It’s been a long road for fans of Sanditon, the PBS series based, very loosely, on the novel that Jane Austen left unfinished at her death.
Heck, it’s been a long road even for those of us who aren’t fans of Sanditon.
Over the past three-plus years, we’ve weathered the much-hyped 2019 UK premiere, the underwhelming UK viewer numbers, the controversial unhappy-cliffhanger ending, the series cancellation, the subsequent US broadcast, the intense lobbying by a passionate fanbase, the back-from-the-dead resurrection of the show, the shocking news that lead heartthrob Theo James wouldn’t return, and the introduction of new heartthrobs in last year’s Season Two.
And now, at last, we are approaching the end of the journey. Because the six-episode Season Three of Sanditon, which we are told is the definite, for-sure, no-doubt-about-it-this-time last season, begins airing on Sunday.
Fans—or people who, like me, don’t especially like the series but must watch for research purposes, or at least that’s our story and we’re sticking to it—will recall that Season Two ended with our heroine, Charlotte Heywood, engaged to a hometown boy we’d barely heard of, after enduring enough vicissitudes and heartbreak to fill a shelf’s worth of romance novels.
Judging from PBS’s latest trailer, the new season will revolve around two major questions: Will Charlotte get back together with last season’s honey, the hot-but-standoffish Alexander Colbourne? And will secondary heroine Georgiana Lambe, the rare non-white protagonist in a period drama, find her way to a happy and fulfilling future? Of course, there’s also a third, equally compelling question: Will fans tweet about it all?
If I were a betting woman, I’d put my money on Yes, times three.