Alex is a character from Fear The Walking Dead that hardly features in the series but is still a favorite amongst fans, mainly because of her lead role in the prequel web series called Fear The Walking Dead: Flight 462. The 2015 series recounts the events of a commercial airplane flight right in the early months of the zombie outbreak. Alex, along with her love interest Jake, survives the events of Flight 462, joining Fear The Walking Dead in Ouroboros, the third episode of the show's second season. She's rescued by Connor and goes on to join his gang of pirates.
Here are some interesting trivia around this ominous yet important characters from the Walking Dead universe.
The Character Was To Be Originally Called Charlie
An article on TheWalkingDead.Com introduced the world to the cast of Flight 462. However, back then the character of Alex was mentioned as Charlie for some reason.
Even Alex's actress Michelle Ang seems clueless about this previous name. "I don't know where that came from," she told Digital Spy. "We never hear her being referred to as 'Charlie' on Flight 462. So maybe it was a placeholder? Or maybe there's a story element to it?"
Michelle Ang Didn't Know She's Auditioning For A Walking Dead Series
While initially auditioning for the role of Alex, Michelle Ang didn't have a clear idea of the project she was being a part of. For her auditions, she wasn't made to act in some sort of zombie world. Instead, she was to audition with dummy slides as an impatient woman in a train station who was getting agitated by a young boy.
While bagging the role of Alex, she still did not know about any possibilities about appearing in anything beyond the Flight 462 web series.
Main Cast Character With The Least Appearances
Because of her leading role in Flight 462, Alex is considered to be one of Fear The Walking Dead's main characters. She's the main character with the least appearances in this case, having appeared in just two episodes.
Further, she's the only main character in the series with unknown status, as her fate was left on an ambiguous note when the Manawas and Clarks left the pirate dockyard.
Michelle Ang Was Nominated For An Emmy
For her portrayal of Alex, New Zealand film and TV actress Michelle Ang was nominated for an Emmy Award in 2016, in the category of Outstanding Actress in a Short Form Comedy or Drama Series.
However, in an ironic twist, Ang lost the Emmy to Patrika Darbo for her role in a dark comedy about Hollywood zombies aptly called Acting Dead. The actress was still happy to be nominated and attend the award ceremony as she tweeted, ''I honestly am having such a wonderful time here! Met so many of my acting heroes."
Her Fate Was Uncertain In Flight 462
Even though Alex was the main lead in Flight 462, the cast members were pretty uncertain about who would end up surviving the flight and then maybe bag a role in Fear The Walking Dead. Michelle Ang compares her character's survival as 'winning the lottery'.
As she puts it, "All the actors who shot Flight 462 were told, 'There will be some survivors that will cross over, but who knows who it's going to be?' - so none of us knew, even after we shot it, and even when it started airing."
A Deleted Scene With Alicia
Alex's planned extended role in Fear The Walking Dead becomes more evident with a deleted scene in which she's supposed to be meeting with Alicia Clark. after their meeting, Alex was to help Alicia escape Connor's boat.
Instead, the final cut showed Strand abandoning Alex and a dying Jake in the ocean. She's later rescued by Connor after Jake's death, which is revealed when she meets an imprisoned Travis aboard Connor's ship.
Alex's Actress Once Auditioned For Cho Chang
Michelle Ang has appeared in several films and shows over the years, making appearances in the reboot of The Twilight Zone, Grey's Anatomy, and Xena: Warrior Princess.
In 2004, she also auditioned for the character of Cho Chang in Harry Potter & The Goblet Of Fire, the fourth installment in the Harry Potter franchise. Cho is a Ravenclaw student and a Quidditch player who was Harry Potter's love interest for a short period.
Nervous Flyer
Ang jokingly confessed that despite the character's scenes being set in the course of one flight, the actress is a nervous flyer in real life.
"I had a flight a couple of days after filming and that was quite a long flight. I was suddenly clocking everyone who went to the bathroom while we were up there. I’m a little bit of a nervous flyer, I don’t like turbulence much, but I’ve never been wary of sick people on a plane before now.", she said in an interview.
A Foreseer For Vague Reasons
Since the start of Flight 462, Alex seems to be ahead of all characters, as she senses the zombie virus outbreak way before than the other characters. This can be understood from the over-protective role she adopts in saving her fellow passengers through the web series. She also seems to be going through PTSD as she boards the flight.
Michelle Ang was herself pretty perplexed on how Alex was such a foreseer, being ahead of everyone else. Ang asked several doubts to the screenwriters, but even their answers didn't provide her with much clarity.Alex's back story was likely left to be vague on purpose.
The Reason Why She Got Close To Jake
Alex is usually a quiet character who hardly bonds with any of the other passengers barring Jake. Ang says that partly the connection was born out of guilt. Alex feels guilty for separating Jake from her mother in the crucial hours preceding the outbreak, by taking her seat in the flight.
Further, Ang feels Alex needed something to push her to survive, something that would function as her 'grand mission'. This is why saving Jake in his final hours becomes a mission for Alex 'to feed her own survival mechanism'.