Through 11 seasons, few shows on television have introduced and killed as many characters as The Walking Dead. Since the start of the show, there are only a couple of major survivors left from the large cast of characters that fans fell in love with. Also, along the way, there have been several characters that joined the cast to varying degrees of fan enjoyment.
Thankfully, for every new hatred Walking Dead supporting character, there is a good chance that they will die sooner rather than later. Whether they die in a way that pays off their defects or it ends up in a tragic death that makes some fans feel bad for hating them, they all go to look at the flowers in one way or the other. Here is a look at the 10 most hated characters in The Walking Dead’s 11-year run.
Updated on April 14th, 2022, by Shawn S. Lealos: The Walking Dead finally launched into its 11th and final season, and while it won’t mark the end of the zombie horror franchise, it will wrap up the storylines from the parent series. Once the season wraps up, there will be spinoffs featuring some of the most popular characters from the show, including Daryl, Carol, Maggie, and Negan.
However, while fans will love to see those characters move on in new stories in the future, there are plenty of characters that fans might be happy never to hear from again. Luckily, most of these characters died, but there are a few that have hung on, despite fans mostly hating every second these Walking Dead characters spent on the screen every Sunday night.
Jadis was mostly known as the leader of the Scavengers, and she was not someone many fans liked from the start. Eventually, people learned about her past, and her real name – Anne. However, she refused to help Rick’s survivors and almost caused his death in her junkyard.
People liked Jadis even less when she escaped Simon’s slaughter of the Scavengers and went to live in Alexandria, only to continue to hide her secrets. Even when she saved Rick’s life after the bridge explosion, she took him to a possibly dangerous place and The Walking Dead movies. The fact she is responsible for Rick leaving The Walking Dead kept her as a hated character on the show.
Ed was one of the first true villains on The Walking Dead. It is easy to hate a man who abuses women, and when the woman he beats is the beloved Carol, he was the first human that most fans wanted to see eaten by zombies.
Ed was one of the reasons that Carol is such a strong character, but that does not excuse the way he treated her, as well as how he treated the other women in their camp. Ed’s death was deserved, but the satisfying moment was when Carol put down his reanimated corpse with a pickaxe, getting a little measure of revenge.
Father Gabriel was hated from the moment he made his first appearance on The Walking Dead. He was a minister who let his entire congregation die so he could protect his own life. When the survivors showed up, he didn’t want them there and tried to betray them the second he met Negan.
Father Gabriel has grown in strength since that time and has become a legitimate fighter, but with all his past sins, his death in the comics seemed perfect. He was stuck, hanging upside down from a water tower, and Beta killed him. He has since become a leader on the TV show, but for most of his life, he was one of the worst Walking Dead characters.
Rosita was, at one time, a beloved character on The Walking Dead. She showed up with Abraham and Eugene and was as tough as nails. It was nice to see a strong and dominant female joining the group and she wasn’t someone to mess around with. Things changed when Abraham died.
She had started to slip a bit while he was still alive. She was doubting herself and becoming less of a strong woman and more of a liability for the group. In the comics, she ended up with her head on a spike in the war with the Whisperers, while pregnant. It was a tragic moment that made fans mourn her loss. On the TV show, she lost that sympathy, but she has a chance to gain it back as a member of the army in the Commonwealth.
When Eugene first arrived, it was easy to hate the survivor. He was a weak link in the trio of he, Abraham, and Rosita, and the tough Abraham took the obligation to protect him. When it turned out he lied about knowing about a cure to make Abraham protect him, he was even more despicable.
Eugene has come around in recent years, but between making the bullets that almost did the survivors in and getting them captured by the Commonwealth, he is no more adept at survival than he ever was and is a liability to his friends and allies.
Aiden Monroe was part of the Alexandria community when Rick and his survivors showed up. Along with his brother, Aiden was a jerk who never wanted these new survivors to come in, and while their fears were correct that Rick and the group planned to take over, these brothers went about it the wrong way.
Neither Aiden nor his buddy Nicholas knew how to deal with The Walkers anyway, and their mistakes cost lives in the end.
Bob Stookey was someone who came around with fans by the time he died. That was a great moment where he was able to let Terminus know that he was bitten and infected while the cannibals were eating his leg.
His death was sad, but for most of his life, fans were not Team Bob. He was a liability, his drinking problems put everyone in danger due to his ineptitude, and he was one of the worst Walking Dead characters. He was also not a team player, and his death made the group stronger in the end.
The Governor on the AMC series was much better than the comic book version. While the Governor in the comics was a sociopath and a real villain, he was a lot more well-rounded in the TV series.
However, his right-hand man Milton was not someone that fans bought into. He was the scientist who was trying to figure out what the risen dead were really about, but he ended up as a wishy-washy character to the end when he finally killed Andrea.
Negan was deadly, and even when he left, the Saviors remained a thorn in the side of the survivors afterward. On the TV show, there was one man in the group that heightened the tensions between the two groups, and that was Richard.
He wanted to take the battle to the Saviors, and he thought he should be a martyr to the cause. Richard even failed at his goal of being a martyr, and Morgan ended up killing him to stop any further deaths.
While the heads on a pike in The Walking Dead comics were tragic and shook up fans when it went down, the version the AMC show revealed was nowhere near as effective. That is because the people who died were not characters the fans were really invested in. Enid was one of those.
While she had a nice introduction on the show when her parents died, she went downhill quickly. She turned into a love interest and put beloved survivors at risk one too many times for fans to accept her into the group. When her head ended up on a spike, no one really cared and she went down as one of the worst Walking Dead characters.
Sam Anderson was one of the many kids who showed up on The Walking Dead that fans wanted to see gone. His mother was Jessie, who became a love interest for a short time for Rick Grimes. Sadly, Carol was partially responsible for turning Sam into the kid no one liked when she scared him into keeping quiet about her gun if he wanted to live.
After this, Sam went into a very dark place and became scared of everything, quickly becoming one of the most hated Walking Dead characters. The moment that Rick tried to save Sam’s family, but he wouldn’t shut up in the middle of a zombie herd, was the moment that he ended up dying and taking his family with him. Plus, his brother shot Carl in the eye.
When Rick Grimes woke up from his coma in the first episode, his only goal was to find his wife Lori and son Carl. He set out, and fans anxiously wanted to see him reunited with his family. He found them with his best friend Shane, and Lori had already moved on with him until Rick showed up, and she changed her mind.
However, after this, Lori became the generic nagging wife, never understanding that Rick was trying his hardest to keep everyone alive and do what he could to protect everyone, including her and Carl. She complained so much that fans didn’t mind when she died giving birth to Judith as one of the most hated Walking Dead characters.
Lizzie is the second child on this list, and she is an extraordinary case. Carol had lost her own family, and now she was playing mother with Lizzie and her sister Mika. However, as the show moved on, she became very annoying, especially since she was the voice that tried to tell everyone that people were probably dead when they were just late returning.
Her pessimistic attitude took a startling turn when she started to identify with the zombies more than with real humans. She wanted the survivors to stop killing zombies and tried to prove it by killing her 10-year-old sister to show that not all zombies were evil. Carol ended up taking her out to see the flowers and putting a bullet in her head to save fans from having to see her anymore.
There were two characters in the comic books that switched places on the TV show. In the comics, Carol was a clingy and emotionally stunted woman who took her own life, while Andrea was tough as nails and lasted longer than almost anyone, even hooking up with Rick. On the TV show, it was Andrea that was a mess and one of the most hated Walking Dead characters.
Andrea always wanted to die, and when people kept saving her, it prolonged the pain fans had, watching her on the show. She finally took her own life while a prisoner to The Governor and the pain finally ended.
There are several Walking Dead supporting characters on this list from the Alexandria community. It is almost sad since they were a safe, self-sufficient community until Rick Grimes and company showed up and decided to take over for themselves. One person who took it badly was Spencer Monroe, whose parents were initially the leaders.
The reason most people hated Spencer was that he was a coward who had everything handed to him. He hated the idea of having to work under someone when Rick showed up and made life hard for everyone. Even Negan had no time for Spencer and killed him in the streets.
Jared showed up in season 7 as part of the Saviors. While he was not a top guy through much of his time on the show, he started to rub viewers the wrong way thanks to his personality. Out of all the Saviors, Jared was the biggest bully and just wanted to antagonize and hurt people.
Negan had morals somewhat, but Jared was just pure evil. Jared was taken prisoner after the war, but while some wanted just to live, he kept on pushing buttons and wouldn’t stop, even when in a cage. Morgan finally trapped Jared in a hall with Walkers, and his death was very satisfying for fans as one of the most hated Walking Dead characters.
Nicholas was a coward, and fans of The Walking Dead hated him because he was just about worthless. He was the right-hand to Spencer but was even more cowardly than his friend. This made the fact that they worked on scavenger teams laughable.
He caused the death of Will and Noah. He almost caused Glenn to die on a trash dumpster when Nicholas shot himself in the head, knocking Glenn into the herd. He served no purpose other than making everyone else’s lives harder, easily one of the worst Walking Dead characters.
Simon was a great bad guy, and unlike many people on this list, Walking Dead fans loved to hate him. His minion in the Saviors, Jared, was someone no one liked, and people just despised him. When it came to Negan, there were just as many people who loved him as hated him.
However, for Simon, he played the bad guy role perfectly. He wasn’t the cool bad guy like Negan. He was a jerk that caused problems and did what he needed to remain on top. Fans hated him, but in a good way.
Beth Greene was a strange case. For many years, fans hated her with a passion. There was nothing about her that was interesting or worthwhile, and she seemed to be more trouble than she was worth. Look online at the time, and fans wanted her dead.
When Beth died at the hospital, a moment that devastated Daryl, fans suddenly spoke up and hated the fact she was gone. Thanks to Daryl being one of the best Walking Dead characters, Beth was someone fans hated but then claimed to love after her death.
If there is one supporting character that Walking Dead fans hated more than any other, it was Gregory. He lived in the biggest, nicest house in the Hilltop and served as their leader, while his people worked hard and lived the best they could. When Rick and company showed up, he was immediately antagonistic.
He was a gutless coward and betrayed them to Negan. He was a devious backstabber and tried to have Maggie killed. Everything he did was for his own well-being, and when Maggie had him strung up by his neck and executed, it couldn’t have happened to a more hated Walking Dead character.