Sep 11, 2026, 4:30 AM1 views

The Walking Dead Officially Gets An Evil Rick Grimes

Dillard is one bad Rick.

Published Sep 10, 2026, 7:00 PM EDT

Craig began contributing to Screen Rant in 2016 and has been ranting ever since, mostly to himself in a darkened room. After previously writing for various outlets, Craig's focus turned to TV and film, where a steady upbringing of science fiction and comic books finally became useful. Craig has previously been published by sites such as Den of Geek.

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Being a cop is an integral strand in the DNA of Rick Grimes. Right at the beginning of , returning to a world of discipline, order, and a rigid command structure allows him to assimilate successfully into a new life. You can take Rick Grimes away from the police, but you can't take the police away from Rick Grimes.

An unspoken question baked into The Walking Dead's very premise has always been, "What if Rick used his training and knowledge for evil?" Rick chose to be a force for good, but with his police background, would have made for a dangerous villain. The Walking Dead showed glimpses of an answer through Shane, but The Walking Dead's Dillard Is The Closest We've Had To 'Evil Rick Grimes'

Dillard (Jimmi Simpson) sitting with a controller in his hand in The Walking Dead: Dead City

Played by Jimmi Simpson, The Walking Dead: Dead City's Dillard is as close as the franchise has come to showing what Rick Grimes might've looked like as a villain.

Like Rick, Dillard takes full advantage of his police training, but whereas the former was more of a rural sheriff, Dillard specialized in going undercover, inhabiting false personas before striking against his supposed allies. That's exactly what Dillard has done in , shows his strategic thinking to seize control of the hospital by storming the armory and cutting off the security feeds, then employs crowd control training to suppress the angry residents.

If Rick Grimes showed the positive effect of having a cop on your team during the zombie apocalypse, Dillard shows how those skills can be warped and twisted into something very much not positive.