Outlander creator has “more than one” idea for a spinoff

Starz recently finished airing the fifth season of Outlander, its time-hopping romantic drama. A sixth is on the way, but with the coronavirus holding up production on sets around the world, it might take a little longer than usual.

When it gets here, what can we expect? The next book in Diana Gabaldon’s series, A Breath of Snow and Ashes, chronicles the travails of the Fraser family as America inches closer to a Revolutionary War with England, although creator Ronald D. Moore reminds us that the show is free to go off the path beaten by the books if it wants. “People who saw this last season; the fifth season, saw that we were already starting to pull from certain things from Book 6 and other books in the series,” he told Collider. “We’ve always been sort of free to kind of play around with some of the chronology and borrow things from different books. So we’re not perfect about a book a season, and we’ll continue that going forward.”

"The large arc that’s still defining where we are is, we’re in the New World; we’re in the American colonies, and the American Revolution is getting closer and closer. So that’s like a big thing that’s gonna be moving front and center the further we get into Season 6."

Down with the redcoats…or at least I assume the Frasers will fight with the revolutionaries, I haven’t read the books.

And it’s not just the Fraser in play. We’ve heard for a while now that Starz is thinking about making an Outlander spinoff show, and Moore is here to confirm. “We’re still talking about it,” he said. “Starz is interested and we’re definitely in conversations. Sony and Starz are in conversations about a spinoff series, yeah…We have more than one idea. We have a couple of ideas, and it’s still in internal conversations, so we’re not really prepared to go out and say what it is.”

More than one idea, huh? I assume that means a couple of ideas are on the table but only one will get made, not there are going to be multiple spinoffs, but you never know.

The most obvious character to spin off is Lord John Grey, a dear friend of Jamie’s. Gabaldon has already written a few books about his character, so the material is right there.

Outlander — Courtesy of STARZ — Acquired via STARZ Media Center

While talking about the franchise’s future, Moore also discussed its past, remembering how casting the role of Claire Fraser was far more difficult than finding someone to play Jamie, the love of her live. Sam Heughan was actually the first actor cast, but Moore and company didn’t settle on Caitriona Balfe as Claire until a few days before filming began. “We were pretty certain from her tape that she was the one,” Moore said. A chemistry reading with Heughan clinched it, and five season of television later, here we are.

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h/t Syfy Wire