“Motherd—k!” We’re guessing we might all be quoting one of our favorite Abraham Ford-isms after The Walking Dead’s Season 5 finale, at least according to what Abraham’s portrayer, Michael Cudlitz, hints to us about the March 29 season ender.

“It’s going to piss you off,” the actor tells Yahoo TV. “There will be tears, but also, once again, like the writers have been doing pretty consistently, it tees up a new beginning in a very, very different way.”

Cudlitz, who’s completing his first full season on The Walking Dead, also tells us what’s motivating Abraham after his D.C. dreams were dashed, why Abraham is more at ease when life is in chaos, what he thinks about that weasel Father Gabriel, and how much he revels in the lighter moments of playing one of the series’ most colorful (and we’re not just talking about the hair and beard hues) characters.

In “Spend,” right before the walkers attacked at the construction site, Abraham seemed to be having a panic attack, or maybe sensed something was going to happen. What was going on with him?

I think a little bit of everything you just mentioned. He’s very aware. He doesn’t want to be out there anymore, from a very real standpoint. None of them want to be out and unprotected. I think he’s processing everything. This is his downtime. This is something he has not had before [since the apocalypse happened], and it’s almost like idle time is not good for him, because he doesn’t want to process what he has to process. He’d rather keep moving forward. As long as he’s moving forward on whatever mission it is, there’s not that time where you’re left with yourself and your own thoughts. Now that they’re in Alexandria and the basic necessities are taken care of, there’s much more time to think. Thinking is what’s going to be the thing that rocks the boat quite a bit in Alexandria.

Is Abraham almost more relaxed in battle than he is when things are peaceful?

I think he terrifies himself, because the thing he’s good at is the thing he wishes he was not good at. The thing that he is good at is what cost him his family. It’s a constant reminder.

What do you think motivates him at this point?

I think his motivation’s changed and is changing. It obviously was the mission to D.C., and that was destroyed. Then there was a time where he was floating completely aimlessly. Now we’re into a phase where, as he said to Michonne at the cocktail party, things have worked out pretty damn good for him. He looks back and, OK, he almost killed himself. He was saved from that situation. Ultimately, he’s in a place where he sees that there’s potentially a future in Alexandria. Now the mission becomes shifting to his place in this new world. Unfortunately, his place in this new world is the same place that he had in the old world.

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There are things that he is good at… that can’t be denied. And there’s things that he probably wishes he could deny. But he is definitely in his element when doing that. He is definitely at his most relaxed. That is something that [showrunner] Scott Gimple really wanted to make sure that we got across — you see it way back even when Tara says to him, “You were smiling when you were killing those walkers,” when you meet Abraham. He’s completely unaware of how relaxed and how in his element he is, and how effortless it is once he goes into that killing machine mode. It is literally what he was built for.

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As you said, Alexandria potentially could offer this safe haven, this chance to start over for everyone. Could Abraham ever imagine himself starting over, in terms of creating a new family, or is the idea of that just too painful, considering what happened to his wife and kids?

I think possibly. One thing that the show always holds on to is hope. I think that all the characters have to have hope, because if anyone’s given up or has sort of said, “This is enough,” I think you’re setting yourself up for disaster. There has to be hope for the future. Even if you think that it probably won’t happen, there has to be the possibility that it might happen. So, I think that he hopes for and he wishes that things can be different, but ultimately in his heart of hearts, and the audience’s view of what’s happening, it’s not really going to change. Nothing’s ever going to really be normal. The people who have it best right now are the children, the youngest children, because they didn’t know the world in any different way, so they will learn to adapt and be happy in this world, not knowing what they’ve lost. I think the adults have a much, much harder journey and much harder transition.