Rivals returns with bigger drama, blood feuds and new guest stars

Rivals returns as more than a glossy period drama: Disney+ is turning Jilly Cooper’s 1980s Rutshire saga into a larger franchise play, with season two set to begin on 15 May 2026 in a rare 12-episode order split into two six-episode batches and launched with a three-episode premiere. In the United States, the new season will stream on Hulu; internationally, it will remain on Disney+.

That expansion matters because the first season was not just a cult success but Disney+’s most successful general entertainment premiere in the UK to date. The streamer renewed the series in December 2024, and filming on season two began in May 2025, as the company doubled down on a title built around rivalries, reputations and private appetites in the fictional county of Rutshire. The second season will pick up the back half of Cooper’s novel, keeping careers, marriages and status fights at the center of the story as the world of independent television turns more vicious.

The returning ensemble stays stacked. David Tennant, Aidan Turner, Danny Dyer, Katherine Parkinson, Nafessa Williams, Alex Hassell and Bella Maclean are all back, giving Disney+ the kind of recognisable cast that can carry a soapy, high-drama series beyond its original fan base. The strategy is clear: keep the tone camp, the stakes personal and the cast broad enough to make the show feel like an event rather than a niche import.

The new additions deepen that ambition. Hayley Atwell joins as Helen Gordon, Rupert Campbell-Black’s ex-wife and the mother of his children, Marcus and Tabitha, while Rupert Everett also comes aboard as a guest star. That casting adds another layer to a story already built on infidelity, class tension and public humiliation, all of it wrapped in the vivid 1980s styling that helped define the first season and its Bristol-based production.

Aidan Turner has said David Tennant’s Tony Baddingham is “out for blood,” a line that captures the upgraded mood around season two. With awards attention already behind the first run and Disney+ branding the return as a major television event, Rivals is being positioned as a prestige-soap anchor: big enough to attract attention, bold enough to keep it, and long enough to keep subscribers from drifting away after one weekend.