If you’ve been feeling adrift since the cliffhanger ending of Outlander Season 6 in early May 2022, I bet you probably know that you are far from alone. Even though all of the Sassenachs around the world know that our beloved drama takes serious time to put to together new episodes, the wait for the upcoming season is going to take us into sometime this summer, when the show will finally debut, and lasting through every Droughtlander is difficult, to say the least. Well, star Sam Heughan has kindly given fans a great Outlander Season 7 update, but why is he already teasing Season 8?
What Outlander Season 7 Update Did Sam Heughan Give Fans?
When the historical series’ leading romantic hero (who’s helped give viewers some of the 1700s-set show’s sexiest moments) isn’t showing off all the hard work he puts into his exercise regimen on social media, he frequently posts about the Starz program that made him famous. Amidst all of his filming efforts on Season 7, he recently treated fans to an update on the coming season that they’re sure to love, by posting a smile-filled set photo to Instagram:
WOOOOO! Oh, praise be! This is yet another sign that our wait is nearing its end, as the cast and crew has finally completed shooting the upcoming episodes. His photo shows the one-time James Bond hopeful and his co-star, Caitríona Balfe, still in full costume and holding a slate in front of them announcing that they’ve wrapped production, as some crew members are equally all smiles in the background.
Though the actor had previously given us updates by revealing when they were halfway done with filming and saying that the new episodes would pick up basically where those Season 6 shocks left us, this new notice is the greatest one yet, and can only be bested by the announcement of the official premiere date. And, considering the fact that they had been set to film for a full year, but managed to come in slightly under that at a still-whopping 220 days on the expanded season, it’s no wonder that everyone in his photo seems giddy.
Why Is Sam Heughan Already Teasing Outlander Season 8?
OK, knowing how long and intensive the process of filming this year’s season of the hit historical romance had to have been, many of us could probably understand the star telling us about wrapping on the new installment and then not thinking or talking about the show again until he absolutely had to. But! What Heughan did instead was end his gleeful caption by adding that “we CANNOT WAIT for you to see Season 8” and concluding with the heart hands emoji. So, why is he already teasing us on the eighth season?
There are a few possibilities for this, the least of which is that, sadly for fans, Season 8 will be the final one. January 2023 saw the announcement of the show’s ultimate ending, which will wrap this time-traveling romance with 10 episodes. This will put the finale ahead of the books that the show’s based on, as each season pretty much takes its story from a specific novel in the series, and the current plan from author Diana Gabaldon is to end Claire and Jamie’s story with the upcoming tenth book.
Also, though Heughan previously said some heartfelt and slightly NSFW things about what he’d miss about filming the series, by the time Season 8 is in the can, they will likely have completed a full 10 years of working on the show. That’s a long time to work on something that can be as heavy as Outlander, so he might be kinda excited to close this difficult but fruitful chapter of his career. Not to mention the fact that, as a producer on the show, he probably already knows what some of the early plans are to close everything out, and that’s got to be fun!
All I know is that fans will definitely miss the “breathless” chemistry between Heughan and Balfe when everything is said and done, but at least we’ll have the books (and repeated viewings of the show) to keep us warm. And if that's not enough, we also have Heughan's The Couple Next Door coming to Starz at some point in the near future.
