‘The Walking Dead’: Father Gabriel Could Be the Key to Finding Rick

Could Father Gabriel (Seth Gilliam) hold answers surrounding the disappearance of the believed dead Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln)?

"I don't know, I would hope so," Gilliam told Le Huffington Post when asked if Gabriel's knowledge of a secret group could prove useful in locating Rick.

"Because what he wants, ultimately, is to be of use and to be of service. I would hope that any information that he had would be useful information and could be of service to helping solve the mystery to the puzzle."

Gabriel learned of the shadowy group's existence when he caught lover Anne (Pollyanna McIntosh) conspiring with one of its members over walkie talkie.

He pressed Anne for answers, but his interrogation proved fruitless: Anne only admitted she traded people to this secret group in exchange for supplies she distributed to her junkyard-dwelling Scavengers.

But when Gabriel declined Anne's offer to journey with her to "another place that's far from here," Anne knocked Gabriel unconscious before he could alert Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln).

Rick would later appear to die in a bridge explosion before The Walking Dead jumped six years into the future, leaving Michonne (Danai Gurira) and Daryl (Norman Reedus) hopelessly searching for Rick's body.

Like the others, Gabriel knows only that the misfit Anne fled to an unknown destination.

While Gabriel can assume that Anne connected with this new group as intended, he hasn't suspected the truth: that a wounded Rick survived the explosion and was rescued by Anne, both passengers aboard a helicopter that then flew away to parts unknown.

That story will next play out in the Rick Grimes trilogy of movies, the first of which will center around Rick and Anne's journey and encounter with this new community, bringing with it answers surrounding the helicopter group and an explanation for the mysterious 'A' and 'B' classification system.

"It was not the greatest, Andrew was a friend of mine," Gilliam told Huff Post of the television series bidding farewell to its longtime leading man.

"I was sorry to see him go and the example that he set and his standard and the bar that he set was very high. You're always sorry to lose a friend. It's a tough show because people come and people go. And at some point you just have to come to grips with the fact that you're going to lose people and you only hope that you'll see them again."

AMC has yet to date the first Rick Grimes movie. The Walking Dead Season Nine airs new episodes Sundays at 9/8c on AMC.

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