Ever since Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) “died” at the Dell Stadium back in Season 4 of Fear the Walking Dead, fans have been speculating regarding her fate.
In fact, Season 6 saw viewers questioning the synopsis for Episode 14 and suspecting Madison might return.
AMC remained tightlipped regarding the character until December of last year, when they made the official announcement that the character was definitely still alive and that she would return at some point in Season 7.
This meant that viewers had been tuning in every week to find out if they would finally get their first glimpse of Madison’s comeback.
Did Madison Clark appear in Episode 16?
So far, Madison had not returned in the second half of Season 7 of Fear the Walking Dead, which meant that she was sure to show up in the Season 7 finale.
And, show up, she did!
In fact, Madison was pretty much the bad guy as the episode opened, being responsible for the kidnapping of multiple children.
It turned out that she was a member of PADRE, the super-secret group that her daughter, Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey), had been chasing for the entire season in the hope they would be a safe place for everyone to go after the nuclear blasts turned the landscape into a radioactive disaster zone.
While PADRE intends to reestablish society, it seems they are only interested in the children and have deemed it important to separate them from their parents to give them the best chance of survival.
Madison will return in Season 8
While Madison seemed like the bad guy, Morgan (Lennie James) eventually managed to get through to her, and she is now intent on trying to help Morgan make PADRE realize that what they are doing is wrong.
In Episode 16 of Fear the Walking Dead, Madison also discovered that her own children, Nick (Frank Dillane) and Alicia, had died. This helped to break her from the cycle of helping PADRE as, with her children dead, PADRE no longer had as strong a hold on her.
However, Morgan was only partly right about her children. Nick certainly died back in Season 4 of Fear the Walking Dead. However, Alicia, who appeared on death’s door for most of the second half of Season 7, actually had a miraculous recovery in Episode 15 and headed off into the sunset to help others.
This meant that Madison will not likely meet up with her daughter in Season 8 of Fear the Walking Dead and has kind of bummed out Kim Dickens, according to Decider.
Of course, Morgan doesn’t know that Alicia survived, so he assumed she was dead or close to it.
As to when viewers will see Madison next in Fear the Walking Dead? One of the series showrunners, Andrew Chambliss, has already revealed that Madison’s return will heavily impact Season 8.
And, with how Episode 16 concluded, it seems very likely that Season 8 will focus on Morgan and Madison’s attempt to reach PADRE, so she should feature prominently when the TV show returns.
As yet, no release date has been announced for Season 8 of Fear the Walking Dead.