| “ | It is not a victory if I do not have everything I want.
―Alpha explaining to Negan her outlook on the war[src]
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” |
The Whisperer Conflict is the third major conflict of the series and occurred during the ninth and tenth seasons of AMC's The Walking Dead.
History[]
Discovery and the fair massacre
In the the hopes of contacting other distant communities with a newly found radio, Alexandria residents Eugene and Rosita head out to boost the radio's transmission by constructing a remote amplify at a nearby radio tower. During the run, a herd of walkers begins heading towards the two of them as they are climbing off the tower, and Eugene's leg is injured jumping off. With Eugene's speed greatly reduced and with the herd following them, the two are eventually forced to take shelter from the herd in a roadside ditch. Covering themselves in mud to camouflage their scent, they hear what appears to be the walkers speaking to one another, talking in full sentences such as "they must be close" and "don't let them get away."
Rosita is eventually found by Aaron and Paul "Jesus" Rovia, who relays that she was forced to leave Eugene behind in a barn. The two reassure her they will locate him for her tomorrow as they transport her to the Hilltop colony. After the arrival of Carol Peletier, Henry Sutton, and Daryl Dixon at Hilltop the next day, Daryl is asked by Aaron and Jesus to help them locate Eugene, which he agrees to. Michonne, who also arrived at Hilltop with Magna and her group, decides to help Daryl, Aaron and Jesus in finding Eugene.
While on the road looking for Eugene, the group discovers a herd of walkers in a field milling around in circles, something which confuses them as they’ve never seen them do this before. When Daryl tries to move the herd out of the field by luring them away with an alarm clock, the herd doesn’t even react to the sound and continues milling around in circles, much to their shock. The group later find Eugene hiding in an old barn, where he reveals he heard the walkers whispering to each other. Soon after, the same herd of walkers converges on the group, but despite their attempts to shake them off, the herd is persistent in finding them. As they are trapped in an old graveyard, Michonne attempts to break the gates down in order for the group to escape. She is suddenly helped by Magna, who had arrived in order for her and her group to earn their place. The herd enters the graveyard, forcing the group to kill several of them while the gates get opened. However, one walker suddenly dodges Jesus’ attack and stabs him dead, whispering “You are where you do not belong” into his ear as he throws his dead body on the floor. Daryl kills this apparent walker, but upon noticing its face looking strange, Daryl realises that the supposed walker was actually a man wearing a walker mask; a Whisperer. The group are then able to escape the graveyard, carrying Jesus’ body with them.
During the journey back, the group are ambushed by three more Whisperers. After they kill two of them, the third one, a teenage girl, surrenders. The group decide to take her back to Hilltop in order to interrogate her about her group. Upon arriving at Hilltop, Daryl interrogates the girl, who says her name is Lydia. She says that she is the daughter of the leader of her group, and her mother will be looking for her. After talking with Henry, who was in the cell opposite for being drunk and disorderly, Lydia talks about the abuse she suffered at the hands of her mother. Daryl overhears this and begins to pity Lydia, as he too was a victim of child abuse at the hands of his father.
Meanwhile, Luke and Alden are abducted by Lydia’s mother, Alpha. She and a group of Whisperers arrives outside the gates of Hilltop and offers to exchange Luke and Alden for her daughter. During the discussion, a small herd of walkers approach due to the crying sounds of a Whisperer’s young baby. The Whisperer is forced by Alpha to abandon her crying baby to the herd when she fails to quiet him. However, the baby is rescued by Connie, who was hiding in a cornfield outside of the walls. Daryl then hands Lydia back to Alpha, but begins to track the group when they leave, accompanied by Connie. Unbeknownst to them, Henry is also tracking the group.
At their camp, Henry is discovered by Beta, the group’s second-in-command. Upon seeing Lydia harbors some kind of connection with Henry, Alpha orders Lydia to kill Henry, threatening to kill both of them if she refuses. Before she can, a herd of walkers attack the unmasked Whisperers at their camp. Daryl and Connie then arrive and rescue Lydia and Henry.
A group of Whisperers led by Beta are sent to find Lydia, but Daryl, Connie and Henry protect her and they are able to make their way to the Kingdom, in time for the fair that is taking place there in order to reunite the communities. During the fair, Alpha infiltrates the fair and finds Lydia. There, Lydia angrily denounces her mother and says she is staying. Although distraught over Lydia’s decision, Alpha disowns Lydia and leaves the fair. Outside of the Kingdom, Alpha and a group of Whisperers then surround Daryl, Carol, Michonne, and Yumiko. Alpha then takes Daryl to the top of a hill overlooking a field which contains tens of thousands of walkers being herded by Whisperers. Alpha tells Daryl that she and her group will be staying in this area permanently now and tells Daryl to not let alone in the Coalition cross into her territory, threatening to unleash her giant herd of walkers onto the communities if they do. Alpha says she has marked the border in the north and Daryl and his group will see it as they leave. Daryl, Carol, Michonne and Yumiko find a distraught Siddiq who tells them of the border. They then marked border that Alpha mentioned. It is marked with ten pike each with a walker head on it. Much to their horror, the heads belong to several members of the Coalition that were abducted from the fair by the Whisperers; the heads belonging to Adeline, Rodney, Tammy Rose, Ozzy, Frankie, DJ, Enid, Alek, Tara, and Henry. The group tell the Kingdom what had happened and the fates of the ten victims; Siddiq was kept alive in order to send a message of fear to the Coalition.
One month after the fair, the Kingdom eventually falls to the spread of rot and falling infrastructure, which results in the community having to be abandoned. The Kingdommers are forced to cross through Alpha’s territory in order to make it to Alexandria and avoid a blizzard.
Whisperer War
One year after the fall of the Kingdom, the Coalition are once again forced to cross into Alpha’s territory in order to put out a fire caused by a falling satellite that risks burning down Oceanside. Alpha then confronts the group about these violations, but instead chooses to expand her territory instead of killing anyone; due to Alpha’s grief over losing Lydia, which she states to have killed to the Whisperers in order to keep hold over them. However, Alpha plans to slowly bring the Coalition down by using their fears against them. She tells Mary, a Whisperer that she christens Gamma, to poison Alexandria’s water supply with walker guts. Mary does so, making the majority of Alexandria’s residents sick with cholera. Alpha also sends small groups of walkers to Alexandria’s gates in order to tire them out. Dante, the new doctor at Alexandria is discovered to be a Whisperer planted by Alpha in order to break Alexandria from the inside. Dante kills Siddiq when he discovers he was one of the Whisperers at the barn where Alpha killed the ten pike victims. Dante himself is killed by Father Gabriel, who is angry over Dante’s betrayal.
Negan is freed from his cell by an unknown person, and he makes his way to the Whisperer camp where he joins the Whisperers and impresses Alpha with his knowledge of the Coalition and abilities. This makes him the target of Beta, who is jealous over the attention Negan is receiving. Beta abandons Negan in a herd of walkers in the hopes he will die, but is shocked to see Negan has returned to the camp unscathed.
Daryl, Carol, Aaron, Jerry, Connie and Kelly find themselves stuck in a cave which contains Alpha’s horde of walkers. They are able to escape the cave, and use found dynamite to collapse the cave with the herd inside. However, Connie gets separated from the group and is lost. Daryl finds Alpha and they engage in a brutal fight which leaves both severely injured. However, Daryl is able to escape. An injured Alpha is then found by Lydia. Alpha tells Lydia to kill her and become the new alpha of the Whisperers. Lydia refuses and formally disowns her mother herself, leaving her to die. Alpha is rescued by Whisperers, where she formally declares war on the Coalition.
Mary defects to the Coalition after discovering Lydia alive and not dead like Alpha said, as well wanting to reconnect with the baby that was abandoned by the Whisperers a year ago at Hilltop, as he is her nephew. Upon learning of her betrayal, Alpha sends Beta into Alexandria to extract Mary. There, Beta kills several Alexandrians and uses their reanimated bodies to distract the rest of the community while he extracts Mary. Upon Beta killing Laura in front of her, Mary surrenders but escapes to Hilltop. A large group of Whisperers then assault Hilltop, setting fire to the community and killing many people while the rest of them evacuate. Upon escaping the carnage, Mary is killed by Beta but before he can take her reanimated body back to the Whisperer herd, she is put down by Alden, forcing Beta to retreat.
Beta leads a large group of walkers to Alexandria in order to destroy it, but find the community abandoned; the Alexandrians fleeing to Oceanside. Negan tells Alpha that he has abducted Lydia and has her tied up in a shed. Alpha states she intends on killing Lydia in order to kindly release her from the world. Upon being taken to the shed by Negan, Alpha discover it is empty. As she turns around, Negan slits her throat and kills her; he never did abduct Lydia and only said this to lure Alpha away from the rest of the Whisperers. Negan then delivers Alpha’s zombified head to the unknown person who freed him, saying he has done his task. The unknown person is revealed to be Carol. She then leaves Alpha’s zombified head on the pikes at the border in order to send a message. Upon discovering Alpha’s zombified head, Beta furiously sends the entire herd towards Oceanside. Upon arrival, Beta engages in a fight with Daryl and Negan, where Daryl gains the upper hand by stabbing Beta in the eyes. A delirious and mentally unstable Beta then embraces as the walkers in the herd proceed to devour him. The Coalition then guide the herd away from Oceanside by having them walk off a cliff.
Aftermath
Following the conclusion of the war, the residents of Alexandria return to reclaim their community, only to find that Beta did not leave it untouched. Instead, before leaving, the Whisperers had severely damaged the walls and destroyed the community's food supply, placing the residents in dire straits. It is only after the recovery of Meridian's food supply and contact is made with the Commonwealth thanks to the help of Eugene that they are able to begin rebuilding from the damage that was done to Alexandria by Beta and his forces.
A small group of Whisperers led by Keith settle in the ruins of Hilltop, where they wish no harm to the Coalition and only want to live in peace. However, they are nowhere to be seen when Maggie and her group resettle at Hilltop, leaving the overall fate of the Whisperers unknown.
After the end of the Commonwealth Conflict, repair efforts resumed on both Alexandria and the Hilltop and, within a year, both were fully rebuilt from the damage caused by the Whisperers. However, the Hilltop's original location was too damaged, forcing them to relocate to a new community called the Bricks.
Casualties[]
Alexandria[]
Hilltop[]
The Highwaymen[]Oceanside[] |
The Whisperers[] |
Results[]
- Dozens of deaths on both sides.
- Hilltop is left abandoned due to the condition it is in following the battle.
- Alexandria is left in critical condition.
- The Whisperers are almost entirely dissolved as a group with the few survivors becoming non-hostile.
Appearances[]
TV SeriesSeason 9
Season 10 |
Trivia[]
- This is the first on-screen conflict to not involve Rick Grimes.
- The first chronological conflict without Rick was with Jocelyn's Group.