The Walking Dead season 7: Could Negan kill two characters?

This may be the secret producers are keeping close to their chests

You know the drill by now: The Walking Dead season 6 ended with new villain Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) beating a character we love's head in with his beloved baseball bat, Lucille - only, we didn't see which character that was leaving fans to endure an agonising wait until the show's return in October.

There are a full 11 characters in contention to be offed, including Daryl (Norman Reedus), Eugene (Josh McDermitt) and Maggie (Lauren Cohan).

What's important to point out is that all of the actors behind these characters have been seen on the show's Georgia set which corroborates the news that producers filmed 11 different endings in an attempt to keep the shock under wraps.

However, The Spoiling Dead Fans has done some digging and noticed that two actors have only been present for the premiere episode's shoot.

*Look away now if you don't want to know anything going into season seven"

These two actors are Steven Yeun (Glenn Rhee) and Michael Cudlitz (Abraham Ford).

Now, there are a few reasons that could account for this: in Yeun's case, he is currently shooting Netflix movie Okja with Jake Gyllenhaal and Tilda Swinton). With the actor being part of an ensemble - who has been present since the show's first season - we're sure production would be willing to work around him.

As for Cudlitz, that could be notched down to the way in which The Walking Dead can show a character in one episode before dropping them for another three. Going by the first trailer released at Comic-Con 2016 last weekend, it seems that one episode could very well be centred around an in-danger Tara (Alanna Mastersn) while new community The Kingdom is said to be the focus of episode three.

Another more alarming theory is that Negan doesn't kill just one character in season 7's opening episode, but two. Considering The Walking Dead's shocks usually go for the jugular, this could exactly be the secret producers have been keeping close to their chest.

The Walking Dead season 7 returns to FOX on 24 October.