The problems stemming from going through multiple showrunners and then ending up with someone who actually wants to stick somewhat close to the source material is starting to rear their ugly heads.
Look, if you're gonna kill someone off who's not supposed to die. (Andrea, Sophia), that's fine. Cool.
But when you do, show how that's going to change the story
Don't just bring in a completely new character that fills that role completely and does everything the deceased character was meant to do, because then what the fuck was the point of killing the character off in the first place?
The Andrea situation was handled well enough by breaking up her story line and spreading it around.
Carol got the twin story line
Michonne got the Mrs. Grimes role
Sasha, even though she's become annoying as fuck, has taken on the sniper role as well as being the one with 'love interest who was infected and partially eaten' situation
But then there's Enid....
Comic Sophia has been with the group from the start. one of the last remaining original survivors.
The death of her wacked out mom, her shutting down, and eventually being taken in by Maggie and Glenn. One of my favorite story lines in the comic.
And then there's her relationship with Carl. The cute little 'boyfriend/girlfriend' phase. The much needed moments of kids acting like kids, especially Carl (something that is more or less completely absent from the show), the dichotomy in how they handle the events around them....Good stuff
Good stuff the show missed out on because Mazarra/Darabont (Hell, since it was Gimple who wrote Pretty Much Dead already, maybe it was his idea) decided to off her in season 2. But the show makes some deviations from the comics as we all know, so it's whatever.
Enter Gimple.
Mr. Faithful to the Comic, Sometimes to a Fault
Instead of just letting the Sophia story line stay dead back in season 2, he has to make Enid.
This annoying, angsty, bratty little shit character. Just about completely unlikable
Made just to fill Sophia's role. I had a feeling that was going to be the case since the back half of the season 5. Last night's episode made me 100% sure about it, what, with Maggie basically saying "aye why not come live with me and Glenn?"
My problem, aside from almost literally everything about her character, is it's too late. If they were going to bring in a replacement Sophia, it should have happened SEASONS ago.
She's missed every single important character moment Sophia would have had, outside of being brought in by Glenn and Maggie, and even that feels forced.
Negan and Lucille are coming in the finale, we know this, and if does end up being Glenn on the receiving end, that just makes the decision to bring in off-brand Sophia even worse.
Her character is not needed. At least not in it's current state as "replacement Sophia"