It’s been a minute. Actually, it’s been years. If you’re like me, the image of June Osborne’s bloodied, determined face is burned into your brain, but the memory of exactly where we left off is starting to get a little fuzzy. We’ve been waiting for the resolution of the most harrowing show on television since 2022. It’s a long time. Fans are restless. Everyone wants to know when will handmaid's tale return to finally close the book on June, Serena, and the crumbling remains of Gilead.
The short answer? Not as soon as we’d hoped, but the wheels are finally turning. Production for Season 6—the absolute final chapter—is officially underway. We are looking at a 2025 release window. That feels like an eternity in the world of streaming, but the delay wasn't just Hulu being cruel. Between the dual Hollywood strikes of 2023 and the massive scale of the production, the timeline got pushed back significantly.
The Production Timeline: Why the Delay is Actually a Good Sign
Let’s get real about the schedule. Filming for the final season officially kicked off in the fall of 2024. Bruce Miller, the longtime showrunner who basically lived and breathed this show, stepped down to focus on the development of The Testaments (the sequel series based on Margaret Atwood’s 2019 novel). Eric Tuchman and Yahlin Chang took over the reins as co-showrunners for this final lap. Change is scary. But in this case, it might provide the fresh perspective needed to stick the landing.
Most of the shooting happens in and around Toronto and Cambridge, Ontario. If you follow the cast on social media, you’ve probably seen the occasional snowy behind-the-scenes snap. Because the show relies so heavily on that specific, bleak, autumnal and wintry aesthetic, they can't just film whenever they want. They need the weather to cooperate with the mood. This isn't a show you film in the bright, cheerful sun of a California July.
Usually, a show of this scale requires about six to eight months of principal photography, followed by several months of post-production. Think about the color grading alone. That specific "Gilead blue" and the heavy, desaturated tones take time to perfect in the edit suite. If they wrap filming in early 2025, we are looking at a late 2025 premiere. It's a grind.
What Season 6 Actually Needs to Resolve
The Season 5 finale left us in a weird, uncomfortable place. June and Serena Joy—mortal enemies, occasional allies, and complicated mirrors of one another—are on a train headed west. They’re refugees again. It’s poetic, honestly. The two women who have defined the show's moral tug-of-war are now in the exact same boat, or rather, the same train car.
Here is what is actually on the line for the final season:
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- The Fate of Hannah: This has been the engine of the show since the first episode. If June doesn't get Hannah out, does the show even have a point? Many fans are speculating that Hannah might stay in Gilead to bridge the gap toward The Testaments, where she is a central character.
- Nick and Lawrence’s End Game: Commander Lawrence is trying to "fix" Gilead from the inside with his New Bethlehem project. Nick is... well, Nick is just trying to keep June alive while balancing his own survival. Their luck is running out.
- The Fall of Gilead: We know from the epilogue of the original book that Gilead eventually falls. We don't know if we’ll see that collapse in real-time or if the show will leave it as a lingering hope.
The stakes are massive. Elisabeth Moss, who also directs several episodes, has hinted that this season is "wild" and "unpredictable." That's standard PR talk, sure, but given the trajectory of Season 5, they don't have much room for filler anymore. Every episode has to count.
Why Everyone is Obsessed with The Testaments
You can't talk about when will handmaid's tale return without mentioning the sequel. Margaret Atwood wrote The Testaments thirty years after the original book, and Hulu snapped up the rights immediately. It’s set about 15 years after the events of the current show.
This creates a bit of a "prequel problem." If we know what happens 15 years later, does it ruin the tension of Season 6? Not necessarily. The show has deviated so far from the original source material that it’s become its own beast. However, the writers have to be careful. They need to end June’s story in a way that feels final, while leaving enough of the world intact for the spin-off to make sense. It’s a tightrope walk.
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The Reality of the "Final Season" Hype
There’s a lot of misinformation floating around TikTok and X (formerly Twitter) about surprise trailers or secret 2024 release dates. Ignore them. Hulu hasn't dropped an official teaser yet because they don't have enough finished footage to show. We might get a "first look" or a teaser-of-a-teaser by early 2025.
Honestly, the wait might be a blessing. The cultural conversation around the show has changed since it premiered in 2017. Back then, it felt like a shocking dystopia. Now, for many viewers, it feels a little too close to the evening news. The hiatus gives the audience—and the creators—a chance to breathe. It allows the final season to be judged on its own merits as a piece of television, rather than just a political lightning rod.
Preparing for the Final Descent
If you’re planning on being ready for the premiere, don't wait until the week before to start your rewatch. The plot is dense. The names of the various resistance cells, the shifting borders of the American "remnant" in Canada, and the back-and-forth betrayals of the Commanders are hard to keep track of.
Actionable Steps for the Hiatus:
- Re-watch Season 5, specifically the last three episodes. The power dynamic between June and Luke, and the rise of anti-refugee sentiment in Canada, is going to be the foundation for the final season's external conflict.
- Read The Testaments. If you want spoilers for the long-term fate of the world, it’s all there. It gives you a much better idea of why characters like Aunt Lydia are acting the way they are.
- Track the "Production Wrap" news. Once the cast starts posting "That's a wrap" photos on Instagram, you can usually count forward six months to the release date.
- Manage expectations. Final seasons of prestige dramas are notoriously divisive. Look at Game of Thrones or Lost. The goal for Season 6 isn't a "happy ending"—Gilead doesn't do happy—but a "fitting" one.
The end is coming. It’s going to be brutal, it’s going to be beautifully shot, and it’s going to be late. But based on the track record of this team, it’ll likely be worth the wait.