The Italian organized crime drama Gomorrah will return to television in America on January 21, 2021 with a third season released exclusively through HBO Max, Collider reports. Although this is the third season in the series overall, it will be the first season of Gomorrah to premiere in the U.S. as an exclusive offering from the WarnerMedia streaming service, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Gomorrah is loosely based on the investigative reporting of Italian journalist Roberto Saviano (The Piranhas: The Boy Bosses of Naples), as compiled in his book of the same name: “Gomorrah transports us to 2010s Naples as we follow the brutal civil war unfolding between two prominent crime families… The series has been likened to The Sopranos and The Wire,” via Collider.
It has been over three years since American viewers have been able to safely access new content from the Gomorrah franchise. The series’ original stateside distributor Sundance TV supervised season two’s initial broadcast in 2017, via IndieWire. The year before, the cable network allegedly bought the rights from The Weinstein Company, who had acquired them in 2014, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Before the year was up, season three aired in the show’s home country on Sky Italia, as reported by Collider. Season four arrived on Italian television in spring 2019, Collider reports.
Gomorrah gained a wider audience starting in the second half of 2017 when both seasons made their way to Netflix in the U.S., via New on Netflix. In a surprise move, the first two seasons of Gomorrah were pulled from the Netflix library in the spring of 2020, via The Hollywood Reporter. Furthermore, the full episodes could no longer be viewed on the Sundance TV website. It was not until summer that American fans of the critically acclaimed series received confirmation that HBO Max would be managing the program’s U.S. distribution plan, according to The Hollywood Reporter. A subtitled trailer for Gomorrah‘s third season was uploaded to the HBO Max YouTube channel on December 21.
The Immortal, a film that connects the fourth season to an upcoming fifth season, arrived in Italian theaters in December 2019, Deadline reports. In September, Gomorrah‘s lead actor Salvatore Esposito (Fargo, They Call Me Jeeg) revealed on Twitter that season five would be the show’s last.
🇬🇧 # Gomorra5 will be the last season and your messages, from all over the world, of affection mixed with sadness for this news moves us a lot. It has been a long journey and as always we will try to do our best !!! #Gomorrah #GennySavastano #cirodimarzio pic.twitter.com/Am6n3AesKw
— Salvatore Esposito (@SalvioEspo) September 23, 2020
Season three of Gomorrah comes to HBO Max on January 21, 2021. The first two seasons are also available to stream on the platform with English subtitles.