Danai Gurira Is Latest Big Name That Will Exit ‘The Walking Dead’

Danai Gurira, who plays the tougher-than-zombies Michonne on AMC’s The Walking Dead, will exit the series for good after Season 10.

Sources confirm that Gurira, also a playwright and one of the stars of Disney/Marvel’s Best Picture Oscar nominee Black Panther, has signed a deal in which she will appear in only a handful of episodes for TWD‘s next season.

Her exit is the third major one among the main cast of the zombie apocalypse drama series, after Andrew Lincoln and Lauren Cohan. AMC declined comment on Gurira’s exit, but Gurira’s deal seems similar in nature to what the producers are trying to work out with Cohan, who might also return for occasional episodes going forward.

The latest TWD news, which THR had first today, comes ahead of the return of the show’s Season 9 on Sunday. AMC announced the Season 10 renewal for the series based on Robert Kirkman’s comics on Monday.

Lincoln, who played Rick Grimes, and Cohan, who played Maggie, both exited during the current Season 9 of the series, at one time TV’s most-watched show and still a big hit for AMC. There are now several offshoots of the franchise already in play, including the current Fear the Walking Dead series as well as potential multiple stand-alone films starring Lincoln as Grimes and written by Scott M. Gimple going into production as early as this year.