The Walking Dead is saying goodbye to two of its longest-running cast members in the incoming ninth season. Though Andrew Lincoln is 100% exiting the show as Rick Grimes is set to depart by the midseason premiere, Lauren Cohan’s future on the AMC zombie series isn’t so set in stone. In fact, there are plans for Maggie to come back in the latter half of the season or, failing that, in season 10.
New showrunner Angela Kang spoke to ComicBook.com recently and revealed that, assuming they can make it work with Cohan’s commitments to ABC’s Whiskey Cavalier, there’s more story to tell with Maggie’s character going forward.
“I’ll say first of all that we’ve still planned some more story with Maggie, Lauren wants to, it will be a little subject to her schedule but hopefully we have her back next season. We have always planned to have this great story with Maggie this season and I think we promised something. We wanted to pay off that promise. We definitely have a very strong Maggie arc.”
This fits with what Cohan herself has already said about her exit storyline in season 9, which will apparently leave things open-ended for a possible return. Unlike Lincoln, who’s deciding to move back to his native England to be with his family, Cohan’s reason for dropping out is purely driven by scheduling conflicts, so there’s no reason for her to stay away for good.
That softens the blow a little bit ahead of Maggie’s goodbye. After all, the actress has been a fixture on TWD since season 2, and with so many OG characters having been offed over the years, she was one of the last ones left from the show’s early seasons. At least we’ll still see her every now and again.
Likewise, Andrew Lincoln will be back in season 10 as well, but only behind the scenes, as he’s pencilled in to direct an episode of the show now that he has some free time on his hands. If he could just scoot around the camera and appear in the episode, too, that’d be great.
The Walking Dead season 9 kicks off on Sunday, October 7th. Will you be tuning in? Be sure to let us know by commenting down below.