Fear the Walking Dead Returns in October With New Cast Members for Season 7

Fear the Walking Dead returns with new episodes October 17 on AMC. Showrunners Andrew Chambliss and Ian Goldberg confirmed the Season 7 premiere date during the Walking Dead spin-off's San Diego Comic-Con@Home panel Saturday, where the cast and crew previewed the nuclear zombie apocalypse before revealing first-look footage from the new season. Chambliss announced the return of Season 5 guest star Sydney Lemmon (Helstrom) as CRM soldier Isabelle and the return of Season 6 guest star Omid Abtahi (The Mandalorian) as Howard, with Walking Dead Universe newcomer Gus Halper (Dickinson) joining as Will.

"We're happy to say that Sydney Lemmon will be returning as Isabelle, we're excited about that. Omid Abtahi, who everyone saw in the [Season 6] finale opposite Colman [Domingo], he'll be back," Chambliss said during the virtual panel moderated by Talking Dead's Chris Hardwick. "We'll also have a couple [of] new cast members, and one of them we can reveal is Gus Halper. But we won't say much about who he's playing."

Season 6 ends with an unseen Althea (Maggie Grace) sending a masked Isabelle (played by double Kevin Knotts) to rescue her friends from the nuclear warheads launched by Teddy Maddox (John Glover). In "The Beginning," Isabelle shuttles the group to safety aboard a Civic Republic Military helicopter, flying Luciana (Danay Garcia), Sarah (Mo Collins), Wes (Colby Hollman), Jacob (Peter Jacobson), Charlie (Alexa Nisenson), and Daniel Salazar (Ruben Blades) to parts unknown.

Victor Strand (Domingo) encounters Howard (Abtahi), a former professor-turned-apocalyptic historian, when he flees for safety from the bombs that blast large areas of Texas.

"It's gonna be a big escalation beyond what we saw in Season [6]. We're dealing with multiple nuclear warheads that have detonated across the landscape, it's gonna change everything," Goldberg said. "It's gonna change the walkers, it'll change how our characters navigate the world outside — in a lot of cases the air is not breathable unless through a gas mask. Resources are gonna be more scarce."

Goldberg continued: "We'll also see that it's going to, as with any new apocalypse, bring about a whole new brand of human adversary as well that will challenge our group. So it's a whole new world in a lot of different ways."

Starring Lennie James, Alycia Debnam-Carey, Colman Domingo, Danay Garcia, Jenna Elfman, Karen David, Ruben Blades, Austin Amelio, Christine Evangelista, Mo Collins, Keith Carradine as John Dorie Sr., Sydney Lemmon as Isabelle, and Gus Halper as Will, Fear the Walking Dead returns October 17 on AMC. Follow the author @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for all things TWD.