Michonne's debut in the season two finale of "The Walking Dead" still stands out as one of the show's greatest moments: the mouthless, chained walkers, the dramatic hooded robes, and, of course, the incredibly sharp katana. Michonne has since decimated hordes of the dead (and the living) with her blade and we went to the source to find out everything about the blade.
Tech Insider spoke with John Sanders, property master and weapons expert for the hit show, about the iconic blade. Sanders told us how they built Michonne's signature weapon. It turns out a suggestion from the comic's creator, Robert Kirkman, impacted its final appearance.
"We had originally decided that we were gonna have red on it or a burgundy on it, to cover the blood," he told Tech Insider. "But Robert wanted white, so we went to an eel skin so it would not absorb blood or liquid or anything like that. So it makes it a lot easier to wash, clean and re-age to the level we need it to."
The eel skin wrap repels the blood and sweat that comes from hours of heavy use when filming the show's action scenes. The props team was very attentive to detail and Sanders told us they built the sword preparing for long-term, heavy use.
"We knew we were gonna have a lot of blood and guts on things. We knew we were gonna have a lot of operations with handling that, pulling and drawing and putting it back, so there were elements of that when we were building it," explained Sanders.
Because of how well built it is, they're been able to maintain the same katana for the show since it was first used in season two. Sanders says there are actually four versions of the katana: the one actress Danai Gurira carries on the show, plastic and rubber versions used for wide shots and stunts, and a digital version, which has green tape on the blade that the VFX team can alter in post-production. After five years, they've never replaced the original blade.
"It’s been on the show for five years now and it’s still the original sword that's in operation," Sanders said. "And we’re able to build, change the blood patterns on it, change the aging on it, change the amount of look to it."
Sanders still marvels at how well kept Michonne's legendary blade is.
"I was just looking yesterday and I’m still thinking that the design, that build, that has to be very similar to the real swords of battle days that they used back in Japan," he said. "It’s gone through as much work as any real battle sword would of, and it’s still in really good shape."
