Serial's Third Season Is Coming Back With a Totally New Approach

This season, we're tackling the whole criminal justice system. Hear the trailer and subscribe today to get the first episode the moment it drops. https://t.co/TscuRSdBuO pic.twitter.com/YdyDeggnaK

— Serial (@serial) September 5, 2018

It's official: Serial is returning for its third season in just a few weeks. The podcast's official Twitter account announced on Wednesday that it was returning with new episodes every Thursday starting on Sept. 20, but fans of the show should expect a slightly different approach from the investigative podcast this time around.

Serial's third season will focus on the American criminal justice system, specifically in Cleveland, OH. That means that instead of tackling one specific case as it has in previous seasons — season one deals with a murder case in Baltimore while season two tells the story of a US soldier who was captured by the Taliban — season three of Serial will take a deep dive into a few "ordinary cases" straight out of Cleveland's courtrooms.

"I don't think we can understand how the criminal justice system works by interrogating one extraordinary case," host Sarah Koenig narrates in the season three trailer. "Ordinary cases are where we need to look. This season of Serial, we do just that."

According to the trailer, the focus is on Cleveland this season "because they let us record everywhere, [like] courtrooms, back hallways, judges' chambers, the prosecutor's office." Koenig and fellow producer Emmanuel Dzotsi spent a year in the city, following the cases as they jumped from the courtrooms, into peoples' homes, and sometimes even into prison. The podcast will deliver an inside look at a new case every week, from the smallest misdemeanours to the most crucial felonies.