The following contains spoilers for Fear the Walking Dead, Season 7, Episode 15, "Amina," which aired Sunday, May 29, on AMC.
“No one’s gone until they’re gone.” It was one of the last things Madison Clark said on Fear the Walking Dead before she "died" in Season 4's mid-season finale. At the time, it meant that everyone has a chance to turn their lives around, no matter how dark a path they traveled. Since then, the line's meaning has evolved, and was repeatedly used to tease Madison's return.
Those teases lasted for multiple seasons, as fans tried to hypothesize how Madison could have escaped the stadium. But hypotheses are no longer necessary. Before 7B started, FTWD revealed that Madison would be returning to the series. Ever since the announcement, fans have been waiting, and next week, their patience will pay off. Madison is confirmed to appear in the 7B finale. Unfortunately, though, her return won't be what fans wanted. Here's why.
"Amina" was a pretty poor showing for FTWD -- it received the lowest IMDb score of any episode in the series. Its plot followed a feverish Alicia, as she wandered around and talked to a manifestation of her subconscious. She wanted to find Padre so that she could save everyone, but her subconscious just wanted to save Victor Strand. As expected, Alicia went back and forth with the idea, but by the end, she helped him complete his redemption arc.
As the episode wrapped up, Alicia's fever was worse than ever. So, when her friends followed Morgan on the rafts, she chose to stay behind because she didn't want to risk hurting anyone. It was an odd ending, but it became even weirder during the Episode Insider. Completely out of the blue, showrunner Andrew Chambliss revealed that "Amina" was Alicia's (Alycia Debnam-Carey) last time appearing on Fear the Walking Dead. Fans had hypothesized that Alicia's exit was coming, but the timing was completely annoying.
Ever since the series announced that Madison was coming back, fans have been looking forward to a few things. First, they wanted to see how she treated Charlie (since Charlie killed Nick), but FTWD already ruined that possibility. The other thing that fans wanted to see was Madison's reunion with Alicia. Now, it looks like that will never happen, and that highlights two unfortunate facts.
First off, it's kind of ridiculous that the writers would make Alicia leave one episode short of a reunion with her mother. There's a time to give fans something unexpected, but there's also a time to just give the fans what they want -- and they wanted a reunion. Whatever reason the showrunners had for depriving fans of that reunion better be awfully good because fans weren't happy with how it's turned out so far.
However, there's something even more disappointing, and that was the reason for Madison's return. With the news that Alicia is officially done, it's clear that the writers never wanted to reunite them. They wanted Madison back as Alicia's replacement. There was never any chance of them being together again. It makes sense that someone from the Clark family should be on the series, but it's outlandish to know that the showrunners only brought Madison back because they knew that Alicia was going to be written off.
To see what everyone does without Alicia, tune into Fear the Walking Dead Season 7. New episodes air Sundays at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT on AMC and are available to stream early on AMC+.
