Warning: Contains SPOILERS for Fear the Walking Dead season 6, episode 12, "In Dreams."
Fear the Walking Dead just delivered the darkest ending in the history of The Walking Dead universe. The death of Athena, the child that Grace (Karen David) was pregnant with, is easily one of the most depressing moments that’s ever occurred in any of the three shows.
Fear the Walking Dead season 6, episode 12, titled “In Dreams”, saw Grace experience a dream about the future of Morgan’s community while going through labor. In this world, Grace had apparently died, and her daughter was raised by Morgan (Lennie James). It looked like the episode, which was the first one this season to focus on the long-missing character, was about to be her last. She came to accept that everything she was seeing meant that death was right around the corner for her. However, she was able to take some solace in this because she was told that everyone would come together and persevere through the coming struggles on account of Athena’s presence in their lives.
Then Fear the Walking Dead offered a huge twist by having Athena turn out to be stillborn. Morgan was left shocked and devastated, with Grace coming to the realization that her dream was actually Athena’s “last moments” and not hers. Sad endings aren’t new for The Walking Dead shows, but this did feel especially dark, even by its standards. It even topped Carol killing Lizzie in The Walking Dead season 4, Rick finding out that Carl was bitten in season 8’s “How It’s Gonna Be”, and most recently, the death of John Dorie (Garret Dillahunt) earlier in Fear the Walking Dead season 6.
A large part of what makes “In Dreams” so tragic is how it was framed. There was a gloomy feel to it along, as it appeared that the point of Grace’s visons was to provide a proper sendoff for a major member of the group. That being said, what Fear the Walking Dead ultimately did was far more heartbreaking than a main character like Grace dying. While “In Dreams” was bracing viewers for her impending demise, it used Athena to offer an optimistic reminder that good things would come from this painful loss. There was this idea that while Grace would die, her daughter would live and give Morgan’s community the unity it needed.
Saving the baby would have been a good way to end Grace’s story on an uplifting note, but Fear the Walking Dead decided not to go there at all. Instead, it did the opposite by letting Grace live and Athena die. That moment erased the episode’s optimistic tone, and replaced it with an overwhelming feeling of hopelessness. Athena, who was thought to be a beacon of hope they could build their community around, is gone, and her death illustrates the notion that the beautiful future she represented won’t be coming to pass. It’s a depressing thought, and may be remembered later as one of the darkest tragedies faced by Morgan’s group on Fear the Walking Dead.