Empire Will End With a Sixth and Final Season on Fox

Empire has had a rough go of it lately. Lee Daniels and Danny Strong’s Fox drama about hip-hop artist and music industry mogul Lucious Lyon (Terrence Howard), his estranged wife, Cookie (Taraji P. Henson), and their three sons has not only been receiving less of the critical praise it once commanded, but it’s also been in the news lately because of the scandal surrounding star Jussie Smollett. On Monday, Fox executives announced that the series will end its run after its sixth season and they currently have no plans to weave Smollett’s character, Jamal Lyon, back into the story to say goodbye.

“We are turning the final season into a large TV event,” Fox Entertainment CEO Charlie Collier explained of the show’s endgame, according to EW. “We are trying to go out guns a-blazing. One of the great benefits of announcing the final season is that it actually allows fans to lean in and have the ending they deserve. Six years is a remarkable run.”

In late January, Smollett claimed to be the victim of a brutal racist and homophobic attack while he was leaving a Subway restaurant in Chicago. Fox subsequently removed Smollett from the final two episodes of the fifth season, but his character was given a happy ending (Jamal ties the knot with Kai). Collier noted that the show’s writers’ room hasn’t started working on the last season just yet, but “there are no plans at this point” to bring back Smollett.

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