The Walking Dead Final Episodes Trailer Teases Rick Grimes Connection

Warning: this story contains spoilers for Sunday’s “Acts of God” episode of TWD. Daryl is locked and loaded for Rick’s return in the final episodes of The Walking Dead. AMC on Sunday revealed the first teaser trailer for the eight-episode series finale of The Walking Dead, showing Daryl (Norman Reedus) and Maggie (Lauren Cohan) at war with Lance Hornsby (Josh Hamilton) and the Commonwealth. With Hornsby’s military occupation of Alexandria, crossbows won’t cut it. The 30-second teaser reveals Daryl wielding the weapon Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) used to blow up the bridge in what was his presumed death: Rick’s Colt Python revolver.

When searching for Rick’s body in the wake of the bridge explosion, Michonne (Danai Gurira) finds Rick’s revolver muddied and washed ashore in Season 9 episode “Scars.” Michonne eventually gives the gun to her daughter, Judith Grimes (Cailey Fleming), sometime during Daryl’s six-year search for Rick’s body. 

Michonne and Daryl don’t yet know Anne, a.k.a. Jadis (Pollyanna McIntosh), shuttled a gravely wounded Rick to safety with a life-saving helicopter medevac, trading him to the CRM for entry into the Civic Republic in Philadelphia. In Season 10, Michonne found evidence her partner survived the bridge explosion when she found items belonging to Rick during an encounter with Virgil (Kevin Carroll) on Maryland’s Bloodsworth Island.

We last saw Michonne headed north in search of Rick, entrusting only Judith with the true purpose of her mission to find the “brave man” and bring him home. Amid war with the Whisperers, Michonne left Judith and RJ (Antony Azor) in the care of their uncle Daryl, who is supporting the Grimes children as an armored trooper in the Commonwealth Army.

Judith has been keeping Michonne’s mission secret from Daryl, fearing he would leave in search of Michonne and Rick. But in Season 11,Connie (Lauren Ridloff) returns to Alexandria with Virgil, the only other person who knows the truth about why Michonne left. 

“Rick was like Daryl’s brother. Daryl was the one that kept searching for him for years out in the woods,” showrunner Angela Kang previously told ComicBook about Judith keeping Michonne’s mission secret from Daryl. “She’s a child, and I think there’s part of it which is she feels like she’s not sure that she’s supposed to say anything about what her mother’s doing, going out there. But I think also she is scared. She’s scared that the one remaining parent figure that she has is going to run away too, at a time when they need him.”

Lincoln recently reunited with Reedus in Georgia as The Walking Dead filmed its final episodes, sparking speculation Rick Grimes will return in Season 11C. The series finale wrapped production on March 30 in Senoia, Georgia. 

Last year, Lincoln said he would “never say never” to a return to the television series as AMC continues to develop his feature film spinoff trilogy. 

“The easy answer is I have no idea,” Lincoln told SFX Magazine in April 2021 about Rick’s return to the flagship series. “I don’t think it’s written yet, but I would never say never to that because everybody that’s still doing the TV show are dear friends, and it’s an extraordinary feat that they’re still going and making this beautiful and ground-breaking show that still resonates with the world.”

The Walking Dead: The Final Season concludes this fall on AMC. The Untitled Walking Dead Movies remain in development at AMC Studios. 

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