In mid-October, viewers will be reunited with Rick Grimes, Carl, Michonne, and a host of other familiar faces when AMC's The Walking Dead Season 5 premieres. Like previous ones, this season will see new people from the comic book enter the show and we now have our first photo of a highly anticipated character from the paneled page: Father Gabriel Stokes.

He appeared for an instant in The Walking Dead Season 5 trailer, but EW has unveiled the first photo of Father Gabriel Stokes, giving us a better look at the key character from Robert Kirkman's comic book series. Father Gabriel was introduced in issue #61, so fans of the comic have been waiting quite awhile to see this character depicted on the small screen. On the show, Father Gabriel is played by Seth Gilliam (The Wire, TV's Teen Wolf).

At Comic-Con, AMC officially announced that The Walking Dead Season 5 will premiere on October 12th, at 9:00pm ET/PT. Similar to past seasons, there are a total of sixteen episodes that will be split into two parts. While specific air dates have not been announced for the second set of eight episodes, AMC has confirmed that the season will resume in February, 2015.

Talking Dead will also make its return on October 12th and our international readers will be happy to know that Fox International Channels is planning to air The Walking Dead Season 5 in over 125 markets within 24 hours of the US broadcast.

Be on the lookout for plenty of Season 5 coverage between now and the first episode premiere. Until then, catch up on our recent coverage by visiting the following links:

Here's the first photo of Father Gabriel (a big thanks to EW for the image!):

Source: EW
  • Derek Anderson
    About the Author - Derek Anderson

    Raised on a steady diet of R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps books and Are You Afraid of the Dark?, Derek has been fascinated with fear since he first saw ForeverWare being used on an episode of Eerie, Indiana.

    When he’s not writing about horror as the Senior News Reporter for Daily Dead, Derek can be found daydreaming about the Santa Carla Boardwalk from The Lost Boys or reading Stephen King and Brian Keene novels.