If the thought of This Is Us going away makes you a little queasy, you’re not alone: Mandy Moore admitted at a cast interview in L.A. on April 2 that reading the final scripts caused her to lose her lunch! “It was so beautiful and upsetting that that was my physical reaction,” Moore explained, while co-star Chrissy Metz added, “I didn’t throw up, but I couldn’t breathe.” Months prior to that announcement, Sterling K. Brown opened up to Kelly Clarkson about what it’ll be like when it’s time to shoot the series’ final episodes—and he also anticipated having a strong reaction, to say the least. “Right now I’m like, ‘Oh, we’re having a great time… blah, blah, blah!’" he explained. “When it gets to the end, there will be no acting, it’ll be ugly [crying].” He added, “Once we start to get to the last two or three episodes, there will be something that happens that I won’t be able to stop from happening, because I know I’m actually saying goodbye.” Milo Ventimiglia, who plays patriarch Jack Pearson, has similarly said that the final season will jerk those tears like never before—not just for the cast, but for fans as well. “This is probably gonna wreck people in the most heartfelt way. It’s beautiful. I’m so excited,” Ventimiglia told Us Weekly in early October. He also promised that the series ending will feel like an “incredibly satisfying… completion of the story.” Apparently, that means that all of your flash-forward questions will be answered and all of the show’s past plotlines will be resolved—so we’ll finally have the complete story of the family we’ve grown to love over the years. If you need to start prepping (or hydrating) now for the amount of crying you’ll be doing once the show’s finale premieres, keep reading to find out everything we know about This Is Us Season 6—including all of the latest spoilers!
When did This Is Us return for Season 6?
Season 6 premiered on Tuesday, Jan. 4 on NBC. Instead of starting back up in the fall as many shows do, NBC previously announced that This Is Us’ last hurrah was being pushed to midseason in order to air all of Season 6’s episodes once a week in one fell swoop, without a long lag halfway through (although there has been a two-week pause for the 2022 Winter Olympics). “By putting it at midseason, we’ll have the least interruptions possible,” Susan Rovner, NBC Universal Television’s Chairman of Entertainment said. “I think it’ll be a great event for the fans to enjoy this incredible show.”
Are there any spoilers for This Is Us Season 6?
Honestly, there are so many spoilers at this point—with the cast sharing more and more juicy tidbits in interviews—that it’s hard to keep up. Let’s start with the latest on the impending divorce of Kate (Metz) and Toby (Chris Sullivan). Metz told Us Weekly in late March that the split we’ve known is coming since the end of Season 5 “is gonna get heated.” Now let’s address the question of whether Kevin (JustinHartley) will end up married by the end of Season 6—and it so, to whom. On or around March 1, someone snapped a pic of Hartley alongside Alexandra Breckenridge, who plays Kevin’s maybe love interest, Sophie. Near them was a fancy, vintage car (the type brides and grooms rent on their wedding day) as well as a “Just Married” sign. Does this mean Kevin ends up with Sophie? It sure seems that way based on a March 21 interview Hartley sat for with Entertainment Weekly, when he told the outlet “I think so” when asked if fans could rule out Cassidy as the woman Kevin ends up with. Plus, eagled-eyed viewers have spotted a wedding band on Kevin’s left-hand ring finger during Season 6’s flash-forwards. On another topic: Following the debut of Season 6 episode 6 (“Heart and Soul”), This Is Us writer Julia Bronwell hinted to Deadline that Malik and Deja’s future may not be as written in stone as fans think it is. “It’s not going to be a smooth ride for them,” she said. “They’re not Randall and Beth. They live very different lives, and we are going to try to navigate that in a real way.” Jennifer Morrison similarly told PEOPLE after episode 6 that fans haven’t seen the last of Cassidy even though she just gave Kevin the brush-off. “I can say that it is not the last time you’ll see her,” Morrison revealed, adding that Cassidy will “consider it—it’s definitely a big maybe” when Nicky asks her to help build Kevin’s future house. Right before that in January 2022, Metz told TODAY about Kate’s future divorce from first husband Toby and marriage to second husband Phillip, “[It’s] coming up pretty soon… [Phillip] shows up for her, which is a good thing, because I think a lot of people think right now that Kate’s crazy from liking this jerk of a guy. But we get to see who he really is pretty soon.” She also told UsWeekly around the same time, “We’ll come to find that neither Toby or Kate are wrong or right. They’re sort of just growing apart… We’re gonna see that these are two people that love each other desperately. But just aren’t meant to be together forever.” But she also told PEOPLE about Kate and Toby’s split, “It’s going to be a doozy. It’s going to be really difficult to watch.” Metz’s sentiments were echoed at a Feb. 11 press event at which Brown warned about Kate and Toby’s split, “Be wary, be on guard… The shit they [the show’s writers] have coming [for Kate and Toby] hits different,” while his onscreen wife, Susan Kelechi Watson, said she felt “gutted” by how Kate and Toby’s marriage will end. As for another major plot point that needs to be explained—how Rebecca and Miguel got together—Moore and Huertas shared some mini-spoilers with EW in December 2021, but made it clear that those two will endure some major bumps in the road before getting to happily ever after. “Rebecca and Miguel collectively reach this boiling point where neither of them can ignore that there’s sort of this unspoken chemistry,” Moore said. And someone needs to do something about it. It’s heartbreaking and so true to life.” Huertas also told the outlet about the upcoming “fracture” between Rebecca and Miguel, “This moment will make people go, ‘They should be together,’” while Moore added that the moment in question “gutted me.” For example, just one day before the Season 6 premiere, Fogelman told Entertainment Weekly, “The early part of the season pretty much stays in the present day, except for when we’re going back in time for Jack and Rebecca.” He also teased a “parenting dilemma involving a tragedy,” telling the outlet, “It’s one we’ve been planning for quite a while to start our sixth season. When people see it, they’ll feel that it was baked into the fabric of the show a little bit. It’s a pretty simple parenting story, which is where we often lived at our best and most simplest with Jack and Rebecca—just two parents navigating new experiences with young children. It’s something that hopefully will be relatable, particularly to people who grew up in that era, or parents who were parenting back at that time. Thematically, they’re going to start dealing with kids exploring heavy subject matter for the first time in their lives.” And in December 2021, Fogelman told Deadline, “There’s a lot with Rebecca and her ailment and how that will be not just affecting her, but her family. Rebecca and Miguel coming together is a story we’ve always been excited to tell in the final season, and having done a bunch of that already, it’s really fun and exciting and lovely.” Jon Huertas, who plays Miguel, elaborated to EW soon after, “I think the audience will understand how something as profound as a relationship between [Jack’s] best friend and [Miguel’s] best friend’s widow could even happen… It’s one of the saddest moments that I’ve felt as a character, as an actor, and even as an audience member and a fan of the show, too. This moment was so tough, so sad, that I think [it] will really help propel people into having their minds open to, ‘Oh my God. We kind of want these two together.’” Moore, meanwhile, seemed to double down on Fogelman’s hints about Rebecca’s declining health when she told TV Line, “Rebecca is on this journey in an inevitable direction, and there’s a lot of loose ends to tie up.” Fogelman also confirmed in his interview that Kevin will still be weathering his “continuing existential crisis,” while Kate and Toby’s marriage will indeed come to an end. (Chris Geere, who plays Kate’s second husband, Phillip, told EW, “It’s a working relationship — at first. And then it will, at some point, turn. Whether that is connected with the collapse of the marriage to build up another, I don’t know. But I do know that from that flash-forward scene, she ends up happy. So she’s not a bad relationship. She’s with the guy that she wants.”) Meanwhile, Metz said in December 2021 to EW, “People are going to be on the edge of their seats with characters’ health issues. Also, what it means for the family and decisions that have to be made—the dynamic of children in the family. Two very important characters, we will see the end of their journey and that’s always just so difficult. It’s going to be a lot.” On Nov. 18, another big spoiler was shared about the Season 6 premiere via Entertainment Weekly: “The Big Three celebrate their 41st birthday in the Season 6 premiere of This Is Us, but is something dampening the festivities?” Of course, celebrating Big Three b-days is a big part of the show, but some first-look pics published by EW shed a little more light on what will happen this time around. One photo shows Randall (Brown), Beth (Watson), and their kids sitting at the kitchen table with a cake and a laptop presumably opened to Zoom—and by the looks on everyone’s faces, this celebration can be chalked up as one of the Pearsons’ less-than-festive birthday fetes. You may notice that none of the above spoilers seem to touch on Jack Pearson, and Ventimiglia has now hinted that’s because his character takes a back seat to the rest of his fictitious family in Season 6. “[Jack has] moved over into a supporting role… It’s the idea that as a parent, you’re a supporting character in your child’s story,” he recently explained to Deadline. (In a September 2021 interview with Mario Lopez, Ventimiglia had similarly said, “When the show first started, we were driving things forward from the pas. Now, I think we’re kind of reversing it. We’re going from the future back to toward the present. In the beginning, the big mystery was all about Jack’s death and, of course, how it impacted his family, his children, his wife. But now, what we’ve started to see are kind of the breadcrumb trail of Rebecca’s legacy… I think what we’re going to see this season is more reflecting on Rebecca’s life and Rebecca’s impact to her kids.” We’ve also got some behind-the-scenes spoilers—namely, that Chrissy Metz and Watson are each co-writing separate Season 6 episodes, while Chris Sullivan, Huertas and Moore will each direct a Season 6 episode! In December 2021, Moore revealed on Instagram that she’s actually helming Metz’s co-written episode, which will be the ninth installment of Season 6. Moore called that episode’s script “truly extraordinary” and added, “I’m doing my level best not to mess this up.” Meanwhile, Metz told PEOPLE in November 2021, “It’s really exciting to support fellow actors and people that you love trying new things. For me in particular, obviously, writing has been a very new venture, but I’m very excited.” So what happens in that episode? “[That’s] Kate’s episode—that’s going to be a massive turning point for Kate and Toby,” Metz told EW. “There will be a turning point when she chooses herself. And I don’t think she’s really, truly done that. She has gone through everything she’s gone through in order to say, “Yeah, this isn’t working for me, and I have to make my own decision for myself.” And I think that is such a testament to how far she’s come and how she walks into this next chapter of her life.” Metz also told Clarkson that her Kate episode will be “the Kate-centric episode out of the trilogy”—meaning, presumably, that fans can look forward to another trilogy like the one they got in Season 2, with each of the Big Three getting their own episode. As for Watson’s co-written episode, we know from her Instagram that it’s the sixth episode of the final season and that it’s titled “Our Little Island Girl: Part Two.” (We also know that the episode will serve as a “follow-up to Beth’s origin story episode;” Part One, which aired during Season 3, showed Beth going back home to care for her mother in Washington, D.C.) Watson also wrote on IG, “The biggest shout out to Sir Daniel Fogelman who called me up and said, ‘I know you wanna write… wanna write this episode?’ I meannnn. Dan…no words, only emojis.” With so many lingering questions still unanswered heading into Season 6, This is Us has teased bits and pieces of the Pearson family’s post-show future for years now, but will those flash-forwards pay off? “I think you’re going to have a real sense of resolution and completion for this family,” Fogelman said in May. “It’s where the mixed-up VHS tapes of this family’s existence will all coalesce and speak to one another in completion.” He’s also promised that the final season will be “ambitious in terms of the way it jumps time, even more ambitious than other seasons.” First things first: Kate’s new hubby is going to be around a lot more. “Obviously, [Chris Geere, who plays Phillip] is going to be a big part of the show next year,” Fogelman has confessed. But why do Kate and Toby divorce at all? “We hinted at, many times in the deeper future, that something was not normal between [Kate] and [Toby],” he explained. “And here we are.” Metz says she’s been told that a cheating scenario between Kate and Toby won’t happen and that the two will co-parent in the future. She wonders how the fans will accept the breakup. “I’m hoping that they’ll see through that and not just be so upset that one of their most favorite couples is no longer … fetch,” Metz said in one interview, while telling EW in another, “[In] the early episodes of the season, she’s getting to know [Phillip] and seeing things that she didn’t remotely understand about Phillip. You can see them getting along, but there’s definitely no romance—yet.” As for mom Rebecca, who’s slowly developing Alzheimer’s disease, expect some exploration of her relationship with her deceased husband’s best friend, Miguel. In fact, there were actually some plans to deep-dive into Rebecca and Miguel’s relationship in Season 5, but it looks like that storyline got pushed back to Season 6. “We really want to have the room to explore it,” co-executive producer and writer Vera Herbert told Entertainment Weekly in February. “But it’s definitely coming—and it’s a thing we talk about a lot.” So how’s it all going to end? Quietly, if Fogelman has his way. “I think when the show eventually comes to an end, I think in the best way, it’ll be very quiet and normal,” he said in 2020. “That’s always been the plan because, at the end of the day, it’s a story about this kind of regular family.”
How will This Is Us end?
Based on the numerous interviews that have been done by the show’s cast and creative team, it seems the series will wrap up in an emotionally satisfying way. “Lots of questions will be answered, but there will still be some surprising things because that’s the trick of the show,” Moore told E! during a group cast interview, while Kelechi Watson added in that same sitdown, “You will get to see what happens with Rebecca. You’ll see how Kate and Toby end up. And also what happens with Kevin. I do believe each storyline will have its closure. It will be a very satisfying season.”
How many episodes will be in This Is Us Season 6?
The sixth season will have 18 episodes, so a January start would mean the last episode would air sometime in May. And—bonus!—fans can look forward to those episodes airing uninterrupted on consecutive weeks, rather than having to wait long stretches for more of the season to arrive. That’s a promise Ventimiglia made during a Sept. 17 interview with E!’s Daily Pop. “Sometimes the show will be on for, like, two episodes and it’s off for three weeks and it’s on for four and then it’s off for seven weeks. No, this is straight through just about 18 episodes, which is kind of remarkable,” he said. “So I think that’s something to look forward to.” (So do we!)
Is there going to be a This Is Us movie?
When asked about a possible followup film during their group interview with E!, several cast members suggested they’d be done for more. “We were laughing the other day with some of the cast, like, all these shows that are getting rebooted, didn’t they just end five, six, seven years ago?” Moore replied. “Are we going to be doing This Is Us the reboot in six years? I would be game to do anything that would reunite me with everybody here.” Meanwhile, Sullivan said, “Of course, I would be on board. I’m always on board for the This Is Us family. I don’t know if it’s gonna happen, but that sounds like a great idea,” while Brown added, “We totally could. And that’s something, actually, I could definitely see them promoting it. Like, we’ve seen the Sex and the City joints, there’s an Entourage joint, if they can do it, why the hell not?”
Is there a trailer for This Is Us Season 6?
This Is Us fans were super-thankful for the first full-length trailer of This Is Us’ final season when it premiered on Thanksgiving Day 2021. The two-minute preview, set to Kate’s performance of “Time After Time” at the retirement home, opens with Rebecca expressing concerns about her declining mental health as she gets older, alongside glimpses of The Big Three’s 41st birthdays. Before that, a brief, 15-second teaser for Season 6 was revealed on Nov. 22 that mostly featured looks back at moments from past episodes.
What happened in This Is Us Season 5?
(Warning: Spoilers for This Is Us Season 5 follow!) Last season saw the Pearson family grappling with the pandemic the same way many real-life families have. Rebecca, who is showing signs of dementia, couldn’t go to the Alzheimer’s trial in St. Louis, instead quarantining with Miguel in Pennsylvania. Toby lost his job. Brothers Kevin and Randall had a vicious fight, perhaps their worst on the show, but later seemed to make up. Kevin’s baby twins came into the world, and Kate and Toby’s adopted daughter was born. As the season ended, Rebecca apologized to Randall for not opening up to him about his birth parents. Toby took a job that will take him away from Kate and their kids three days a week, while Kevin didn’t get married to Madison (CaitlinThompson) as planned. Rebecca told Kevin to build her the house that his dad Jack always wanted to build for her. And in the most shocking moment of the season finale, we see Kate in the future marrying her coworker Phillip—implying that her marriage to Toby doesn’t last in the long run.
Which cast members will be returning to This Is Us Season 6?
All of the Pearsons, their love interests and their kids will be back to close the show out, including: Chrissy Metz as Kate Pearson Justin Hartley as Kevin Pearson Sterling K. Brown as Randall Pearson Milo Ventimiglia as Jack Pearson Mandy Moore as Rebecca Pearson Chris Sullivan as Toby Damon Susan Kelechi Watson as Beth Pearson Jon Huertas as Miguel Rivas Chris Geere as Phillip
Is Season 6 the last season of This Is Us?
Sadly, yes. But that was always the plan, according to Fogelman. “We never set out to make a television series that was going to last 18 seasons, so we have a very direct plan,” he said back in 2019. Still, the experience is bittersweet for everyone, even Fogelman. “Whoever casually first said ‘All good things must come to an end’ never had to end their favorite thing,” he tweeted in May 2021. “While [I’m] sad to have just one season left, also grateful to NBC for letting us end the show how, and when, we always intended. We’ll work hard to stick the landing.”
How to watch This Is Us Season 6 (Time, Channel)
The Season 6 premiere episode will debut on Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2022 at 9 p.m. ET/PT on NBC. If you’d rather stream the show, you’ll have a lot of options. NBC.com and the network’s app will have it, as will NBC’s streaming service, Peacock. Hulu+ Live TV, YouTube TV and other streamers who air live television will carry Season 6 as well. In the meantime, you can binge-watch the first five seasons on Peacock. Next, we asked First Wives Club’s Ryan Michelle Bathé about her first love, first impression of husband Sterling K. Brown and more!
