HBO revives Girls for five-episode limited run with Lena Dunham returning

The announcement

HBO has ordered a revival of Girls, the comedy that ran on the network from 2012 to 2017, as a limited run of five episodes. The news came on Tuesday, 13 October 2026, in a video in which the returning cast confirmed they would reprise their roles. Lena Dunham, who created the series and plays Hannah Horvath, framed the comeback as a story-driven decision rather than a nostalgia project.

We always said we would only return to Girls if there was a specific story we were burning to tell

Dunham said she had missed the characters but could not picture them in the present day until she turned forty, when they started talking to her in the shower. Production is set to begin in summer 2027, and HBO has not said when the episodes will air or stream.

Cast and creative team

Dunham returns as Hannah Horvath, joined by Allison Williams as Marnie Michaels, Jemima Kirke as Jessa, Zosia Mamet as Shoshanna and Andrew Rannells as Elijah. Judd Apatow returns as executive producer. Dunham's company, Good Thing Going, also counts Ilene S. Landress and Michael P. Cohen among its executive producers. Williams, Kirke, Mamet and Rannells serve as co-executive producers. Amy Gravitt, HBO's head of comedy programming, said the network was pleased to see the characters at a new stage of life.

To say the world has changed since we last saw Hannah, Marnie, Shoshanna, Jessa, and Elijah is a massive understatement

Gravitt added that fans, both longtime and new, would be glad to see how the characters had grown.

Who is missing from the lineup

Adam Driver, who played Hannah's on-and-off boyfriend, is not named in the announced cast, and it is unclear whether he will return. In her memoir Famesick, published in 2026, Dunham described Driver throwing a chair at a wall in anger during a rehearsal. A representative for Driver did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Jenni Konner, Dunham's co-showrunner from 2012 to 2017, is also absent from the revival. The two announced in 2018 that they would stop working together as producing partners.

Background on the original series

Girls ran on HBO from 2012 to 2017 and followed a group of friends through the messy post-college lives of their twenties in New York City. Dunham co-wrote the first season when she was 23. Over its run the show received 19 Emmy nominations and two wins, including for best casting, and it also won two Golden Globes and a BAFTA. In the 2020s the series drew renewed attention from Gen Z audiences. Since the finale, Dunham has worked on projects including the Netflix series Too Much and the indie film Sharp Stick, and she has published two memoirs.

What has not been announced

HBO has not announced a title, a plot or any casting beyond the core group. The network has not said when the five episodes will air or stream. The revival arrives a decade after the series finale aired. Story details remain under wraps for now.