Longtime fans of The Walking Dead will certainly remember Emily Kinney as Beth Greene, the younger sister to Lauren Cohan's Maggie and daughter of Scott Wilson's Hershel. Originally introduced in season 2, Beth lasted a few seasons before she met her sudden end in the midseason 5 finale. Her demise came after several episodes' worth of storylines where Beth had been held prisoner at a hospital by former police officers.
Per ComicBook.com, Kinney spoke about her final season on the show at Fandemic's "Fallen Heroes" panel. She revealed how then-showrunner Scott Gimple asked her to shave parts of her head for her return in season 5 after having gone missing the prior season. At the time, Kinney was not aware her character was set to die that season, but still knowing that it was a possibility, she found it best to decline that request to give herself that particular hairystyle.
"Scott Gimple talked to me one day about — I don't know if you guys remember, but [Beth] had a big scar, when I show up in the hospital, something bad happened to [Beth] and I had a big scar. He had this idea of the scar being on my head and my head being shaved, all messed up — not completely shaved, but all messed up. I said, 'Okay, sure, as the dedicated actress, I would love that. However, if you're thinking we might kill her off soon, please, no, because I would like to get another acting job after this' [laughs]."
Kinney says she made it clear that she was totally willing to shave her head, or parts of it as the case might be, just as long as her character would be sticking around long enough for that hair to grow back out. The actress probably knew it was a bad sign when the head-shaving aspect wasn't in the final script, though she remained hopeful for Beth's survival.
"Then it wasn't in the script that I shaved my head. So then I was like, okay, I didn't necessarily think I was going to die... But I'm glad that we didn't shave my head."
Emily Kinney Has Made Special Appearances Since Beth's Demise
Following Beth's death, Emily Kinney reprised the role when Tyreese (Chad Coleman) was killed in the very next episode, the midseason 5 premiere. While succumbing to a walker bite, Tyreese had envisioned Beth in the car with him, telling him it was okay to let go. Years later, Kinney made another appearance on the show for Rick's (Andrew Lincoln) final episode in season 9. While Rick was in a lucid state, Beth spoke to him and appeared alongside other corpses of people from Rick's past.
Kinney has also appeared as the Bug-Eyed Bandit in the Arrowverse shows The Flash and Arrow. She has also appeared in other shows like Masters of Sex, Conviction, Ten Days in the Valley and Messiah. The singer and actress also appeared in the 2021 movie The Enormity of Life.