Outlander: Lucky! Season 7 was almost the end of the series

“Outlander” finally returns to US television on June 16, 2023. After fans had to wait a particularly long time for season 6 and were only offered 8 new episodes, season 7 followed faster and even has 16 episodes in its luggage, which will be released in two parts.

It has also been clear for months: the end of “Outlander” is getting closer! Starz renewed the series for an 8th season, which will also be the finale of “Outlander”. However, the producers of “Outlander” did not yet know whether Starz might be discontinuing the series after Season 7, which is why the preparations were based on the need to bring Season 7 to a happy ending.

For most of the writing and production, we thought season 7 would be our final season. It wasn’t until two-thirds into filming that the announcement came that we were getting Season 8. We had an idea for a contingency plan: ‘Hey, just in case we [noch eine Staffel] get, we can adjust the last few episodes to go ahead.’

“Outlander” producer Matthew Roberts

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly the producers did not reveal how the series would have ended if season 7 had already marked the end. However, due to the uncertain future, the novels by Diana Gabaldon were not exactly used sparingly.

“Outlander” season 7 will not only tell the remaining story from the 6th novel, books 7 and 8 also served as a template for the new episodes. Since “A Shade of Treason and Love”, the 8th “Outlander” novel, has a rather round ending, it can be assumed that season 7 would have ended in the same way if it had not been extended.

Now, of course, the final “Outlander” season will adapt “The Swarming of a Thousand Bees” and thus the last “Outlander” book that has been published so far. With Diana Gabaldon planning at least one more Outlander book, the series will end earlier and differently than the novel series, but it avoids the fate of Game of Thrones, where missing templates caused problems in later seasons.

When the first 8 episodes of “Outlander” season 7 aired in early August, the series will take a break until 2024, only then will the remaining 8 episodes of the overly long season follow. Thus, “Outlander” season 8 should start and end in 2025, unless the last season is also divided into two.