The 'Gentleman Jack' Season 2 Teaser Touts Anne Lister's Return
Programme Name: Gentleman Jack S2 - TX: n/a - Episode: Gentleman Jack - First Look (No. n/a) - Picture Shows: Ann Walker (SOPHIE RUNDLE), Anne Lister (SURANNE JONES) - (C) Lookout Point/HBO - Photographer: Aimee Spinks
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Gentleman Jack is back! Well, almost.
HBO announced that the highly anticipated second season of the popular period drama would finally hit our screens in April, nearly three years after its first aired.
Gentleman Jack centers on Anne Lister, a 19th-century British landowner, intellectual, lesbian, and all-around unorthodox woman who was wildly ahead of her time in many respects. The series is largely based on Lister's real-life diaries, in which she wrote hundreds of thousands of words---much of it in an elaborate code to disguise all the racy bits about her sexual exploits with women.
The drama premiered in 2019 to widespread critical and viewer acclaim, but although it was renewed for a second outing just weeks after its U.K. airing that May. But by the time production got underway the following spring, the series ran straight into the coronavirus pandemic and the resulting shutdowns, lockdowns, and delays that plagued much of the entertainment industry for the better part of two years.
In its first season, the show tells the story of Lister's love affair with neighboring heiress Ann Walker, as well as her efforts to rebuild her ancestral home and revitalize the family coal mines. In its second, it appears that its story will follow Anne and Ann's attempt to live a normal life in a time that viewed their same-sex relationship as anything but ordinary. Season 2 will see the two women decide to live together at Shibden Hall as wife and wife, determined to combined their estates as any other married couple might. Incredibly enough, this process wasn't actually forbidden by law at the time, but their decision is sure to raise some eyebrows, particularly among the local residents of Halifax who already viewer Anne as what we might describe as a dangerous weirdo.
Watch the teaser for yourselves:
Here's the official synopsis for Season 2.
Anne Lister's entrepreneurial spirit frightens the locals as much as her unconventional love life, and, with her Halifax hometown on the brink of revolution, her refusal to keep a low profile becomes provocative and dangerous.
Former Scott & Bailey star Suranne Jones returns as Anne Lister, alongside Jamestown's Sophie Rundle as Ann Walker, and a supporting cast that includes Gemma Whelan (Game of Thrones), Gemma Jones (Sense & Sensibility), Timothy West (Last Tango in Halifax), and Lydia Leonard (Flesh and Blood). The Larkins' Joanna Scanlan joins the cast for Season 2 as Isabella' Tib' Norcliffe, Lister's former lover.
Gentleman Jack comes from creator Sally Wainwright, whom most Anglophiles know as the mind behind popular dramas like Last Tango in Halifax and Happy Valley.
HBO hasn't announced an official premiere date for Gentleman Jack just yet, seemingly content for the moment to tease fans that it will take place some time in April. Until then, you can stream Season 1 of the series now on HBO Max.
