The seventh season of Outlander got here to an finish early within the 2025 TV schedule, and filming had already completed on the eighth and last season. Season 8 is predicted to premiere earlier than the tip of 2025, so the final Droughtlander hiatus no less than will not be the longest within the historical past of the sequence. Particulars are pretty few and much between… until you’ve got learn Diana Gabaldon’s supply materials books and might make some educated guesses, anyway! What I felt assured about guessing was that the ultimate script read-through was emotional for the solid, but it surely wasn’t till talking with Sophie Skelton that I absolutely understood.
I used to be lucky sufficient to speak with Skelton, who performs Brianna MacKenzie on the long-running Starz sequence, throughout SCAD TVfest in Atlanta, the place the actress acquired the Lumiere Award. After Skelton shared ideas on why Outlander is at all times getting robbed on the awards circuit, I requested what the ultimate read-through was like on the time. Whereas she in fact did not drop particulars for what occurred in that individual script, her description of the particular assembly was so beautiful that I hope there are photographs that the solid can share sometime. She shared:
It was stunning. That they had a choir in and we noticed some outdated faces by way of writers who hadn’t been in a position to make it over for a bit. It was actually emotional. We have been in a spot the place we may see the ocean after we have been doing the read-through, and it was fairly a small group, and it simply felt actually, actually stunning. The right approach to say goodbye.
And right here I used to be imagining a plain outdated room, with solely the script making the moments emotional! I might not have guessed that the Outlander crew not solely introduced in a choir and a few acquainted faces, however primarily based it in a location with an ocean view. No surprise Sophie Skelton described it as “the proper approach to say goodbye” on the TVfest crimson carpet!
She did not reveal who all was current in the course of the last read-through, though the photographs of the solid as they wrapped filming on Season 8 suggests some who might have been there. On the very least, I might say that we are able to depend on Caitriona Balfe, Sam Heughan, and Richard Rankin together with Skelton. Oddly sufficient, the solid was commemorating the tip of filming Season 8 again in late September 2024, almost two full months earlier than Outlander returned for the second half of Season 7.
Skelton did press forward of Season 7B after which spoke with journalists once more following the finale at SCAD TVfest, all whereas realizing how the story finally ends for Brianna. So, I requested: does she should refresh her reminiscence on what she filmed at which level, in order that she does not by accident drop spoilers? She responded:
Yeah! As a result of we shot that a few years in the past, and clearly your thoughts is so in the place I’ve left Brianna. Particularly as a result of we’re ending eternally, you truly really feel such as you’ve tied up the story fairly superbly. You actually are sat in your present character’s head, and… it is like, ‘The place was Brianna when her baby was taken and he or she was a complete mess?’ [laughs]
Bree actually went by means of it within the again half of Season 7, when Sophie Skelton’s scene companions have been primarily kids and he or she was remoted from her standard co-stars. With Claire and Jamie nonetheless within the American Revolution period and Roger by accident going ever additional again in time than supposed, Brianna was caught with out anyone to speak in confidence to again within the ’80s. Fortuitously, Season 7 ended with the MacKenzie household reunited, and no matter occurs for them in Season 8, Skelton no less than believes that the story is tied up “fairly superbly.”
And for now, it is only a matter of ready till Season 8 premieres. Outlander is predicted to return in 2025, which hopefully means nearer to the center of the yr than December 31 since Outlander time journey does not fairly work in actual life. The spinoff, known as Outlander: Blood of My Blood, will premiere this summer time, so my finest guess – or maybe hope – is that Starz is planning on debuting Season 8 shortly after the tip of Blood of My Blood‘s ten-episode run.