I added it to functions.php in my theme directory.
Issue resolved. Added template_include filter to functions:
add_filter( 'template_include', 'comments_popup_template', 99 );
function comments_popup_template( $template ) {
if( isset($_GET['comments_popup']) && $_GET['comments_popup'] != '')
{
$new_template = locate_template( array( 'comments-popup.php' ) );
if ( '' != $new_template ) {
return $new_template ;
}
}
return $template;
}
Turns out we weren’t at 4.5.1 as believed but 4.4.2 and comments popups were deprecated in 4.5.0. I still need them, though, so I guess I’ll have to figure out how to put them back in. Any suggestions or pointers would be appreciated.