Andrew Lincoln explains why he was "gutted" after returning to show's set

It's probably a huge surprise to some fans that fairly soon after The Walking Dead's Andrew Lincoln filmed his "heartbreaking" exit from the show, he was right back on set!

No, that doesn't mean a comeback for Rick Grimes is already in the works — Lincoln was actually working behind the scenes so he can direct an episode next season. He recently described the experience of watching an episode he wasn't a part of while speaking to Digital Spy and other press.

"I am actually gutted, because I went on set, and this extraordinary new cast of people have joined the show," Lincoln admitted to us. "They're amazing. I watched my first episode in 10 years, and it was an episode I wasn't in, and it was brilliant.

"So my decision [to leave] was nothing to do with quality control. It was to do with personal reasons."

Those newbies include Academy Award nominee Samantha Morton as leader of a roving gang of killers known as the Whisperers, who disguise themselves wearing the flesh of the dead.

There's no telling if Rick will encounter them before his swansong, but Andrew Lincoln has promised that his departure will live up to the hype.

"Angela [Kang, showrunner] was amazing," he said. "She called me up before we started. She pitched it to me. There wasn't as much real estate as we thought there would be.

"But what we covered in the time that we had on the show was phenomenal, and I think the last two episodes that I'm in are my favourite episodes since the pilot."