Virgin River Season 4: The 4 Things I'm Most Excited About For The Upcoming Season

mel smiling on virgin river season 4
(Image credit: Netflix)

With many TV shows having trouble getting their productions up and running in the past few years, Virgin River fans are quite lucky that that has not been the case for our beloved small town romance. The past two years have gifted us with one new season each (after it premiered in December 2019), and now we’re finally on the fast track to having Virgin River Season 4 delivered into our eyeballs when it joins this year’s new and returning shows on July 20.

And, while everyone is very excited to see Virgin River become a part of the 2022 Netflix TV schedule, it will still be a little over a year until we get to pick back up with the shocking events of the Virgin River Season 3 ending. If you’ve been awaiting some answers on those cliffhangers and looking for more details about a number of other surprising developments, then you're probably just as excited as I am to see the following four things transpire at some point during the new season!

jack on virgin river

(Image credit: Netflix)

Finding Out Who Shot Jack… Finally

You guys? I cannot remember the last time a show refused to give viewers a solid answer to this big of a cliffhanger, and it’s driving me crazy! As you will likely recall, the final moments of the Virgin River Season 2 ending (SEASON…TWO!!) revealed that Jack had been shot and left for dead in his bar. Luckily, Mel found him and he was fully recovered by the time Season 3 kicked off, but we still don’t really know who shot him. 

Sure, I know that Brady was arrested for the attempt on Jack’s life, but I’m sure we all noticed the curious timing of Brady becoming a suspect just as drug kingpin Calvin popped back up and tried to force the misguided young man back into illegal dealings with him. Brady already had to admit to Jack that he was present when the shooting went down, then his alibi fell apart, and when Mike had officers search Brady’s property, they found the gun which likely did the deed. It seems pretty clear that Brady was set up, but with the showrunner saying that the answer to who shot Jack is a complex “webbing” going “back to the first season,” the resolution might not be as simple as “Calvin did it.” And, I cannot wait to finally get this answer!

charmaine on virgin river

(Image credit: Netflix)

Watching Charmaine Lose Her Whole Mind When She Finds Out Mel Is Pregnant

Oh, Charmaine. Charmaine, Charmaine… shitty, truly problematic Charmaine! Keeping in mind that the entirety of Virgin River’s action so far has only taken place over a few months, you know that she is going to flip her lid when she finds out that Mel is pregnant! This is especially true with Charmaine still being in love with Jack and, you know, currently carrying his twins and also attempting to keep him out of those twins' lives with her new (probably dangerous) husband, Todd.

In fact, as soon as Charmaine finds out (and you know she will, no matter how Jack and Mel may try to keep the pregnancy to themselves), I think we can (unfortunately) count on her using it against Jack in the mounting court case to cut him off from their babies, particularly if it looks like Jack is going to have an easier time in court. Also, if we happen to find out that the kid Mel is carrying is actually her dead husband’s, Charmaine and Todd will probably then claim that Jack is in a situation that’s unfit for the twins. While I and most fans despise Charmaine and her continued stupidity, actress Lauren Hammersley does a fantastic job of portraying a slightly unhinged character, so I will LOVE IT when she hears the news and blows all of her remaining gaskets!

doc mullins on virgin river

(Image credit: Netflix)

Learning About Doc’s Past

I don’t know about you, but hearing that Doc almost certainly has a grandson that he doesn’t seem to know anything about was way more surprising than finding out how much trouble Hope was in after the car accident that kept her out of the finale (and kept Doc within reach of a very supportive Muriel). Photos released for Virgin River Season 4 appear to show that Hope will make it out of her medically-induced coma OK, which means that Doc will, at some point, have to talk to her about his grandson.

Prior to that young man showing up at the bed and breakfast and saying that Doc is his grandfather, we’d had no real information that suggested he could have family that he wasn’t close to/didn’t know about. But, it now seems clear that Doc’s had a much more intricate past than we’ve been privy to. I'm really intrigued by the idea of digging into Doc’s past, and certainly can’t wait to see how the revelations impact his newly solidified romance with Hope!

preacher drugged on virgin river

(Image credit: Netflix)

Seeing How Preacher Gets Out Of Trouble 

Another reveal that turned out to be very lucky for Virgin River fans when some photos from the new season dropped was that Preacher looked to be alive and well, barring that picture of him dining with a mysterious woman being of a dream sequence/flashback, anyway. So now comes the big question: How the hell does Preacher get out of the trouble he was in at the end of Season 3?

Good guy Preacher had been looking out for young Christopher until he could reunite the boy with Paige, who had to go on the run after accidentally killing Christopher’s abusive father, Wes. With Wes’ twin brother seemingly on to the fact that Preacher was involved in covering up his brother’s disappearance, Preach trusted a supposed friend of Paige’s to take him to her. But, the woman drugged Preacher and abandoned him in the woods without his phone. When and how does Preach get back to Virgin River? And, will he be able to stop Christopher’s uncle from nabbing him and hurting Connie in the process? I need to know!

Virgin River has always been good about mixing several small town romance stories with surprising criminal elements, leaving fans with several intriguing cliffhangers each season. Honestly, I’m very excited to get into everything that Virgin River Season 4 will have to offer, and just as excited to see where they leave everything before Season 5!

Adrienne Jones
Senior Content Creator

Covering The Witcher, Outlander, Virgin River, Sweet Magnolias and a slew of other streaming shows, Adrienne Jones is a Senior Content Producer at CinemaBlend, and started in the fall of 2015. In addition to writing and editing stories on a variety of different topics, she also spends her work days trying to find new ways to write about the many romantic entanglements that fictional characters find themselves in on TV shows. She graduated from Mizzou with a degree in Photojournalism.