She's baaaack! The Walking Dead fan favorite Maggie Greene-Rhee will return ... just not for Season 10. AMC announced The Walking Dead was officially renewed for Season 11 AND that Lauren Cohan would return as a series regular next year.
Check out Lauren Cohan joining her Walking Dead co-stars at NYCC:
So The Walking Dead won't be ending after 10 seasons, which isn't a huge shock since there are "decades of story left." However, I'm a mix of happy and sad that we're getting Maggie back. Happy that she will indeed return, after the six-year time jump of Season 9 showed Maggie and baby Hershel were both missing. Maggie's story was left open, and Lauren Cohan did say her story was not over. That was a hint, but we didn't know when or how Maggie would return.
Now we know Maggie will return NEXT season. That makes me a little bit less excited for Season 10, which is where the sad comes in. The Walking Dead Season 10 starts tomorrow night, Sunday, October 6. I was hoping Maggie would return this season. We are losing Danai Gurira's Michonne in Season 10, so maybe getting Maggie back in Season 11 is supposed to balance that in some way? Andrew Lincoln's Rick Grimes is also gone, and yet not gone because he has at least one movie coming to AMC -- and also to theaters.
Sarah Barnett, President of AMC Networks Entertainment Group an AMC Studios, shared a statement on The Walking Dead renewal and Lauren Cohan's return:
The Walking Dead burst out of the gate ten years ago as a genre show that had all the character depth of a top-tier prestige drama. And now 10 years later – led by the brilliant Angela Kang and fueled by one of the most consistently talented casts in television – this phenomenon is flourishing creatively, with critics and audiences embracing its reset. We’re delighted to welcome back Lauren Cohan, she has meant so much to this show and its passionate, global fanbase, who are in for a fantastic ride over the coming months.
Once ABC decided to cancel Lauren Cohan's new show Whiskey Cavalier, it definitely led fans to hope she would return as Maggie. Cohan reportedly left due to contract disputes, wanting more money closer to what Norman Reedus and Andrew Lincoln were getting. Now Andy Lincoln is kinda sorta gone and Reedus is said to be making the big bucks. But it sounds like AMC came to some kind of arrangement with Cohan, since she's not just back on a guest star or recurring basis. Series regular is full-time.
I'm curious to see how not-so-baby Hershel looks now. He'd be, what, 7 or 8 now -- maybe older by the timeline of The Walking Dead Season 11?
The Walking Dead Season 10 premieres Sunday, October 6 at 9 p.m. on AMC.
