The Walking Dead cast and creative team rocked their San Diego Comic-Con panel earlier today. We caught up with them at the press conference later on, and got a few extra details about season 7.

1. Ezekial

Robert Kirkman states that he loved bringing Ezekial and Shiva (confirmed as pronounced Shee-va) of The Kingdom to the series. “It was their time,” he said. As for CGI vs. using a real tiger, the answer is that they used CGI due to filming restrictions, actor safety, and expense. Check out the trailer below to see if you think the CGI is realistic.

2. Negan’s victims

As for keeping the secrets of who are Negan’s bat victims, Kirkman joked, “It’s easy to just be quiet.” Steven Yeun said that it was hard holding up in his apartment for a month last season during the post dumpster episodes to hide Glenn’s fate from fan set observers, “With this show you sign up not just for a part but a lifestyle.”

Danai Gurira comments that on set, there’s been a bit of funny chatter: “So are you here for a flashback or for real?”

3. Is winter coming?

So far we’ve only seen the show in the summer/fall. There are no immediate plans to show winter, or walkers in the snow. Showrunner Scott Gimple remarked that, “I’d be surprised if we did that.”

4. Overestimating Negan

The actors all agreed that their characters had a “legitimate overconfidence” because given their intel, they should have been able to handle Negan and his crew given their skill set and previous experience. As Michael Cudlitz who plays Abraham, stated, “The TV audience realizes in real time with the characters just how wrong they were. It all went sideways fast, and they were just outnumbered.”

According to Steven Yeun the way you know it’s that level of bad is the look of terror in Rick’s eyes.

5. When did Richonne happen?

Richonne was entirely Scott Gimple’s call, and according to Robert Kirkman, he started discussing it in season 4. Gimple saw a certain natural chemistry, and natural formation of bonding Michonne, Rick, and Carl. They didn’t want to rush it. It had to take time to make it fully develop. They dropped small moments into the show so that the relationship could build.

6. Handling fan reaction

Josh McDermitt says that the fan’s have been fantastic. It’s mostly been fans saying, “I don’t want it to be you,” not “I hope you die.”

7. Showrunners dealing with everything after the Lucille scene

Apparently it was four years ago today that Greg Nicotero and others read the comic version of Negan. He felt that as horrific as that moment is, it’s been a “master class in acting” to watch the surviving characters deal with the aftermath.

All showrunners agreed that if a character dies it has to hurt and have lasting impact, or else it is wrong.

8. On playing Negan

Jeffrey Dean Morgan says that so far playing Negan has been awesome. He was filming this and The Good Wife at the same time, and he’s a huge fan of the walker series. Next year he thinks he’ll be greeted at Comic-Con with a slew of raised fingers. Lastly, he said he was majorly impressed with the level of acting that went on during the bat scene.

The Walking Dead returns this October on AMC.