‘Virgin River’ Showrunner Unpacks Season 6: Wedding, Cliffhangers, That Catchy Song & “Hold Space” Line; Teases Season 7’s Theme & More

SPOILER ALERT: The story includes details about Season 6 of Netflix‘s Virgin River.

Another Virgin River season ended on a Charmaine-related cliffhanger. She dropped the pregnancy bomb in Season 1 then admitted that Jack was not the father in the Season 4 finale, with Calvin revealed as the dad a year later. Now, Season 6 ended with Jack stopping by to check on her after she didn’t attend his and Mel’s wedding to find her house ransacked and her and the babies possibly missing after she had taken a restraining order against Calvin.

Season 6 followed Mel (Alexandra Breckenridge) and Jack’s (Martin Henderson) journey to the altar, with both facing the ghosts from their past before the big day. Trying to build a relationship with her biological father Everett (John Allen Nelson), Mel asks him instead of Doc (Tim Matheson) to walk her down the isle. Everett is overwhelmed, Doc is upset. The two men remain hostile until they bury the past after Everett reveals he was trying to end his life on that fateful night decades ago, resulting in another patient of Doc’s, a boy, dying.

Mel and Doc also reconcile by the rehearsal dinner. But then Everett suffers a heart attack the night before the wedding. He survives but, somewhat inexplicably, Mel and Jack proceed with the wedding, which Hope (Annette O’Toole) has turned into an elaborate production with flying doves and ice sculptures. It’s all too much for Mel, and Jack whisks her away on their new horse to that spot by the river where they first bonded in Season 1. His moving “I’ve got you” speech works, and Mel is ready to get married.

Doc walks Mel down the isle, and Everett comes out of the hospital to perform a song at the reception, which he had started writing after meeting Mel’s late mom, Sarah. Everett and Sarah’s love story was charted through flashbacks with the idea to possibly turn that into a prequel series starring Callum Kerr and Jessica Rothe.

Star-crossed lovers Brie and Brady proved once again that they can’t stay away from each other for long and had sex while both were in relationships, Brie with Mike and Brady with Lark who had tried to con him.

Things come to a head at Mel and Jack’s wedding, with Lark overhearing Brady telling Brie that she will always be the one, leading to her somehow draining Brady’s bank account through his phone (that is some really poor bank security) and disappearing with her daughter. Meanwhile, Mike proposes to Brie, she admits that she slept with Brady and Mike tells her he knows.

Also at the wedding, Preacher and Kaia, who successfully went through his trial, and expectant parents Lizzie and Denny, both discuss marriage. Doc’s clinic is under threat of being taken over by a large network, Muriel was diagnosed with breast cancer and Cameron visited a couple of times before jetting back to San Diego.

Meanwhile, newlyweds Mel and Jack may become parents much sooner than anticipated when Mel’s patient Marley asks her in the finale to adopt her unborn baby.

Season 7, which was ordered ahead of Season 6’s debut, is now being written. Scripts are expected to be ready in January, with filming scheduled to begin in the spring, according to showrunner Patrick Sean Smith.

In an interview with Deadline, Smith breaks down Season 6’s wedding storyline, teases Season 7’s overarching theme and reveals whether there will be a time jump. He addresses whether scrapping the nuptials was considered, the cliffhangers involving Charmaine’s disappearance, Mike’s proposal and Lark’s revenge as well as how many weddings and babies we could expect next season and whether it could be the series’ last.

Smith discusses the proposed prequel and reveals which other Virgin River characters’ back stories will be explored next season as well as which Season 6 and Season 7 storylines were inspired by the Robyn Carr books the series is based on, and by his personal experiences. He also reveals why Mel and Jack’s dog Pony was MIA for most of the season, hinting at a possible recasting, and whether Cameron and Everett will be back next season.

Additionally, Smith explains that “hold space” line in Mike’s proposal and its impeccable timing on the heels of the viral Wicked meme and how ‘This Heart of Mine’ song came about with The Lumineers star.

DEADLINE: Let’s start with the very end of the finale, the Charmaine cliffhanger. What can you tease about what Jack sees in that nursery, and whether she and/or the babies are safe?

SMITH: I want to say the babies are safe for sure. As far as the circumstances surrounding what Jack sees, I think you’ll have to wait and see next season. But it came out of something that felt interesting for us to explore in Season 7, so we kind of knew where we were jumping on this cliffhanger before we jumped.

DEADLINE: Will we see more of Charmaine? She has been a cliffhanger device on the show but, outside of the restraining order, we barely saw her this season.

SMITH: In Season 5, I was glad that we were able to round her out a little bit more, to humanize her a little bit. I think since we already had the number of characters that we have, we’ll see her be a similar amount. But I think in Season 7, it’s more about characters that are reacting to the circumstances that result from the cliffhanger that are brought back into our story.

DEADLINE: Onto the main storyline, the lead-up to Mel and Jack’s wedding. We got some classic romantic movie tropes, including a runaway bride (and groom). Talk about the fact that they almost didn’t get married after we were building towards that the entire season and them going back to the place of their first date. You were not on the show when that scene was filmed in Season 1, how did you decide to do that throwback?

SMITH: I looked at the wedding as the event that has been six seasons in the making so wanted to give a nod to as many pivotal moments for Mel and Jack throughout the episode without it becoming a clips episode. It felt like an interesting place for them to return, especially for their characters, just the fact that Jack intuitively knew that it would be a place that Mel could emotionally respond to, given the trauma that she was bringing to her new life in Virgin River.

With it cropping up through Everett’s health scare, I think he knew that it would have the same effect on her. And it just proved, in a way, the magic of Jack to Mel, to be able to support her and be there for those moments where she doesn’t have the faith and confidence that she’s going to be able to have the strength for what life and us are throwing at her at that moment.

DEADLINE: Jack’s speech on the riverbank served as his vows. Did you consider not having a real ceremony at all? Or did you think fans would be too upset? It would’ve been understandable, Mel’s father almost died; it felt almost too rushed to have a wedding the same day.

SMITH: Given the unexpected nature of Season 5, I felt there was already an inherent question mark whether this wedding is going to actually happen or not but I knew from the beginning that I did want to deliver on the wedding. It almost felt like the happy outcome was the more unexpected outcome, given the history of the show — and also television in general. And it felt very much in the spirit of the show that the big twist of this wedding season is that the wedding actually happens and they cross the finish line together and just as much in love as when they were first on those riverbanks together, as to when they return there for that private moment of sharing their vows.

I really had no intention of depriving the fans of one moment of wedding bliss that we could find. I found, historically, for me, that I’ve seen some wedding episodes that I just wanted to live in it more, and I wanted the audience to be as satiated as possible with the wedding.

DEADLINE: With Jack wearing his Marine uniform and Mel in the white dress, the wedding had almost a fairy tale feel to it. Was that intentional?

SMITH: It wasn’t intentional to be that literal with the fairy tale imagery. I knew that I wanted him to wear his dress blues in the end, which just felt like a way to honor his service, which, through much of the series, had been a source of pain, but I like that it became a source of pride over the course of the season, that manifested in him wearing his dress blues. But no, I think those fairy tale elements did pop in there in a way that felt fun and sweet and suitable for how special this relationship has been between them.

DEADLINE: Will there be a time jump? Approximately when is the next season picking up?

SMITH: Currently, the next season picks up like two hours later, there is not a time jump this time.

DEADLINE: In addition to Mel and Jack’s wedding, the finale teased three more potentially, with Danny and Lizzie starting to talk about marriage in a more serious way, Preacher and Kaia getting to that place. and Mike proposing to Brie. How many more weddings could we expect next season?

SMITH: I can’t promise any more weddings. We are a little weddinged-out after Season 6, but it felt like, at weddings, sometimes the idea finds its way into couples, so exploring it felt like even more of a way of bringing our supporting characters into the event itself by them evaluating or reevaluating their own individual or couple relationship to marriage.

DEADLINE: Mike’s proposal. I watched a couple times that scene with the guys by the fire that preceded it, and I’m still not sure what exactly in that conversation prompted him to do it. Why did he decide to propose and, more importantly, how did he know about Brie and Brady and how long has he known?

SMITH: We will unpack all of that in Season 7, for sure. We dropped hints In the earlier episodes, specifically in 608 when Mike has the theory that Brie and Jack’s parents are sleeping together, and at one point he says, ‘I’m a detective, I detect things’. So the idea was that we felt like by profession, let’s make him a really good cop, and let’s have him pick up on these breadcrumbs and clues along the way.

At the fire with the men, it’s off Jack knowing that Brady and Brie slept together when it’s referenced that Brady could be a family man in this relationship with Lark, Jack shoots a look to Brady that’s somewhat accusatory, so it was super super subtle. But again, it’s something that we will unpack more in Season 7.

DEADLINE: Assume you can’t tease what Brie’s answer is to the proposal?

SMITH: She says either yes or no.

DEADLINE: There’s a line in Mike’s proposal that had me howling. He says, ‘All I’ve wanted to do is to take care of you and hold space.’ You wrote this months before “holding space” took social media by storm after a Wicked press interview with Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo. I still don’t quite understand what that phrase means. What does it mean for Mike? And what do you think about the crazy coincidence and timing?

SMITH: It’s certainly a coincidence. It’s a phrase that I’ve heard in my peer groups and we use in the writer’s room as far as the idea of supporting somebody while they’re going through something I think is my interpretation of it. If it’s wrong, I stand corrected and I defer to Ariana and Cynthia respectfully.

I think the idea of Mike is always that he’s there supporting her and being a safe place for her, compared to Brady, where she’s endured disappointment and heartbreak, but she’s also still carrying this torch and still has very passionate feelings For Brady.

DEADLINE: Brady and Lark’s tumultuous relationship came to an abrupt end after she swindled him and took off. Did she always plan to take his money or was that a reaction to her overhearing Brady profess his love to Brie?

SMITH: Our intention was in seeing her emotional reaction to the conversation when she was in tears. That’s when she sort of detached. What we’re exploring in Season 7 is what she sees as how Brady emotionally conned her, that while it felt like they were solid, he was always in love with Brie, and when she got that information, she retaliated in a big way.

DEADLINE: Will Brie and Brady’s star-crossed lovers arc continue? They both were in committed relationships with other people this season, but in the end, they find themselves where they were a season ago.

SMITH: Yeah, we’ll continue to explore that relationship with Brie and Brady as well as Mike, and looking at the three of them as more of an immediate love triangle, as opposed to this past season, which is a little bit like a love rectangle.

DEADLINE: We talked about weddings, what about babies? Obviously one is on the way with Lizzie and Denny. But we also got an expected possible instant family with Jack and Mel when Marley asked Mel to adopt her unborn baby. For me, it came out of the blue because yes, the adoptive parents were a little overbearing, but that seemed to be coming from a good place. How did this twist came about?

SMITH: Well, there’s a nod to the book series where Marley and Phil and Darla were characters in a similar situation as Mel was, the doctor to Marley who was looking to give her baby up for adoption. So that’s what inspired the storyline. And then carrying that through, I can guarantee at least one baby in Season 7, potentially two.

DEADLINE: Like Charmaine, Mel and Jack’s dog Pony only appeared sporadically in Season 6 despite the duo spending a lot of time in their cabin. Why was that?

SMITH: It turned out Pony wasn’t as prepared for the role before we cast Pony. And I say again, respectfully to the animal wranglers, they had the best of intentions. Pony, I think, was maybe borderline feral when he started on set, and we learned that the hard way. Martin and Alex were troopers, I actually sent an email to production with a subject line in a reference to an 80s song where it said,
“Pony, Pony, Pony has done it again.” Pony was completely out of control, so we pulled Pony from the scene. And I think we were feeling kind of less our best of intentions and more Pony’s got to go back to acting school.

DEADLINE: Will you recast the role or will Pony remain largely in the background?

SMITH: I’m hoping we’ll find a lookalike that’s prepared for what the role demands. Alex and Martin were just — they had the clickers, they were acting, we were throwing babies at them and everything, they signed up for a lot. [Mel and Jack volunteered to babysit Charmaine’s babies at their cabin.]

DEADLINE: One more character we barely saw this season was Cameron, despite Mark Ghanimé, who plays him, being a series regular. His scene with Muriel in the finale felt like a goodbye. Is this the last we saw of Cameron?

SMITH: Cameron will always be part of our world, and I would love to see his character come back again. He unfortunately won’t be a series regular in Season 7, but I love Mark, and I love the character, so when opportunity presents itself, I’d love to have him back.

DEADLINE: Speaking of Muriel, who just found a new love post-Cameron, will Season 7 follow her cancer battle?

SMITH: We’ll continue to explore as she enters treatment and endures that with the support of the new love interest, but also, and more specifically, with the sawing circle and Hope.

DEADLINE: The Everett and Sarah flashbacks. Talk about crafting the 1970s timeline, telling that backstory, and what the status of the potential prequel is.

SMITH: it’s still in development, so I’m working on that now. I personally see it a little bit like Queen Charlotte to Bridgerton. I think if there’s an opportunity to take what Virgin River as a book series was, which was each book was focusing on one couple and expanding the world outside of it, to put Sarah and Everett in the foreground of their own story, while populating, as Virgin River has, the world with supporting characters and other relationships — but all still running it through the romance lens — to me, is what defines a lot of what an expansion of the show and the franchise would be.

So it’s still keeping things romance-forward, character-based, solid story engines, the beauty of the area, but then putting that in a time period that can inform some of the issues of the time, and that can still speak and feel relevant to issues of today, which I think is what Virgin River itself has done beautifully In its balance of not being so boxy, but also having something to say that still matters.

DEADLINE: I’d like to see Hope as a young woman in Virgin River, and Doc, in flashbacks. Season 6 introduced her ex, a rancher. We will see him again?

SMITH: Roland, yes, her ex-husband will come back in Season 7. A lot of what we’re doing in Season 7 that marries itself somewhat to the prequel is looking more in Hope’s history. From the beginning of the series, it was acknowledged that the McCrea cabin was something that people knew within 50 miles, and we’ve never really explored her family legacy to that area.

DEADLINE: In addition to Hope, are there any other characters whose backstory will be explored next season?

SMITH: We are exploring a little bit more of Mel’s origins as a midwife, which we understand led to her choice of becoming a nurse, and a bit of her calling came from the emotional experience she had with her mother’s illness and passing. It’s getting to understand in a deeper way Mel’s relationships with babies, her relationships with birth mothers, and digging into that part of her calling as well.

DEADLINE: Mel and Everett’s relationship was pretty bumpy, he pulled back at one point, she later saved his life. Talk about the trajectory of that relationship, with the two ultimately accepting each other and Everett showing his love for her with the song at the wedding.

SMITH: The introduction of Everett was really something to recontextualize Doc and Mel’s special bond with him as a surrogate father. And I think what we were interested in was trying to explore it as authentically as possible: an estranged, biological child dropping into your life 40 years later when you haven’t been a parent, you isolated yourself from most personal relationships, and now you’re the father of the bride. It was putting a lot of the pressure on Everett and seeing Mel navigate that, which felt fresh and new since we hadn’t seen her dealing with a living parent.

He had closed off his heart because of all of the past loss, and it was Mel’s love that made him able to open his heart again was what we were going for. And it felt, in a way, that it was less focus on Mel’s heartbreak and her loss, which had been so much at the beginning of the series, seeing Mel bring some of the experiences that she has had and starting to use those in lifting Everett up in a way that I don’t think she expected to be able to do at the beginning.

DEADLINE: I have to ask about the song, “This Heart Of Mine”, it’s so simple but so catchy. Who wrote it? Are you releasing it? Did John Allen Nelson sing it on the show?

SMITH: Wesley Schultz from The Lumineers wrote the song. I wanted to get some bigger name-y people to have a featured song for the season, and he and I texted back and forth a few times. The challenge of it was capturing the inspiration for Everett, which was Sarah, but then also capturing Mel & Jack’s relationship at the same time.

We’re totally releasing it in Wesley’s version. Callum, who played young Everett, who happens to also be a recording artist in Nashville, has a version of it, and then the version of John Nelson, who did sing the song himself, will live in the show. So we have several versions of it, but I think it really became a season highlight for me, and it’s something I was really proud that it worked as well as it did. And I’m so glad that it resonated for you too.

DEADLINE: With Doc and Everett also reconciling after Everett came clean about that accident decades ago, will Everett be back next season? Are there more stories to tell about him?

SMITH: He’ll continue to be a part of the show. I think we’ve told a bulk of his story with Mel for now. But I think another thing that the show has always done so beautifully is keep secondary characters alive and pop up in places where you wouldn’t necessarily always expect it. So I think he is a resident of Virgin River who’s here to stay.

DEADLINE: Doc and Mel got into a pretty ugly fight before they mended fences just in time for the wedding. Was Doc always going to walk her down the aisle?

SMITH: I think that was the idea. She asked him initially. Everett came into her life, she made the change, which I think hurt Doc deeply, but in a way that he didn’t want to disappoint her by letting her know that, which is what I think culminated in their fight. But then we saw the opportunity in Everett’s health scare to sideline him, to put Doc back in that rightful position, being the one that walks Mel down the aisle.

DEADLINE: The upcoming fight for the clinic. You mentioned how the show reflects realities, and small-town medical practices being steamrolled by larger networks is a reality. Where are you taking that storyline?

SMITH: The show, while we’re not a medical procedural, we do have a medical story engine that I think is special in terms of looking at small-town medicine. I had the great pleasure and privilege to start out my career working on Everwood, carrying the wish-fulfillment idea, and I think what Virgin River has done well as far as how it reflects on small town medicine. I’m curious about seeing a little of the current state of medical healthcare and our realities of it seeping into that world.

There’s an overarching theme for Season 7 of the outside encroaching into Virgin River. It all comes from a personal place for me. I grew up in small town in Texas. Our small town hospital has been taken over by a network. I’ve seen the repercussions of that on the people that live there. One of the town doctors who was 82 only recently retired, and that’s been an inspiration for me, as far as Doc in his longevity, which I would love to see go for as long as humanly possible, because it feels real. I feel like we have an opportunity to look at it in a way that other shows can’t.

DEADLINE: Last question. Are you considering Season 7 a potential final season, and how long can you go with the show?

SMITH: No plans to wrap up the series anytime soon, and as long as people keep coming back for it, we’re proud and happy to keep telling these stories.