The Walking Dead: How will Lydia react to Negan and Alpha?

That moment between Negan and Alpha on the mid-season premiere of The Walking Dead will have lasting implications, especially for Lydia.

For anyone worried about coming up with a new ship name for Negan and Alpha on The Walking Dead, well, don’t worry about it too much. It looks like that “crass reward” was exactly that: A reward. Though Negan got his reward in the mid-season premiere episode “Squeeze”, he might have a lot of explaining to do when Lydia finds out what happened between her friend and protector and her abusive mother.

In terms of the passage of time between the end of The Walking Dead 10A and the start of 10B, only a few hours have passed. The group in the cave was in the cave, Michonne just left with Virgil and Lydia was off on her own after realizing that Carol meant to use her as a pawn against Alpha.

We don’t know where Lydia is or what she’s thinking at this point, but after seeing Negan and Alpha get their groove on in the woods, it begs the question: What would Lydia think?

Lydia’s eyes have been opened to her mother’s actions after her time spent among friends in Alexandria. Killing Henry was the final blow, but after Carol tried to use Lydia in the fight against Alpha, she went off on her own to think about things.

Though Lydia has been a valuable member of the Alexandria community, providing valuable insight into the Whisperers’ strategy and habits, she wasn’t always welcome. When fear turned into a vicious attack, it was Negan who stepped in and saved the day, protecting her from additional harm. Unfortunately, in protecting her Negan accidentally killed someone and old anger toward him returned. Negan escaped from his cell and ended up pledging allegiance with the Whisperers.

We don’t know at this point where Lydia is, or whether or not she knows that Negan is with her mother at the Whisperer camp. We have to think that the idea of her savior (pun intended) hooking up with her abusive mother would be very problematic for her.

Negan was someone who understood her. He was there to listen and he gave her his no-nonsense hot takes on life in Alexandria to help her survive there. With both Daryl and Negan watching out for her, Lydia had an actual support system for the first time in her life.

Now that Negan is a Whisperer, though, he’s an enemy. Even if he’s there to infiltrate the camp and destroy them from within, there’s no erasing the fact that he slept with Lydia’s mother. (That might be a very loose application of the expression: We can only assume there was sleeping, since all we saw was naked standing up grindy-grindy) It doesn’t matter who initiated it, or why. The simple fact is that it happened.

Can Lydia look at Negan the same way, knowing that he was intimate with Alpha?

The short answer: Probably not.

At minimum there will be awkwardness, and at worst there will be a sense of outright betrayal. Negan genuinely liked Lydia and Lydia trusted him. It would be a shame to see that relationship disappear, but it’s hard to imagine that there won’t be lasting repercussions from the freaky deaky. (Unless Negan decides to never share that moment with Lydia, which could also happen)

What do you think? Will Negan’s moment of passion with Lydia’s mom change the relationship he has with Lydia? Let us know what you think in the comments!