In 2013, Orange Is the New Black debuted on Netflix as one of the streaming platform's very first originals. The show's seventh and final season will drop on Netflix on 26th July, and with it, the concluding chapter in the lives of the former residents of the Litch. At least, the last one we get to be privy to.
Last season, Orange Is the New Black moved away from Litchfield minimum security prison following a riot that caused many of the key players — including Piper Chapman (Taylor Schilling) — to find themselves thrown into the maximum security facility (aka Max) down the hill. The penultimate season also introduced us to newcomers such as twisted sisters Carol (Henny Russell) and Barbara (Mackenzie Phillips); drug runner Daddy (Vicci Martinez); and Carol's highest ranking soldier with the most infuriating name, Badison (Amanda Fuller).
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At the end of the season, however, the biggest change to the Orange Is the New Black world happened: Piper, the preppy Connecticut woman who was the show's original gateway into the prison system, was finally released. Will she find happiness outside the walls of Max, or will life on the outside come with its own struggles?
According to the new trailer for season 7, it's definitely the latter. Piper may have shed her navy blue jumpsuit for colourful designer threads, but she looks positively miserable — perhaps because she's separated from her prison wife, Alex (Laura Prepon)? Or maybe it's because she now lives in a world where most people she meets have no idea what life behind bars is really like and they don't even trust her to hold a bow and arrow.
Meanwhile, the trailer teases that everyone in prison is going through their own existential crisis as they "chase drugs or dreams and grapple with the reality of their place in this world," according to Netflix's official synopsis of the upcoming finale season. Expect fan-favourite Taystee Jefferson (Danielle Brooks) to have the toughest road of everyone this season after last year's gutting murder trial ruling. The trailer gives viewers their first real look at Taystee's return to prison life after her wrongful conviction — and it's even more emotional than you think.
Yet, as usual, there are still moments of comedy to be found — and, for Suzanne (Uzo Aduba), one magical chicken. And maybe dessert?
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"What is it you really want?" Pennsatucky (Taryn Manning) asks Suzanne in the cafeteria in the new trailer.
"Ice cream," replies Suzanne, before adding after a beat: "And justice."
Orange Is The New Black returns to Netflix on 26th July
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