Laurie Holden thinks Andrea from AMC’s “The Walking Dead” got a raw deal. Whereas the comics version of Andrea survives long past the prison arc and grows into one of the toughest survivors in the group, TV’s Andrea dies at the end of Season 3. While comic Andrea is remembered for her skill as a sharpshooter, TV Andrea is best known for spending her final season waffling over whether to trust the Governor (David Morrissey).
“I think the departure from book Andrea to the screen was a mistake,” Holden said at a 2017 fan convention. “I think the whole stuff that they wrote about Andrea and the Governor was complete and utter nonsense.” This was a fairly common opinion in the “Walking Dead” fandom; throughout Season 3, fans were consistently frustrated and confused by Andrea’s sympathy for the Governor and disappointed with how the storyline resolved.
Much of comic Andrea’s arc shifted to other characters
Regarding Andrea’s death, in which she shoots herself in the head after a walker bites her, Laurie Holden added, “There was so much beautiful narrative that was lost … she should have been there for a long time.”
In the comics’ “beautiful narrative” Holden referred to, Andrea marries Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln on TV) and becomes a stepmother to Carl (Chandler Riggs) and Judith (multiple actors). With Andrea written out of the show, Michonne (Danai Gurira) gets this arc instead. Fans also speculated that the show transferred over Andrea’s marksmen skills to Sasha (Sonequa Martin-Green), although Sasha was killed off as well.
The other lost part of comic Andrea’s narrative is her growing confidence and strength. Critics and fans have speculated that Carol (Melissa McBride) absorbs much of Andrea’s character arc. Whereas Andrea survives long past the prison arc in the comics, Carol dies during the prison arc in the comics but thrives long beyond it in the show.
Showrunner Glen Mazzara saw Andrea’s death as necessary
Although Laurie Holden stated she had signed an eight-year contract with “The Walking Dead,” showrunner Glen Mazzara told the Hollywood Reporter he’d realized he wanted to kill her character halfway through Season 3. Although he said it was a “difficult” choice, he viewed it as a key moment in the growth of Rick Grimes.
“At the end of the finale, [Rick] brings in these women, children and elderly people and the group is going to transform,” Mazzara explained. “There needed to be a blood sacrifice for that, and there had to be a price that was paid. Andrea paying that price was important.”
Holden may have been frustrated by her character’s ending, but she did credit Scott Gimple, a writer for the show who replaced Mazzara as showrunner immediately after Season 3, for rewriting her final moments. “I love Scott Gimple for giving me a gorgeous death with redemption so that you understood [Andrea],” Holden said at the ’17 fan convention. She added, “And she wasn’t a victim — she died on her own terms.”
