Crown Media When is When Calls the Heart Season 9 premiering?
The Hallmark Channel just announced in TV promos that season 9 of “When Calls the Heart” won’t be premiering until March, rather than its normal February premiere. But after the promos aired, the “When Calls the Heart” official website added a date that’s at the end of February rather than March. Now fans are confused and aren’t sure if this is a premiere date or something else.
Update: After this story was written, the official premiere date for the new season was announced. It’s still unclear why February 27 remains on the webpage. Read more in Heavy’s new story here.
Hallmark Added ‘February 27’ To Its Official ‘When Calls the Heart’ Website
Hallmark’s “When Calls the Heart” website was just changed on January 4 to list February 27, 8 p.m. at the top of the page without any additional explanation. You can see a screenshot below. Heavy reached out to Hallmark for an explanation of what the date is referring to, but Hallmark did not respond.
Hallmark.com
The change was first noticed late in the morning on January 4, 2021. The “Showtimes” dropdown also lists 8 p.m. Eastern/7 p.m. Central as the next upcoming date for “When Calls the Heart.”
Hallmark
Fans were confused by the date, since TV promos from the weekend before indicated a March return for the season. The website doesn’t indicate if this is the first date of the new season or perhaps the date of a special “When Calls the Heart” event.
Some fans wondered online if this was an old date from season 8. However, February 27 only falls on a Sunday in 2021, and season 8 of “When Calls the Heart” premiered on February 21. A look at Google cache indicates that as of 5:34 a.m. Central on January 4, the date had not yet been added to the page.
Hallmark
So this change was added to the website later on the morning of January 4.
In addition, a look back at the webpage in November, courtesy of Internet Archive, also does not have a date at the top.
HallmarkNovember WCTH webpage
Hallmark Advertised March as the Premiere Month
Over the weekend, the Hallmark Channel had advertised March as the premiere month for the new season of “When Calls the Heart.”
The Instagram account Starwatchbyline was one of the first to notice the change. The promos over the weekend on TV ended with “All New Season Coming in March” when it previously said “Coming in 2022.”
A “Team Lucas” fan shared the same photo on January 1 after seeing the new promo closure on TV.
The official “Hearties” Instagram page also announced that the new season was debuting in March.
So now fans are confused by the February 27 date that’s been added to the website, and Hallmark isn’t offering any explanations yet.
In an online discussion on the official Facebook page for “When Calls the Heart,” a fan asked on January 3 when they’d learn the premiere date of season 9 and Hallmark simply said it would be announced soon.
When Erin Krakow, who plays Elizabeth, was asked during an Instagram Q&A in August when season 9 might premiere, she had guessed it would be in February 2022.
Ever since season 3, the show has returned in February. Season 3 debuted on February 21, 2016. Season 4 debuted on February 19, 2017. Season 5 debuted on February 18, 2018. Season 6 debuted on February 24, 2019. (It then went on hiatus briefly to edit Lori Loughlin out of some episodes.) Season 7 premiered in February 2020. Season 8 premiered on February 21, 2021.
In a Twitter post, executive producer and co-creator Brian Bird revealed that season 9 is going to have 12 episodes, just like season 8 did. Most seasons prior to that only had 10 episodes each at the most.
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