In season 4 of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series, the Wildcats return to school after spending season 3 at a summer camp. Just days after the season finale aired, showrunner Tim Federle is already on location and working diligently on the upcoming season.
He tells EW, “I’m looking at a production plan for season 4 while standing in my office in Salt Lake City. “Although we had a fantastic season in Los Angeles, here is the place where we got our start, so it truly feels like we have returned home. Back to school has begun, whether you are prepared or not. We seem to be only getting settled after the conclusion, yet autumn preparations are already underway.”
Not all Wildcats are returning to school. You shouldn’t anticipate seeing Nini (Olivia Rodrigo) at the beginning of the following season because she made the decision to leave East High in the season 3 finale and focus on her music career. In the paragraphs below, Federle discusses Rodrigo’s potential role in the series as well as the High School Musical 4: The Reunion arc, which might bring back a number of original High School Musical cast members.
Tim Federle: Without a doubt. The feeling of still trying to figure out who you want to be and what you want to do with your life as an adult permeates most of adulthood. Returning to school is incredibly humbling since this season’s key events for these people — including first love, figuring out your future, and parental expectations — are so significant that I’m thrilled to be back.
What was your primary objective in terms of bringing this season to a close in the finale?
My main objective was to end things with anarchy and optimism rather than pessimism and unsolved questions, which I believe was the case with our last season finale. [Laughs] Gina and Ricky have had a pretty gradual rise to fame. In the upcoming season, they must now make enormous decisions and discoveries. For characters like Nini, who I hope isn’t gone forever but is definitely gone for the moment, my goal for the show was to try to provide a lot of satisfactory conclusions. With Big Red and Ashlyn, Seb and Carlos now have a lot to cope with, Kourtney, and where are Jet and Maddox going to wind up, we also got a preview of some surprises and greater stories to come. There are many hints about season 4, but we wanted it most of all to feel like a return to the original High School Musical. We’ll continue a lot of it into the following season.
