cold, vengeful look towards the man. This causes Negan to show perhaps a tinge of fascination in the boy when he gets no tears or anything but a death-glare reaction. Negan's interest in the boy is further exemplified when he specifically says he wishes not to kill "the little future serial killer".

Glenn Rhee
Negan is shown to have an immediate dislike towards Glenn for trying to attack him upon nearly deciding to kill Maggie, threatening to kill him in addition to whomever he choses to kill if he tries it again. He does seem to be amused by his feelings for Maggie as he sarcastically smiled upon hearing him beg for their lives.

Abraham Ford
Upon meeting him unlike most of the group Abraham shows no fear towards Negan when he apporaches him with Lucille. Negan seems to find Abraham amusing and says "I gotta shave this shit", rubbing the stubble on his face.

Maggie Greene
Upon meeting, Negan noted how "shitty" Maggie appeared, unknowingly due to potential miscarriage, and almost killed her outright saying "I oughta just put you out of your misery right now." Only Glenn's intervention made him change his mind.

Season 6

 * "Last Day on Earth"

Trivia

 * On November 10, 2015, his character was officially revealed as Negan and his character was first mentioned in "Start to Finish" as a teaser to his impending appearance.
 * Upon describing the character, Kirkman stated: "Negan is kind of an atomic bomb that's going to be dropped onto the show and the show will probably never be the same after that".
 * Upon discussing Negan's foul-mouthed nature, Jeffery Dean Morgan stated: "We're going to push AMC - the plan is to push them as far as they can because it's who Negan is. He uses some colorful language. And I use some colorful language. And reading the comic, it's important. So we'll see where that lands. It's our intention that this character is going to leap off the pages of the comic book. It's very important that that's who it is. Some of the characters there's much more leeway, but Negan is a guy that you want to keep as true as possible, and that would be how I want to play him as well."
 * According to Robert Kirkman: 'When it comes to the Saviors, and Negan in particular the way I've always thought about this in the comics is this is a group that's led by a guy who's had his morality dial a few clicks away from Rick toward the darker aspects of his personality, but is still an intellectual and capable leader who's kept his group alive against all odds just as long as Rick has. It's really the best encountering the best."
 * In an interview Scott Gimple provided an insight for viewing Negan as one of the greatest villians in television - "The worst kind of bullies in high school, and junior high, and elementary school, and kindergarten, pre-school, and the womb were the bullies that were funny. That was the worst because the bullies that were funny were show-people. I’m not going to say show men because there are a lot of girl bullies in school, too. They were funny and yet they were awful… And Negan is the ultimate version of that bully. And he is an incredible strategist. He can often appear capricious. He is pure id. He is this force of nature. He’s charismatic. A lot of villains on shows and comics and everything, it’s like, “Oh they’re the villain that you love to hate.” I think Negan is the villain that you hate to love. But you just love him. And he does some horrible things, but he has a reason for them."
 * His signature weapon is a baseball bat coated in barbed wire named "Lucille".
 * Negan is implied to be a cult leader as indicated in "The Same Boat" through Molly's expression, "We are all Negan."