The Walking Dead EP Gale Anne Hurd Confirmed as a Producer on Andrew Lincoln's Rick Grimes Movie

The Walking Dead executive producer Gale Anne Hurd will serve as a producer on AMC's untitled Walking Dead feature film releasing theatrically via Universal Pictures. Since 2010, Hurd's Valhalla Entertainment has produced all seasons of The Walking Dead, and AMC Studios franchise spin-offs Fear the Walking Dead and The Walking Dead: World Beyond. Star Andrew Lincoln, who reprises his role as Rick Grimes for the first time since his Season 9 exit from the flagship series, also serves as producer on the film from Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman and TWD Universe chief content officer Scott Gimple.

Along with the franchise-spawning hit series The Walking Dead, Hurd's decades-long list of film credits includes the James Cameron-directed blockbusters The Terminator, Aliens, and Terminator 2: Judgment Day, as well as live-action Marvel Comics adaptations The Incredible Hulk and Punisher: War Zone. Hurd most recently produced the horror-slasher Hell Fest for CBS Films and Lionsgate.

Announced in 2018 as a series of AMC Studios Original Films, the AMC and Skybound-produced Walking Dead movie later shifted to release only in theaters when Universal partnered on the project in 2019. AMC Networks President and CEO Josh Sapan said on a 2019 earnings call that there was "interest fairly widely" among multiple studios to distribute the Walking Dead film in theaters, coming as "a representation and affirmation" of the strength of the decade-old live-action franchise.

Details are scarce on the as-yet-untitled feature film. Announced as the start of a trilogy, Gimple and Kirkman wrote the film's script about "where Rick is taken and what he faces in a new corner of the zombie apocalypse" after a Civic Republic Military helicopter flies him away from his family on The Walking Dead.

Joining Lincoln is his Walking Dead series co-star Pollyanna McIntosh reprising her role as Anne, previously known as Jadis, who disappeared alongside Rick in Season 9. It has been hinted, but not yet confirmed, that presently unaccounted for characters like Rick's partner Michonne (Danai Gurira) and old friend Heath (Corey Hawkins) could return on the film side of the franchise.

Other cast members and a director have not been announced, and no release date has been set. Lincoln most recently anticipated a spring or summer start of production on the Walking Dead film, where he returns to the Rick Grimes role for the first time since 2018.

AMC Networks confirmed Hurd's role as producer in a press release announcing the Etheria film festival streaming exclusively on AMC's Shudder, where Hurd will present The Walking Dead showrunner and executive producer Angela Kang with the 2021 Etheria Inspiration Award for inspiring women "who pursue careers working in genre film and television."

Follow the author @CameronBonomolo on Twitter for all things TWD. The Final Season of The Walking Dead premieres Sunday, August 22, on AMC.