The Walking Dead’s Danai Gurira Previews Mother Daughter Journey as Part of Michonne’s Final Season Story

A theme of mothers and daughters will play into the story for Michonne in star Danai Gurira‘s final season of The Walking Dead.

“She’s dealing with the massive threat for her community, and that involves taking a lot more comprehensive responsibility,” Gurira said of killer new enemies the Whisperers during The Walking Dead Season 10 Preview Special.

“And at the same time, really feeding into her daughter. There’s a lot of great stuff that connects her and Judith, into Judith really becoming her mother’s daughter. That’s a very beautiful thing, in terms of, ‘How do you deal with an enemy, and how do you raise a daughter in this world?’ It’s a very cool sort of journey they’re taking together.”

Michonne will be tasked with shielding Judith (Cailey Fleming) and brother RJ (Antony Azor) from the nearby horrors of the Whisperers as paranoia caused by the flesh-wearing freaks infects the various communities.

For showrunner Angela Kang, who consulted with Gurira when developing a proper exit for Michonne, the writer-producer said Michonne’s final arc on the television show proved to be the toughest storyline for Season 10.

“It’s all hard, but I think the one that we probably put the most work into thus far has been for Michonne, because we have this planned exit for her,” Kang said on the preview special.

“She’s been such a huge part of the series since season 3, just such a force of nature, [she] really demands excellence and brings excellence every day that she’s on set. And so we really wanted to do right by that character and by the actress, so we worked really hard on that. I think we have a pretty cool journey for her, and Danai has just been killing it, killing it. Just everything we’ve seen come back has been so exciting, so I can’t wait for the fans to see all of that.”

TWD chief content officer Scott Gimple previously hinted Michonne could survive her final season and join Andrew Lincoln in the Rick Grimes movies. A teaser trailer debuted at San Diego Comic-Con appeared to reveal the long-missing Rick was relocated to Philadelphia.

Gurira’s final season of TWD premieres Sunday, October 6 on AMC.