The Most Popular Streaming Series Of All Time Has Been Canceled
The hit series, Outlander, is set to finally end in 2025.
The popular Starz series Outlander has been officially given an end date, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The time-traveling historical romance will officially close at the end of season eight, which will likely be released sometime in 2025. The news of the series’ end comes before the release of Outlander season seven, which will bring back many familiar faces, including Graham McTavish (House of the Dragon) as Jamie’s uncle Dougal MacKenzie.
When the show ends at the end of season 8, Outlander will officially be Starz’s longest-running original series. The epic love story follows a nurse named Claire (Caitríona Balfe) in 1945, who somehow gets transported back in time to 1743 Scotland and falls in love with the landowning natural-born leader and soldier Jamie (Sam Heughan). The romantic drama is based on the best-selling series of novels by the author Diana Gabaldon.
Outlander as a series has received high praise from critics and has been capturing the imagination of audiences since the show first premiered in August 2014. While most seasons followed a 13-episode format, fans were disappointed by season 6, which only released eight episodes and had to be shortened due to the global pandemic. Fortunately, season 7 of Outlander will make up for what fans have been calling “droughtlander” by releasing 16 episodes for the second to last season.
This means that fans have 26 more episodes to follow the epic Claire and Jamie romance, as the final season is set to have 10 episodes. The President of Original Programming at Starz, Kathryn Busby, feels confident that the next 26 installments of the show will be enough to wrap up the passionate love story the series is centered around and conclude the story in a way that will leave fans of the show satisfied.
And for those who aren’t yet ready to say goodbye to the Scottish drama, Starz has already greenlit its first spin-off series. The prequel, Outlander: Blood Of My Blood, will follow the love story of Jamie’s parents, Brian Fraser and Ellen MacKenzie. Original Outlander executive producer Matthew B. Roberts will serve as showrunner for the prequel, with author Gabaldon working as a consulting producer.
Just like Outlander, Blood of My Blood is a love story. The series aims to provide an origin to the Outlander world and explore the lengths lovers would go to in a time when love was not a priority and people married out of strategy and politics. The title Blood Of My Blood is a reference to the vow that Jamie made to Claire in the original series.
Although the news of Outlander’s cancelation comes after a tumultuous year of film and television annulments (see Batgirl and Westworld), it seems as though the Starz and Outlander showrunners are doing their best to see the popular series out in the most gratifying way possible. While fans might be sad to see the end of Claire and Jamie’s saga, there is still so much story left to tell in the Outlander world. In addition to the prequel, the author of the source material, Gabaldon, will continue writing the literary version of the series and is currently working on the tenth book.
