The Walking Dead Key Art Shows Sheriff Rick Grimes Back in Action

Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) is getting back to his roots in his final season of The Walking Dead. The official Season 9 key art shows the former sheriff wearing his classic sheriff's hat, an iconic look from the series premiere that he hasn't worn much in the later seasons. In fact, he passed it along to his son Carl (Chandler Riggs), who gave it to his sister Judith before he died last season. And it looks like Rick has taken the hat back from Judith, which is kinda messed up, actually. Rick, how you gonna take a little girl's hat?

AMC also released the official synopsis for Season 9. Check it out:

Last season brought the culmination of "All Out War," which pitted Rick Grimes and his group of survivors against the Saviors and their cunning leader, Negan. With Negan's life in his hands, Rick had a character-defining choice in front of him. By making the unilateral decision to spare Negan, Rick upheld the values his late son, Carl, championed in order to build for the future, but created conflict within his group.

Now, we see our survivors a year and a half after the end of the war, rebuilding civilization under Rick's steadfast leadership. It is a time of relative peace among the communities as they work together, looking to the past to forge the future, but the world they knew is rapidly changing as man-made structures continue to degrade, and nature takes over, changing the landscape and creating new challenges for our survivors.

As time passes, the communities confront unexpected obstacles, danger, and of course, walkers, but nothing quite prepares them for the formidable force they are about to encounter, which threatens the very idea of civilization that our survivors have worked so hard to build.

Also also, AMC released a bunch of gallery photos of the 17 of the show's regulars -- which isn't even all of them -- including one of Eugene (Josh McDermitt) with a ponytail instead of his iconic mullet. He's a new man.

The Walking Dead Season 9 premieres Sunday, Oct. 7 at 9/8c on AMC.