13 Reasons Why season 4 will only be 10 episodes

13 Reasons Why season 4 premieres on Netflix on Friday, June 5, 2020, but the final season will only be 10 episodes, three episodes shorter than the other seasons.

13 Reasons Why season 4 will be a little bit shorter than the first three seasons of the Netflix original series.

According to an Entertainment Weekly interview with creator Brian Yorkey, 13 Reasons Why will only be 10 episodes, three episodes shorter than every other season of the series so far. Of course, this is also the final season of the series, which brings the total episode count to 49 after season 4 is released on Netflix.

13 Reasons Why season 4 will be added to Netflix on Friday, June 5, and that’s much sooner than we thought the new season would be added to the streaming service. We were expecting to see the new season on the streaming service in the fall of 2020, but we’re obviously happy for fans that the release date is in June!

It’s sort of a bummer that the final season is only 10 episodes. Fans of the series probably wanted dozens more, but the reality is that the season likely would not have been released this soon if there were 13 episodes or more in the final season.

Along with that, the creative team could probably cut some of the fluff that the show needed to stretch each season to 13 episodes. There seemed to be some pacing issues in the first three seasons of the series, but not all fans would agree with that I’m sure.

Here’s what Yorkey told EW about the reduced episode count for the fourth and final season, via EW:

"“It served the story better, and 10 episodes ended up being the sweet spot for us. I think 10 episodes is a nice length for a season. I was adamant going into season 2 that it had to be 13 because the show’s called 13 Reasons Why and if I’m a young viewer, I’m like, “13 reasons why but there’s only 10 episodes.” But at this point, heading into season 4 it was like, “We’ve given them 39 reasons why at least, so I feel like we can say, yes the show is still called 13 Reasons Why, this season is 10 episodes.” It’s the right number, you’ll see that when we get to the end.”"

We’ve seen several Netflix shows with reduced episode counts in the final season. Overall, it’s much better to give fans what they want in fewer episodes than try to stretch the story out because the show has a number in the title and we, for some reason, want the episodes to match that number.

If you still aren’t caught up to the latest season of 13 Reasons Why, you still have plenty of time to catch up. The new season premieres on June 5.

Will you be watching? Let us know what you think will happen in the final season of the hit Netflix original series!