Morgan Jones (The Walking Dead)

Comic book series

Morgan's son, Duane, spots Rick wandering around their house and, mistaking him for a walker, knocks him out with a shovel. Morgan quickly comes to the realization that Rick is a living human and aids him back to health. He details Rick of the outbreak and what has been happening within the world the past couple months. Rick later supplies him and his son with guns from the Sheriff's station to ensure their protection, and departs from them to Atlanta.

Morgan and Duane are later shown still remaining within their house several months afterward, during the winter. In an attempt to preserve old tradition and celebrate Christmas with Duane to lift his spirits, Morgan is able to find a Game Boy from a nearby store and give it to him as a present.

Sometime within the following months, Duane falls prey to the walkers and gets turned. Morgan, unable to cope with the death of his son, resorts to locking Duane in the house with chains. As his mental and physical health deteriorates, he begins murdering survivors who pass by so he can feed the boy. Rick, along with his son Carl and new second-in-command Abraham, arrive back to the town with the plan to bring Morgan into the group, which he agrees to after freeing his zombie son. He quickly develops an intense fixation on Carl, who reminds him of Duane. While in the group, he becomes one of the primary defenders of their campsite, and deepens his bond with Michonne, the two of them both connecting due to their damaged psyches and history of loss. At the same time, he attempts to deepen his bond with Carl after witnessing first-hand the boy's cold-blooded mentality. He believes himself to be responsible for maintaining Carl's childhood innocence and is determined to make amends for his failure to protect Duane.

Once arriving at the new walled-in community named the Alexandria Safe-Zone, he was assigned by the leader Douglas the role of being a chef. He and the rest of the survivors enjoyed the resources that the community offered, however he was one of the few who found himself frustrated with the fake upbeat attitude of their surroundings. After he and Michonne leave the welcome party hosted by the townspeople, the two finally engage in sex. He deeply regrets his actions the following morning, believing himself to be an adulterer and continuing to cling to the memory of his deceased wife. His burdening of ill-conceived principles and refusal to let go of the past angers Michonne, despite their growing attraction towards one another.

Morgan later apologizes for the hindrance in their relationship and reassures her that he is trying the best he can to get over all that has happened. She accepts and the two are able to reunite as lovers once more. Tension between the two of them develops again however, as Michonne becomes insulted by his egocentric demeanor when he justifies their sexual activities as him deserving to be happy.

While helping fight off zombies with Rick, Morgan is caught off guard and bitten on the arm by a walker. Michonne chops his arm off, and from there he is left bedridden. He confesses to Carl his knowledge of the murder committed by him and pleads for him not to let darkness overcome his morality. Michonne later tries to make amends with him, only to discover that he has died from blood-loss. He is shortly thereafter put down by her before he has the chance to re-animate.

Season 1

In the television series, Rick's hometown - where the Jones' settle - is a small Georgia town called King County. In the series premiere "Days Gone Bye", Morgan examines Rick after his son Duane mistakes Rick for a walker and hits him with a shovel. Rick later wakes up tied to a bed, as Morgan checks Rick for zombie bites or fever, either of which could indicate he is turning into a walker. Morgan initially doubts Rick's status as a living being, going so far as to threaten to shoot him if he does not prove his humanity. After deciding Rick is not a threat, Morgan frees him using a Buck 110 hunting knife and shares what information he has regarding the apocalypse and the walkers. The following day, Rick tells Morgan that his wife and son are missing and they are most likely alive, since the family photos have been taken from the house. Morgan and Duane tell Rick they may have set off to Atlanta, where the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has set up a quarantine zone. Rick takes Morgan and Duane to his former Sheriff's headquarters, where the trio use the emergency generator to power up the station. They take hot showers and clean out the armory. Rick heads to Atlanta, while Morgan and Duane stay behind. Rick gives Morgan a rifle and a walkie-talkie and promises to broadcast every morning at dawn. Morgan goes to the top floor of his house, where he looks through old family photos before shooting several zombies. As he hoped, the noise attracts more walkers, including his dead wife Jenny, but Morgan finds himself unable to shoot her and breaks down in tears.

Season 3

In the episode "Clear", when Rick, Carl, and Michonne go on a run into King County, Morgan holds them at gunpoint from a roof. They have a shootout, and while trying to pursue Rick, Carl ultimately shoots Morgan in the chest. Rick pulls off Morgan's shirt, revealing that he had donned body armor. They drag his unconscious-self into his building, avoiding his traps, and lay him down on a bed. For safety measures, his hands are bound by Rick. While Rick is reading the strange writings on the wall, he discovers that Duane had reanimated, and decides to stay and wait for Morgan to wake up. While Michonne and Carl go on a run, Rick waits for him to wake up, but Morgan grabs a knife that was taped to the side of the bed. He attacks Rick, claiming that he is not familiar with anyone anymore. He stabs Rick in the upper-left chest. Rick knocks the weapon away, pointing his revolver at Morgan's head, and Morgan begs Rick to kill him. Morgan is tied up again and, after patching himself up, Rick finally manages to make him remember that the two know each other. Morgan says that he tried to contact Rick every morning for several weeks, but he never answered the radio, before explaining what happened to Duane. He is offered the chance to join the group at the prison, but he realizes that Rick is taking a lot of guns, meaning that they are preparing for a war. Morgan claims that Rick, Carl, and his people will die either by bullets or by walkers, and refuses to join them, not wanting to see anyone else die. While clearing out the walkers caught on his traps, Carl approaches Morgan and tells him that he is sorry for shooting him earlier. Morgan remarks to Carl, "Don't ever be sorry." While leaving King County, Rick, Carl, and Michonne watch as Morgan prepares to burn the corpses of the walkers he captured.

Season 5

After the credits in the episode "No Sanctuary", a masked man is seen approaching a Terminus sign Rick had written "No Sanctuary" on. He turns around and pulls off his mask, revealing himself to be Morgan who finds a cross mark on a tree and begins following a trail of them. Morgan reappears after the credits in the episode "Coda" where he follows the tree markings left by Gareth to the elementary school where he and the Hunters had cannibalized Bob Stookey's leg. Morgan puts down a walker pinned under debris and comes across Fr. Gabriel Stokes's church, where he puts together a makeshift shrine and kneels in front of it, praying for a short time before laughing. Morgan finds the map with a route to Washington D.C. lying on the ground (the one that Abraham Ford had previously given to Rick in the episode "Four Walls and a Roof") and reads the message Abraham had left on it for Rick. Morgan realizes that his friend is still alive somewhere.

In the season finale "Conquer", Morgan is now in Virginia and sleeping inside of a car, before starting a fire. A man approaches him at gunpoint, revealing himself to be a member of the Wolves, and after a brief conversation, demands that Morgan surrender all of his supplies as well as himself. As another Wolves member lunges at Morgan from behind with a knife, Morgan dodges the attack and fights the men with a wooden staff, overpowering them and knocking them unconscious. Morgan places them in the backseat of the car and blows the horn—checking if any walkers are nearby—before departing. When Daryl Dixon and Aaron become trapped in a van surrounded by walkers when they set off a trap laid by the Wolves, Morgan rescues them and Aaron offers him the chance to come to Alexandria as a thank you for saving them. Morgan initially turns down the offer, but says he is lost but on his way to somewhere, and shows Daryl the map to Washington D.C. with Rick's name on it that he had found at the church. Realizing that Morgan knows Rick, Daryl and Aaron bring him to Alexandria, where they arrive in time to witness Rick executing Pete Anderson under orders from Deanna Monroe following Pete's murder of Deanna's husband.

Season 6

In the season premiere, "First Time Again", Morgan and Rick catch up, revealing that he learned how to use his staff from someone after the outbreak. Morgan is kept in a room for the night before Rick lets him free, telling him he doesn't take chances anymore. Morgan accompanies Rick in going out of the Safe Zone to bury Pete, when they come across a rock quarry filled with walkers. Morgan helps Rick with his plan to lure the walkers out of the quarry and away from the Safe Zone, knowing it's only a matter of time before they break free. Morgan is present when they walk in on Carter (Ethan Embry) discussing his plans to kill Rick and take the Safe Zone back, holding a gun to Eugene. Rick disarms Carter, which leads him into telling Morgan that no matter what happens, people like Carter will end up dying. During construction on a makeshift barrier, several walkers stumble into the work zone. Rick wants the Alexandrians to kill them, but Morgan intervenes, saying he doesn't take chances anymore either. As the group are luring the walkers out of the quarry and away from the Safe Zone, a blaring horn is heard coming from Alexandria. This causes the herd of walkers to begin making their way through the woods and back to the Safe Zone, with Morgan, Rick and Michonne running back to Alexandria.

In the episode "JSS", Morgan arrives back at Alexandria after a big rig truck crashed into a tower. He finds out that Alexandria was breached by a group known as the Wolves who are brutally slaughtering everyone they can in Alexandria with an arsenal of blades. The Reverend Gabriel being attacked by a Wolf but is saved by Morgan. When asked by Gabriel how he learned to fight like that Morgan responded, "from a cheese maker." Morgan ran around Alexandria to fight off other wolves and found himself surrounded by five of them. The leader of the pack recognized Morgan from their previous encounter. Morgan asked the Wolves to leave, but instead the Wolves attacked him. One by one the Wolves were knocked down by Morgan using only his staff in hand. He informs the Wolf that his people have guns and they would be shot if they didn't leave. The Wolves finally comply as they realize they can't win. Once the Wolves left Alexandria, Morgan surveys the carnage left behind by the attackers. He went inside a house the Wolves ravaged and was ambushed by who appears to be the leader of the Wolves. A fight ensued between them in the living room, and eventually Morgan was able gain an upper hand to subdue the Wolf leader and knocked him unconscious.

The episode "Here's Not Here" reveals how Morgan regained his sanity and learned his martial arts skills from a survivor named Eastman. After Rick left Morgan in King County, it's revealed that Morgan began attacking and killing anyone he came across. When he comes across Eastman, he was knocked unconscious and locked inside a cell in the cabin. While Morgan initially rebuffs Eastman's attempts to get to know him and help him move past his trauma (constantly telling him, he's going to kill Eastman when he gets out), Morgan eventually calms down and listens to Eastman's philosophy. From then on, Eastman taught Morgan how all life is precious as well as teaching him Aikido to allow him to defend himself without resorting to lethal force. The episode shows how Eastman died from a walker bite, but Morgan carries his peaceful ways on with a promise to never kill again. The episode ends with Morgan shown to have been telling the story to the Wolf leader (locked in his basement) in an attempt to convert him in turn.

In the episode "Heads Up", Morgan admits to Rick and Michonne that he let the Wolves escape, believing that people can change, though Rick doubts his ability to survive without getting his hands dirty. Morgan later visits Denise Cloyd and gains her help in treating the Wolf he captured. In the mid-season finale "Start to Finish", when Alexandria's walls are breached by a horde of walkers, Carol and Morgan take shelter in Morgan's house. She finds the captive Wolf, and threatens him with a knife, but Morgan intervenes and they fight, allowing the Wolf to escape.

In the mid-season premiere "No Way Out", the escaped Wolf is killed while saving Denise from walkers. When the Wolf reanimates, Morgan kills it and apologizes. In the episode "Not Tomorrow Yet", Morgan tries to talk the group out of attacking the Saviors, but Rick is determined to kill them all. With the strike force gone on their sneak attack, Morgan is seen back in Alexandria welding bars together to make a new detention cell. In the episode "Twice as Far", Morgan is seen reinforcing his jail cell, telling Rick it will give them options in the future. In the episode "East", after Carol goes missing, both Morgan and Rick set out to find her. They find an unknown man, whom Rick decides to shoot after the man asks for his horse, but Morgan stops him. The man is already gone by the time Morgan explains to Rick how everything is a cycle and by sparing the Wolf leader he kept in Alexandria, Denise was saved and was able to save Carl. The two then part ways with Rick giving Morgan a gun and telling him to come back once he finds Carol. In the season finale "Last Day on Earth", Morgan continues to search for Carol. He finds the missing man's horse and is pleased to see he was telling the truth. Soon, he finds Carol, who has been shot twice by one of the Saviors. When the man moves to shoot Carol, Morgan kills him by repeatedly shooting him and then moves to help Carol when the man he and Rick encountered before returns with a friend. Morgan returns his horse and the men agree to help get Carol to safety.

Season 7

Morgan first appears in the second episode of the season, "The Well" where it's revealed that the men he encountered at the end of last season brought him and Carol to a community known as The Kingdom. After Carol wakes up from a long sleep, Morgan introduces her to the leader of the community, King Ezekiel and his pet Bengal tiger Shiva. While Carol dismisses Ezekiel's masquerade as a true medieval king as ridiculous, Morgan seems more open-minded. He begins to become more involved in the community, helping feed their pigs and dispatch walkers. Ezekiel, impressed by Morgan's skills with the staff, asks him to train Ben, a young survivor who is very important to him. Morgan is reluctant at first as he reasons the stick couldn't have saved Carol, but he eventually agrees. While training Ben, Morgan borrows him The Art of Peace book given to him by Eastman and states that he is struggling with his beliefs as he was forced to kill again to save Carol, but still continues to value life. Morgan is later present when Ezekiel and other members of the Kingdom give tribute to the Saviors with Ezekiel expressing his desire to fight and defeat the Saviors. The episode ends with Morgan escorting Carol to an abandoned house outside the Kingdom where they part on amicable terms before Morgan heads back. Morgan reappears in the mid-season finale "Hearts Still Beating", where Carol sees him leaving fruit by her door. She calls him inside and shows him Ezekiel has already brought plenty of fruit, before asking him how he is. When he responds that he's good, she then tells him to leave. The two are then approached by Ezekiel's adviser Richard, who asks for their help in convincing Ezekiel to launch a preemptive strike against the Saviors. Morgan refuses as he doesn't want to be the one to break the peace. When Carol reiterates that she just wants to be left alone, Morgan replies that she was never supposed to see him before leaving. In "Rock in the Road", Morgan is reunited with Rick and the others when they are brought to the Kingdom by Jesus. He tells them that he found Carol, but she left a short time after being in the Kingdom. He later sits in on Rick's meeting with Ezekiel, where he asks the Kingdom to join their fight against the Saviors. Ezekiel asks Morgan for his opinion and Morgan admits that he believes war isn't the answer and suggests they find another way. This sways Ezekiel to turn down Rick and the group leave the Kingdom soon after (though Daryl stays behind in order to better hide from the Saviors). In "New Best Friends", Morgan is present at the next tribute to the Saviors when tensions escalate between Richard and Jared. When guns are drawn, Morgan and Ben use their staffs to stop Jared who then takes Morgan's staff. Despite this, he continues to disagree with Daryl who advocates war. Morgan's moral conundrums come to a head in "Bury Me Here", when during a tribute, the Kingdom comes up short. To make an example of the Kingdom, Jared shoots Benjamin. They rush him to Carol's but Ben succumbs to his injuries and dies. Benjamin's death causes Morgan to become distraught and begin to lose his grip on reality (with flashbacks of King County flashing through his mind). When he realizes Richard engineered the situation, he confronts him. Richard claims it was supposed to be him, but that they can use Ben's death to rally the Kingdom. The next day, while compensating the Saviors, Morgan snaps and attacks Richard, stunning him with his staff before strangling him to death (shocking both sides). Morgan explains that Richard was behind Ben's death and is able to placate the Saviors. He then goes to see Carol and reveals what happened as well as telling her the truth about everyone the Saviors as killed. He claims he's going to kill them all, one by one, but Carol convinces him to stay. The episode ends with Morgan sharpening his staff into a spear, symbolizing his abandonment of Eastmen's ideals in favor of violence.

Development and reception

Lennie James played Morgan in the series premiere "Days Gone Bye". Mike Ryan of Vanity Fair described Morgan in his review of the episode as "scared shitless of zombies breaking in, which seems like a reasonable reaction". Liz Kelly and Jen Chaney of The Washington Post commented on Morgan and Duane, "whose loss of the mother figure in their family reminded us a little of "Lost's" Michael and Walt". Josh Jackson of Paste described Morgan and Duane as being "tormented by Morgan's wife walking the streets outside the suburban home where they're squatting. Unable to put her out of her misery or move on without her, they're frozen in place, tormented by loss that hasn't really gone away. It's the most nightmarish of scenarios – hunted by the shell of a loved one – the zombies aren't generic; this one is personal." Jackson also stated that Rick is "shell-shocked by the world he wakes up to and Morgan serves as his shepherd into reality". Leonard Pierce of The A.V. Club described Morgan as "beautifully played by the always welcome Lennie James" and adding that he "adds a moment of poignancy, as he finds himself actually apologizing for having not killed his now-reanimated wife". Pierce describes the scene in which Morgan "tries to gather the—strength? resolve? compassion?—to destroy what used to be his wife" as a "wrenching" scene. Kris King of Starpulse noted that Morgan "has a powerful scene involving the fate of his wife and his grizzly attempt to come to terms with his loss". Writing for The Atlantic, Scott Meslow describes what he considers "the episode's most devastating scene", in which "Morgan aims at [his wife's] head through a rifle from a window, almost pulling the trigger several times before collapsing in tears. Morgan's fate is a dark reflection of Rick's worst fears; with his wife and son missing, and with no way to contact them, Rick never knows if he'll turn a corner and find a grotesque perversion of the wife and son he loves."

It was confirmed on November 19, 2012, that Morgan would be returning in Season 3. In an interview with Inside TV, Robert Kirkman defines the title of the episode "Clear", and how it relates to Morgan: "It means a lot of things. To a certain extent it's the ravings of a lunatic but it's also about him trying to clear out his life and clear out any entanglements around him. He's living by himself so he's trying to have a clear head. It's basically about him getting rid of his wife and getting rid of his son and the only way for him to survive is to clear the area around him." Kirkman also felt that Lennie James was "really playing a completely different character and doing completely different things in this episode and is just as amazing doing it. So it was a lot of fun having him back and also having him do things that were so different from what he had done before." In his recap of the episode for the Los Angeles Times, Todd VanDerWerff called Lennie James a "brilliant actor", and felt that "his role is significant enough that he essentially becomes the main supporting player in the piece". Eric Kain of Forbes called the performance of Lennie James "absolutely riveting", noting that Morgan "is a changed man, and not for the better"; Kain called Morgan's refusal of Rick's offer to return to the prison with him "a glorious scene". Zack Handlen of The A.V. Club describes Morgan's situation: "Morgan's crime is that he couldn't let go of the past; he couldn't shoot his dead wife, and so his dead wife eventually killed his son. So now he has nothing to live for, but he doesn't have the strength of will left to take his own life. Which leaves him trapped. He can't join up with Rick's group, no matter how much Rick wants him to, because that would mean connecting with people again, becoming vulnerable, risking himself and having to suffer when his new friends die. And he can't commit suicide, because that would require a different kind of courage. So he's stuck building his traps, covering the walls with his writing, sending messages to strangers he'll never see."