‘The Crown’ To End With Season 5, With Imelda Staunton Succeeding Olivia Colman

The monarchy is approaching its final days. Well, on TV, at least. The Crown, Netflix’s lavish drama about the life and reign of Queen Elizabeth II, will end with its fifth season. Season 3 of the series dropped on Netflix last year, with Olivia Colman taking over the lead from Claire Foy. Colman will stay in the role for season 4, but come season 5, it’ll be time for Imelda Staunton to assume the throne.

The Crown was originally planned to run for six seasons, but it looks like the timeline is being truncated. As you can see in the post above, the series is now ending with season 5, with Imelda Staunton taking over the role of Elizabeth. “At the outset I had imagined The Crown running for six seasons but now that we have begun work on the stories for season five it has become clear to me that this is the perfect time and place to stop,” said creator Peter Morgan “I’m grateful to Netflix and Sony for supporting me in this decision.”

Morgan added:

“I’m absolutely thrilled to confirm Imelda Staunton as Her Majesty the The Queen for the fifth and final season, taking The Crown into the 21st century. Imelda is an astonishing talent and will be a fantastic successor to Claire Foy and Olivia Colman.”

The question that lingers now: where will the story end? The next season, season 4, will introduce Margaret Thatcher, as played by Gillian Anderson. It’s also likely to cover the story of Princess Diana, as Emma Corrin has been cast in the role. So where will the fifth and final season end? With Brexit? Or perhaps the most recent big story from the monarchy: with Megan Markle and Prince Harry stepping away from the monarchy. That sounds like the most logical choice to end this story, but we shall see.

The Crown is one of Netflix’s better shows, featuring fantastic production design and wonderful casting. It’s also the rare Netflix show that takes an episodic approach, with each episode serving as its own self-contained story, rather than following a binge-format.

There’s no word yet when The Crown season 4 will arrive. Season 3 dropped in November of 2019, so perhaps we’ll see it at the end of this year. Which means we probably won’t get to the fifth and final season until late 2021.