Image Source: Focus Features [1]

The Crawley family is finally heading back to the big screen in Downton Abbey: A New Era [2]! Over two years after the Focus Features film became a box office hit, a sequel to the 2019 film [3] has been announced. The movie will reunite the entire original principal cast, and if that wasn't exciting enough, there are a handful of new faces joining the cast this time around — including Hugh Dancy, Laura Haddock, Nathalie Baye, and Dominic West. The upcoming film was originally slated to premiere on 22 Dec., 2021, but has since been pushed [4] to 18 March, 2022.

Details of Downton Abbey: A New Era's plot are still scarce, but the new teaser trailer shows that the sequel film takes the Crawleys on a summer getaway trip to the South of France. It also seems to hint that the movie will focus more on Maggie Smith's character Violet Crawley and there appears to be a wedding taking place as well.

Downton Abbey served as followup to the 2015 series finale for the popular TV show, picking up approximately a year and a half after the events of the final episode. While the film followed a royal visit to the Crawley family from the King and Queen of England and ended with a ball, it's unclear exactly where this second film will pick up. That being said, we're counting down the days until March! Take a look at the first trailer for Downton Abbey: A New Era below.