Saving One Character in The Walking Dead Destinies Should…

Summary

The Walking Dead Destinies allows fans to potentially spare or kill characters they wish, giving them control over the storyline.
Players can reverse actions and make choices that could have a ripple effect throughout the franchise.
Sophia's death could have been easily avoided in the show, and if she doesn't die in The Walking Dead Destinies, it may have implications for Carol's character development and future storylines.

Part of the fun of The Walking Dead is how high-stakes it is at any given time, where any character regardless of their screen time or popularity can be killed off for one reason or another. There’s at least some correlation between the graphic novels and the TV show fans could anticipate, but The Walking Dead’s AMC show largely diverges from its source material content in a way that still keeps it unpredictable in certain ways. Fortunately for fans who may not think that the show’s content panned out the way it should have, The Walking Dead Destinies allows them to potentially spare or kill whoever they wish.

Players probably won’t have an opportunity to have anyone killed. But if a character is spared while another dies, players should be able to reverse those actions depending on the choices they make. Having Nicholas die in the revolving door instead of Noah, for example, would have a rippling effect throughout the rest of the franchise. Of course, players won’t get that far with The Walking Dead Destinies only encompassing the first four seasons, but there are still many more deaths that could’ve been easily avoided, at least according to fans, and they’ll possibly have an opportunity to thwart these deaths themselves.

Carol’s Daughter Has an Easily Avoidable Fate in The Walking Dead

The character whose death was arguably the easiest to avoid was Sophia’s, whether her death was a necessary plot device in order to progress Carol’s character development or not. In season two, before Rick’s group reaches The Walking Dead’s Greene family farm, Sophia dies during a prolonged search-and-rescue mission the group engages in to find her.

Sophia is pursued by a walker and disappears into the neighboring woods, where Rick discovers her and tells her to hide while he lures nearby walkers away. This is the last time that Sophia is seen alive, with her mysterious vanishing becoming a point of contention for the remainder of the season, including Daryl nearly getting himself killed while tracking her potential whereabouts. Carol obviously struggles with losing her daughter and eventually grapples with the idea of never seeing her again before Shane releases the walkers from the barn and Sophia is revealed among them as a newly turned walker herself.

Rick choosing to keep Sophia by his side instead of telling her to hide on her own would’ve been the wisest decision to make at that point, and it will be interesting to see if The Walking Dead Destinies offers players the chance to make that choice themselves. It might not be possible to have Sophia stay beneath the car on the highway or keep her at arm’s length to make sure she never needs to run into the woods, but when Rick finds Sophia her death should be incredibly easy to avoid by not leaving her there alone.

How Sophia Being Alive Could Affect The Walking Dead Destinies’ Story

Carol arguably never would have been able to evolve into the hardened survivor she became in later seasons if it wasn’t for Sophia and Ed being removed from the equation, but it is undeniable that Sophia’s death could’ve been completely avoided. If Sophia doesn’t die in The Walking Dead Destinies, it would be interesting to see if Carol still has it in her to stealthily kill and burn Karen and David, resulting in Rick exiling her from the prison—or not, depending on whether players want to exile her in season four of the game.

Carol is really the only character who would be tremendously impacted by Sophia dying or not as it could ripple into future seasons, but the group not being out to look for her would have meant that they weren’t putting themselves in danger while taking refuge at the farm, either. The barn and its inhabitants would still be a boiling point for the season despite Sophia not being found within, and it’s possible that Herschel would still reevaluate his preconceptions with Shane and the group gunning down all the walkers he had restrained there anyhow.