The Righteous Gemstones Season 3 Starts in June

Good news: HBO’s best show about three unserious children desperate to take over their father’s business returns sooner than expected. The third season of The Righteous Gemstones launches on Sunday, June 18, with two back-to-back episodes airing on HBO from 10 p.m. to 11 p.m. ET/PT. They’ll also be streaming on Max, the streaming service currently known as HBO Max.

Created by and starring Danny McBride, who was also responsible for Eastbound & Down and Vice Principals, The Righteous Gemstones is about a family of South Carolina televangelists who basically run their church as a criminal enterprise. As McBride told Paste last year, he’s fascinated by the idea of “a pastor that sees themselves as bigger than the message they’re trying to sell,” which is something anybody who has ever lived in the South is very familiar with. It’s often been called a Southern take on Succession, that other HBO show about ruthless family maneuverings; the similarities are obvious, but Gemstones is more overtly comedic than the Roy family saga, and deeply rooted in the same recognizable version of the modern South that McBride’s previous shows were set in.

The show’s stellar ensemble returns intact. McBride plays eldest son Jesse Gemstone, who has been scheming to take his father Eli’s place at the head of the family since the first season. John Goodman plays Eli, the patriarch and founder of the family’s church who started as a low-level pro wrestler and Dixie Mafia enforcer in Memphis in the ’60s. Edi Patterson and Adam Devine play Eli’s other two grown children, Judy and Kelvin, with Tim Baltz playing Judy’s husband BJ and Tony Cavalero as Kelvin’s best friend and acolyte Keefe, a reformed Satanist. Cassidy Freeman plays Jesse’s wife Amber, who fully supports his goal of taking over the church, and Skyler Gisondo plays their stuntman son Gideon. Sugarland and Soul Miner’s Daughter singer Jennifer Nettles plays the family’s deceased matriarch Aimee-Leigh Gemstone in flashbacks, and Walton Goggins basically steals the whole damn show as her brother, a 60-something man with a shock of gleaming white hair known as Baby Billy Freeman (or Uncle Baby Billy, as Eli’s kids call him). Just go ahead and give ’em all some Emmys, already. And as always, the series is directed and executive produced by McBride, Jody Hill, and David Gordon Green.

HBO also released a teaser for the new season today. As you can see, Steve Zahn and Shea Whigham both join that already stacked cast, which we fully support. Check it out below.