How many seasons will The Crown have?

The Crown has a planned ending and Netflix is happy with that

It’s not often we see a Netflix show go past four seasons. In fact, we rarely see one go past two or three seasons. With The Crown season 4 dropping on Sunday, it’s natural to wonder how many seasons there will be.

There is some great news going into this season. We know The Crown is renewed for a fifth season. But that’s not all.

This is one of those shows with an ending in mind. The ending has been in mind from the very beginning, and it’s something that Netflix has been on board with from the start. So, how many seasons will The Crown have?

From six, to five, to six again

From the beginning, the plan was to end the Netflix series with The Crown season 6. Every two seasons there would be a change of main cast, allowing the characters to age without the use of makeup or CGI.

Then there was a change of heart. There was talk of ending the show with the still-to-be-filmed fifth season. A fear was that there wouldn’t be enough content to fill 20 episodes, so it was better to run with just 10.

However, there was a change of heart. After looking at the actual content, 20 episodes were necessary. This would allow everyone to tell the stories fully instead of rushing things. Netflix was happy to readjust.

There don’t appear to be any plans to change the season order again. So, there will be six seasons to The Crown. The final two seasons will see Imelda Staunton in the role of Queen Elizabeth with Jonathan Pryce as Prince Philip and Lesley Manville as Princess Margaret. There are also talks of Dominic West joining as Prince Charles to join Elizabeth Debicki as Princess Diana.

It’s going to be some time before the final two seasons drop. Filming for The Crown season 5 isn’t slated to start until summer 2021 at the earliest, meaning 2022 is the likely release date and 2023 for season 6.

The Crown is available to stream on Netflix.