Set eight months after the killing of Shane Walsh and onslaught of the Greene Family Farm, with the world growing increasingly more dangerous and Lori's (Sarah Wayne Callies) pregnancy advancing, the season continues the story of Rick Grimes, who has assumed a dictatorial-like leadership over his group of survivors as they survive in a post-apocalyptic world infested with flesh-eating zombies, dubbed "walkers". After discovering a potential safe haven, the group takes refuge and inhabits a large fortified prison, but this security is threatened by a nearby community — Woodbury — led by a nefarious man known as The Governor, who takes an interest in Andrea (Laurie Holden) as she remains, after the burning of the farm, separated and unaware of the main group's status.