Elsbeth season 2 is coming to CBS: Here's everything we know so far about the next season

Elsbeth has been one of CBS’ best surprise successes, and a second season is coming! What can we expect from the quirky show next year? 

Elsbeth seemed a risky proposition for CBS. Taking Carrie Preston’s recurring The Good Wife character Elsbeth Tascioni and giving her her own show was one thing. Turning it into a Columbo-style crime show where the audience sees from the start who the killer is is something else. 

But the show succeeded with good ratings to earn a second season. The Season 1 finale scored high in the ratings and wrapped up the storyline of Captain Wagner (Wendell Pierce) not happy to discover Elsbeth had been sent to secretly investigate him for possible corruption.

That threw Elsbeth off her game as for the first time, the audience didn’t see from the start who the killer was and Elsbeth took longer to solve it. Thankfully, Wagner came around to let Elsbeth stay in New York to help the police. He also said it was time Kaya Blanke (Cara Patterson) jumped to detective. 

That was a good wrap-up so what can we expect in Season 2?

What will Season 2 of Elsbeth be about?

With her and Wagner on better terms, Elsbeth will still continue looking over the police while stumbling into murder investigations. The show is likely to continue the trend of the “reverse whodunnit” with some turns. For example, one episode had the killer accidentally murdering the wrong person, and it’s likely that other episodes will have twists in the formula. 

Wagner will try to rebuild his rep and his wife (Gloria Reuben), who are repairing their charity after Noonan uses it for his criminal activities. It’s also going to be fun seeing Kaya becoming a detective and likely aiding Elsbeth. 

Besides that, we might see Elsbeth’s long-talked son and maybe even her trying the dating life, but it’s always going to be the fun mysteries that pull fans in. 

Who stars in Elsbeth Season 2?

It’s likely we’ll stick to the main cast of Preston, Pierce, and Patterson. With Kaya becoming a detective, we may see less of the rotating cops who help on cases, but there is still a chance we may see more of Molly Price’s Donnelley and others.

The focus will always be on the guest stars playing the killers or suspects and scores of actors to be featured there. Of course, fans are hopeful that Preston’s husband, Michael Emerson, might pop in, and the actress told TV Line how she’d like to see it. 

"Look, he’s very good at playing evil people. [Laughs] He’s very good at doing that, as we have seen. So it would be fun to see him in a role that wasn’t that, where we would expect him to be the murderer, but what if he wasn’t. What if he was someone who was somehow connected to the precinct or someone who Wagner knows? I don’t know, but it would be fun. That said, I think he’d be open to pretty much anything. He loves the show, and we’ve been talking about how fun it would be if he came on and did an episode or two."

It’s possible if Patterson becomes a regular detective, the show might bring in a new character to be the sidekick for Elsbeth but otherwise, it’s unlikely the cast expands too much.

When does Elsbeth return? 

The show is set for a fall premiere on Thursdays at 10/9c following Matlock. There’s no word on the episode count yet, but it’s likely to be a full 20-22 episode season, giving fans plenty of time to enjoy Elsbeth’s antics. 

There’s still more to come over the summer, yet this shows how Elsbeth has beaten the odds to become a hit show, and fans are happy to see the quirky lawyer returning. 

Elsbeth Season 1 streaming on Paramount+.