The final season of Fear the Walking Dead is almost here! After seven seasons of yachts, ranches, stadiums, bounty hunters, militias, cult leaders, nuclear fallout, loss, death, and of course zombies, the show returns next month for Season 8. This is the place for viewers who need a refresher on where the show left off and what our heroes were up to last.
When Season 7 started, everyone was acclimating to a new world devastated by a nuclear detonation set off by a cult leader named Teddy (John Glover). As all this was happening, many of the survivors began hearing whispers about PADRE, a mysterious place that could be a safe haven – except no one knew where it was or if it really even existed.
The antihero of Season 7 was Strand (Colman Domingo). He took refuge from the nuclear blasts in The Tower, a downtown skyscraper that he remade into a luxurious headquarters for himself, replete with all the creature comforts. He led a posse of Rangers, a group of quasi-troopers, and wielded power by deciding, sometimes on a whim, who could live in The Tower — those who displeased him were thrown ruthlessly off the roof into a teeming moat of walkers below. One person who was always emotionally connected to Strand was Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey), but the onetime allies clashed in Season 7. Teddy had locked Alicia in a bunker, but she escaped post-blast and met Will, who told her about PADRE. It was a supposedly secure location full of all the necessary supplies to rebuild society and he was supposed to head there with his boss, Senator Elias Vazquez. But Vazquez, who was killed and became a walker, was the only one who knew where it was. Alicia got bitten by the zombie senator and tried to save herself by amputating her arm. For the rest of the season, a feverish Alicia, convinced she was on the verge of death, was determined to find PADRE, even resorting to following Walker Senator Vazquez in hopes that his undead self would still remember the way there. She even convinced Morgan (Lennie James) to join her. However, her hopes were dashed when the senator ended up in The Tower's walker moat and Alicia became enraged when she discovered that Walker Will was there too because Strand had him thrown off The Tower. She then vowed to destroy The Tower and she accomplished her mission when the building was accidentally set on fire during her showdown with Strand. A weakened Alicia was saved from the inferno and made up with Strand before passing out. When she awoke, she was fully healed from her infection and strode resolutely into her future.
Dwight (Austin Amelio) and Sherry (Christine Evangelista) reinvented themselves as "ethical" outlaws who tried to level the playing field for those in need. They were also on the hunt for PADRE, even though they only heard chatter about it and didn't know much about it either. The duo encountered a woman named Mickey (Aisha Tyler), who was looking for her husband as well as PADRE. Even though Mickey's husband was a zombie when they found him and Mickey didn't lead them to PADRE, her plight resulted in the two of them recommitting to each other by trying to start a family. By the end of Season 7, Sherry was pregnant.
Morgan (Lennie James) and Grace (Karen David) also learned about PADRE after they left their refuge in the USS Pennsylvania submarine with Baby Mo to find food for her. While on the road, they met a couple that told them about PADRE, though, again, they didn't know where it was, even after extensive searching. Frenemies Morgan and Strand were reunited briefly when Morgan, despite his distrust of Strand, eventually made his way to The Tower because he needed medical treatment for Mo. While there, Morgan used the opportunity to poison Strand. When Strand discovered what Morgan did, he freed Morgan only because Grace offered to find and remove the radioactive walkers near The Tower and because she agreed to stay in The Tower with Mo. Ultimately, Strand became attached to Mo and resolved to remove her from her parents' care and to keep her permanently in The Tower with him. It was up to John Dorie, Sr. (Keith Carradine) to rescue Mo and return her to Morgan. John Sr. and June (Jenna Elfman) survived the nuclear explosion in a bunker, but eventually moved into The Tower, where June was the on-site medic and John Sr. manipulated himself into becoming Strand's right-hand man. But John Sr. came down with radiation sickness, and given his terminal diagnosis, chose to extract Mo from Strand's clutches and sacrificed himself to The Tower's walker moat in order to get her back to Morgan. Morgan took Mo and escaped on a raft to find a safe place for her, away from the radiation and away from Strand.
John Sr. wasn't the only character who left our screens in Season 7. There was also Althea (Maggie Grace). She got her happy ending by reuniting with Isabelle (Sydney Lemmon), who had abandoned her post with the CRM (Civil Republic Military). Alicia also departed, choosing not to join her fellow survivors – Dwight, Sherry, June, Grace, Josiah LaRoux (Demetrius Grosse), Wendell (Daryl Mitchell), Sarah (Mo Collins), Jacob the rabbi (Peter Jacobson), Luciana (Danay Garcia), Charlie (Alexa Nisenson), Daniel (Rubén Blades), and Strand – on the rafts that would take them away from Texas because she was afraid she would die and reanimate while adrift at sea. Once she recovered fully from her infection, she went off on her own to try to save people.
But amid all the departures, there was a significant arrival — the return of Madison (Kim Dickens). The mother of Alicia and Nick (Frank Dillane) appeared for the first time since Season 4. Morgan came face-to-face with Madison, who proceeded to kidnap Mo and give her up to PADRE. It turned out that Madison was a "collector" for PADRE, which meant that she took children from their parents and gave them to PADRE to raise them. After an angry group of parents tried — and failed — to kill Madison, Madison regretted what she'd done and agreed to help Morgan retrieve Mo. Season 7 closed as Madison and Morgan were taken at last to the elusive PADRE.
How will Madison and Morgan's journey unfold? What will become of Baby Mo? What is PADRE and who runs it? What's going to happen to the rest of the survivors aboard all those rafts? To get answers to these questions and more, tune in to watch Fear the Walking Dead's exciting conclusion when the final season premieres on Sunday, May 14 at 9pm ET on AMC.  AMC+ subscribers will get early access to every episode on Thursdays beginning May 11. Try AMC+ for free here.