A McLeod’s Daughters reboot has been confirmed.

I was late to the McLeod’s Daughters bandwagon. It wasn’t until I was in the last year of my teens that I discovered the classic rural Australian TV drama. 

I do think I can be excused, considering I had only just turned three when the first episode aired on Channel Nine, but either way, after moving into a sharehouse with a seasoned McLeod’s Daughters fan, I well-and-truly made up for the years I’d missed.

We would spend hours cradling bags of chips on the couch while watching the endless chaos that took place at Drovers Run. Laughing, crying and yelling at the TV screen when the Ryan brothers inevitably did something annoying.

The phrase: “got bit by a brownie and nearly carked it” became a staple in our sharehouse chats and saying “g’day” became just as normal as “hello”. 

So you can only imagine my excitement when I found out that a McLeod’s Daughters reboot is in the works, 25 years after the first episode aired. 

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At the Nine Upfronts on Thursday, Stan announced a return to Drovers Run is in the works. 

The official teaser opened up on the famous windmill from the original series before showing a woman riding on horseback across the McLeod family’s farm. We can’t see her face in the teaser, but it’s likely it will be a member of the McLeod clan — maybe even Claire’s daughter Charlotte, Tess’ daughter Claire or Stevie’s son Xander.

For the fans, this reboot has been a long time coming. It’s been 17 years since the last episode aired in 2009. Some of us have been rewatching the same eight seasons for over a decade.

But for those not quite across the show, here are six facts you need to know before you watch the series reboot.

Bridie Carter has been campaigning for a reboot for years (and she’s not alone).

While many fans have been hoping for a return, Bridie Carter, who played Tess McLeod in the show, has been trying to make this happen for years. 

Back in 2018, she spoke on WHO’s Who Are You podcast about the fact that she would love to see the show return. 

“You have this ready-made audience globally, they’re waiting,” she said. 

“I would love to go back and do it.”

Bridie Carter, who played Tess McLeod in the show, has been campaigning for a reboot for years. Image: Nine, McLeod’s Daughters.

At the time, Carter added that the show’s creator Posie Graeme-Evans was in talks for a remake with Stan. 

“Posie was keen and she got together and there was a synopsis written and they had discussions with Stan,” she said.

Just last month, Carter expressed that a reboot of the series would be a “no-brainer” as the Aussie drama celebrated 25 years on air. 

“I still know how it could work,” she told Nine. 

“You can absolutely see Tess and Nick coming back from Argentina … You see where the farm’s at and their offspring, and just starting again.”

Simmone Jade Mackinnon, who played Stevie on the show, also said that she’s “been gunning for [a reboot] for years”.

Where the show left us.

There are no details yet about where the reboot will kick off from. Carter and Mackinnon both think it would make sense to open up on the McLeod’s children all grown up but time will tell. 

While we wait for the reboot, let’s look back at where McLeod’s Daughters left us. The show, which featured the lives of the McLeod’s sisters living and working on a cattle farm in South Australia, finished with the final episode titled ‘The Long Paddock’.

In that episode, family and friends gather for Stevie and Alex’s son Xander’s first birthday, one year after Alex, played by Aaron Jeffery, was killed by a falling branch (it still stings all these years later). 

Jodi, played by the late Rachael Carpani, returned for the final episode pregnant with her husband Matt’s child. But Tess, played by Carter, and Nick, played by Myles Pollard, did not return to the show for the season finale. At that time in the storyline they had moved to work on a farm in Argentina. 

The last season ended with Stevie celebrating the first birthday of her son Xander. Tess McLeod didn’t feature in the finale. Image: Nine, McLeod’s Daughters.

What can we expect from the reboot?

While we don’t know exactly what to expect. We have been drip fed some hints about what the reboot will entail. 

First of all, the teaser trailer makes it clear that we will be returning to Drovers Run, the McLeod family’s famous farm, which is filmed on location near Gawler in South Australia. 

“A lot has happened since Australia last visited Drovers Run, but what hasn’t changed is the landscape and the uplifting spirit of the strong, resilient women navigating life on the land alongside the challenges of finding love and connection in the modern world,” Nine said of the upcoming reboot.

It’s not clear who will feature in the new show but we can assume it will be relatives of the original McLeod’s Daughters. 

The Stan Original show will be produced by Werner Film Production.

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What we know about the cast so far.

At the moment, we don’t have any details about who will be cast in the reboot. Despite her campaign for the reboot, Carter is yet to make an announcement as to whether she will be involved in the show. 

There’s a chance it will be an entirely new cast but here’s hoping some of the original favourites make an appearance.

Three cast members have sadly died since the show ended. 

There are, of course, some actors who aren’t here to see the show return. 

Rachael Carpani, who played Jodi Fountain, the youngest of McLeod’s daughters, sadly died last December after a long battle with chronic illness. Her co-stars mourned her passing, including Carter who wrote on Instagram: “Thank you Rachael Carpani for your tenacity, your strength, your compassion, your courage … You are not forgotten.”

Rachael Carpani, who played Jodi Fountain, died last year. Image: Nine, McLeod’s Daughters.

Meanwhile, Marshall Napier, who played Harry Ryan, died in 2022, aged 70 following a battle with brain cancer and Peter Hardy, who played Phil Rakich, died in 2023, aged 66 after drowning while snorkelling in Western Australia. 

The show is still an international hit.

McLeod’s Daughters wasn’t just a fan-favourite in Australia. It has sold to more than 100 countries and still airs internationally today, more than two decades later.

In fact, the show was so popular among international audiences that fans travelled to regional South Australia from across the world for a farewell of the show at Gawler Showground when the filming of the final episode wrapped in 2008.

“It was very humbling,” Matt Passmore, who played Greg Hope and later Marcus Turner in the show, told Newscorp at the time.

“People lined up for autographs for four or five hours and there were fans from Germany, The Netherlands and Texas who came out especially for this after reading about it on the internet.”

I am one of the people around the world who dips back into the world of McLeod’s Daughters occasionally and I am thrilled that we get to return to Drovers Run soon.

There are no details yet as to when the reboot will arrive, but I can guarantee as soon as it does I will be parked on my couch with a bag of chips ready for a screenful of nostalgia.

Feature image: Nine, McLeod’s Daughters.