Warning: SPOILERS ahead for Fear the Walking Dead season 8, episode 7

Summary

• Co-showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg explain the decision to bring back Daniel Sharman as Troy Otto for Fear the Walking Dead season 8, aiming to challenge characters to confront their past.
• Sharman expressed interest in reprising the role of Troy Otto, wanting to explore more of the character's story.
• Madison and Troy's dynamic will be further explored in this next chapter, with both Kim Dickens and Daniel Sharman excited to revisit and expand upon their characters' relationship.

Fear the Walking Dead's co-showrunners explain the decision to bring back Daniel Sharman as Troy Otto as the final villain. More than halfway through its eighth and final season, the long-running Walking Dead spinoff includes a tense team-up between old friends Madison (Kim Dickens) and Strand (Colman Domingo). They're captured, and it leads to the reveal that Troy has returned. The character had not been fully on the show since the season 3 finale, "Sleigh Ride", in 2017.

In an interview with Fear the Walking Dead season 8. In the quote below, Chambliss described how the idea evolved from a half-serious suggestion to a more serious discussion about including an antagonist that would connect to Madison, Strand, and the rest of the group. Goldberg discusses bringing Sharman back, mentioning that the Teen Wolf alum was interested in playing Troy again. Goldberg also specifically mentions the Troy and Madison dynamic:

CHAMBLISS: It was something that Ian and I threw out half-seriously when we were trying to think of ways that we could have an antagonist who would really put the question front and center to Madison, to Strand, to Daniel: Have you guys really changed? Have you really escaped your past? Can you really move forward? And it felt like having someone return from their past seemed like the way to do it.

And the more we talked about it, the more excited we got about that person being Troy Otto. And you’re right, we’d never written for the character. We had never worked with Daniel Sharman. So we scheduled a phone call with him and we introduced ourselves and pitched him what we were thinking and why we wanted to bring the character back, and what it is that he would get to explore with Troy Otto. And we had a really great conversation, and Daniel said he was a character that he loved to create and always wished he could explore more, so he was excited to come back and we were able to make it happen.

GOLDBERG: We were just huge fans of his and the character, even though we had not worked with him before. And then what was really exciting is when we knew that he was in and Daniel was interested in coming back, we talked about it with Colman and Ruben and Danay [Garcia] and all the people that had been on the show when he was in it previously — and their excitement was huge as well.

Everybody was excited to revisit this chapter of the show and to expand the Madison–Troy story, especially Kim and Daniel. They loved the dynamic and the dance that those characters did together in the past. And so they were really excited to get in there and explore this next chapter for Madison and Troy.

How Fear the Walking Dead Brings Back Troy

Troy is believed to have died in Fear the Walking Dead season 3, as Madison attacked him with a hammer. But as teased in the episode prior to the midseason premiere, which is aptly titled "All I See is Red", Troy is very much alive and he seems particularly keen on taunting Madison as Troy did not survive their last encounter unscathed. There's damage done to his eye, which he hides behind a pair of sunglasses.

Troy is stopped before he can do more damage. Daniel (Rubén Blades) comes around with an army of his own. That includes June (Jenna Elfman), Sherry (Christine Evangelista), and more who are able to hold off Troy's group. But the returning villain does his fair share of damage, at least emotionally, by making a confession that sets up the remainder of Fear the Walking Dead.

Troy says he's killed Madison's daughter Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey), using Alicia's severed arm as proof. This enrages Madison, who tries to attack Troy but gets held back. The last showdown between the two rivals is on the way, and given their history on Fear the Walking Dead, the spinoff is poised to exit in spectacular fashion.

Source: EW