True Detective season 3 won't air until 2019

Here’s another big HBO drama to add to your 2019 calendar: True Detective season 3.

HBO told EW the anthology crime drama won’t be back for its next round this year.

“We couldn’t have it ready for ’18 so you can assume ’19,” HBO programming president Casey Bloys told us as part of a wide-ranging Q&A covering several current and upcoming HBO shows (including the final season of Game of Thrones, which, as we all know now, also won’t air until 2019).

The next season of True Detective stars Mahershala Ali as an Arkansas State Investigator, Stephen Dorff as his partner, and Carmen Ejogo as his wife. The installment is set in the Ozarks with a story described by HBO as chronicling a “macabre crime… and a mystery that deepens over decades and plays out in three separate time periods.��� True Detective will go into production next month.

Bloys wouldn’t reveal anything specific about the new season — and declined to say how the scripts compare to seasons 1 and 2 — but would say this: “I think [the scripts are] fantastic. I’m excited. I think people are going to be very happy.”

Another HBO hit unlikely to return this year: Veep. Emmy-winning star Julia Louis-Dreyfus has recently undergone treatment for breast cancer and the show postponed the start of production on its seventh and final season. “They’ve got a big year planned,” Bloys said. “They pitched it out to us, it’s really funny. When Julia is ready to get back, we’ll be shooting — I’m not sure what date we settled on — but we’re waiting for her to feel well enough to get back to it.”

Next: HBO boss explains why Game of Thrones won’t return until 2019.