'The Walking Dead' season 7 spoilers: Another chapter, 'all new worlds,' says Greg Nicotero

Greg Nicotero, the "The Walking Dead" executive producer, director, as well as make-up effects supervisor, revealed what can be expected from the upcoming season 7 and clarified why season 6 had to end in a cliffhanger.

In an interview with IGN, Nicotero teased a new chapter and new worlds to be explored by "The Walking Dead" characters in the next season run. According to him, it made sense that season 6 ended a new chapter, although it kept back the identity of the character who was at the receiving end of the blow that Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) dealt using Lucille as his weapon.

However, he also downplayed fans' belief that whoever it was that Negan hit was the same as the character in the comic book series. This is because the television show did not always hold true with what happened in the comics. The EP also explained that scenes were not really being filmed in order, and so, it would be very tough for diehard fans to figure out who the unfortunate character was based on the actors present or absent.

In short, fans would have to wait for "The Walking Dead" season 7 premiere in order to find out the answer to the burning question.

Nicotero, however, defended the decision to go for a cliffhanger in season 6, saying, "It propels our people. It affects our people profoundly, as it does in the comic book. That changes everyone's direction."

He went on to explain that "The main thing about Season 7 is establishing that the world isn't what everybody thinks it is, the world out there."

Nicotero said Rick (Andrew Lincoln) had become so sure of his estimation of the events in the world, believing it would only be as easy as knocking out an outpost, etc., but it ends with him going, "'Heh, oh well, I had no idea. What I perceived as the world is not even close to what the reality of the world is,' and Negan's there to show him that."

So when Negan did what he did, he none-too-gently enlightened Rick that the world was in fact not entirely and did not too closely resemble the world he imagined at all.

"Season 7 of 'The Walking Dead,' there's all new worlds that we're going to meet," according to Nicotero. "So it wouldn't have made sense to end a chapter and then start it halfway through the next chapter. You want to end in one place and pick it up."

The show's executive producer though emphasized that the show is not about to abandon the idea of the walkers, despite there being big bad human villains vying for popularity in the show. He believes it is important to keep the focus on the walkers because they are an important part of the story. The walkers are the show. And he said that, if it happened that the episode did not show a lot of walkers, then viewers could expect "gags" to be part of it.

"... there'll be some awesome gags in it that you'll just be blown away by. I came up with a couple this year that we'll be shooting next week that we've never done before..."

"The Walking Dead" season 7 will return in October on AMC.