Since 2019, the good (and bad) people of Virgin River have brought us lots of small town romance, familial strife, emotional reveals and more dramatic twists than Mel Monroe could shake a stethoscope at. As we all hope, it does sound like the upcoming Virgin River Season 6 will be no different when it returns for those with a Netflix subscription, and we already know quite a bit about what’s coming up. Let’s dig into what we know about the hit drama that you can watch on one of the best streaming services , and how it will delve into all the questions left after the surprises of Season 5 Part 2 !
As of late September 2024, there is no exact release date set for Virgin River Season 6 just yet, but Netflix revealed in early February 2024 that it won’t return until some point next year, on the 2025 TV schedule. As mentioned previously, the series has aired yearly for the past half-decade, so it’s unfortunate that we won’t see new episodes hit the streamer in 2024, but at least we know they’re hard at work on the show and will be back, hopefully before too much longer.
We’re also not sure right now whether or not the season will release all at once, as Seasons 1-4 did, or be split into two parts, as was the case with Season 5.
Virgin River seems to be one of the few shows with a pretty large cast that has managed to see mostly everyone return from year to year, and fans can, luckily, expect that to happen again in Season 6.
Tudum revealed in late February 2024 that all of our main players will return. So, let’s go ahead and take a look at who we’ll be seeing in the cozy mountain town once again!
Alexandra Breckinridge (Mel)
Martin Henderson (Jack)
Annette O’Toole (Hope)
Tim Matheson (Doc)
Colin Lawrence (Preacher)
Zibby Allen (Brie)
Marco Grazzini (Mike)
Benjamin Hollingsworth (Brady)
Sarah Dugdale (Lizzie)
Mark Ghanimé (Cameron)
Kai Bradbury (Denny)
Kandyse McClure (Kaia)
Seeing as how all of our favorites will be back, we can also probably expect to see supporting actors like Teryl Rothery (Muriel), Jenny Cooper (Mel’s sister, Joey), Gwynyth Walsh (Jo Ellen), Keith MacKechnie (Nick), and others return, as well.
It was in September 2024 that Netflix made a great casting announcement when it revealed that not only will we definitely see Mel’s parents during 1970s-era flashbacks, but that both roles had been cast!
As seen above, Jessica Rothe (the Happy Death Day franchise) will portray Mel’s mom, Sarah, during the scenes set around 1972. She’s described as being funny, free-spirited and as having a taste for activism and adventure while attempting to avoid “the conventional and traditional life of a young woman in the ’70s.”
The city girl will pass through town and happen upon Mel’s eventual father, Everett, as portrayed by Callum Kerr (One Piece). He’s a “freewheeling singer-songwriter with a poet’s soul” who’s “skimming through life in a VW van” until he meets Sarah and begins to hope for more. So, it sounds like we’ll definitely be treated to yet another emotional and romantic love story this season!
Tudum also confirmed that actor John Allen Nelson, who debuted as Mel’s biological father, Everett Reid, in Season 5 Episode 12 has been added to the cast. That episode saw Mel and Jack track down the man her mother had an affair with after a shockingly short search led them to find out that he’d been in the small town this entire time. We’ll get into more details later, but he will play an important part in the new season.
Showrunner Patrick Sean Smith told Tudum that some of the surprises in Virgin River Season 6 will be character related, as fans will “be surprised by some returning favorites from the past.” He could be referring to a character like Ricky (Grayson Gurnsey), who left town and his job at Jack’s Bar in Season 4 for basic training after enlisting in the Marines.
Smith also spoke to Deadline in November 2023 about the next season, and teased that some of the show’s villains will be back, as well. Every fan who saw the last few episodes of Season 5 will know that not only did drug-runner Calvin (David Cubitt) actually survive that boat explosion in Season 4 Episode 9, but his former right-hand man, Jimmy (Ian Tracey), who’s still in prison right now, is back on the scene in a scary way that we’ll get into more in a bit.
