Ramy Season 2 Release Date, Cast And Plot

When Hulu's dramedy Ramy debuted last April, critics and audiences alike praised the series for its non-stereotypical depictions of the American Muslim community, as well as its humorous and endearing take on the millennial experience. 

The series follows its title character Ramy Hassan (Ramy Youssef), a first-generation Muslim-American on a spiritual journey to understanding himself and his place in his politically divided New Jersey neighborhood. Each episode tackles issues both personal and cultural, and attempts to capture the challenges involved with being in a religious Egyptian community which believes life to be a test of one's morality, and among a generation of Americans whose approach to life is not quite so serious.

From decisions around observing religious practices or holidays to growing up Muslim in a post-9/11 world to modern dating, holding down a job, and experimenting with drugs, Ramy explores a strand of the American experience rarely seen on the small screen. Following a mountain of praise and calls for more, Hulu renewed the semi-autobiographical comedy not long after the first ten-episode season dropped. 

Since then, the series — created by Youssef, Ari Katcher, and Ryan Welch, and produced by A24, the studio behind hits Midsommar and Uncut Gems — has gone on to win an SXSW Audience Award and a 2020 Golden Globe for best performance by an actor in a TV comedy series. The series' early success with audiences and critics further proves that the streamer has something special on its hands. 

If you loved the first season and are curious about what to expect for the second, or saw Youssef's surprise win and are now interested in joining Ramy on his spiritual journey, here is everything you need to know about Ramy season 2. 

It used to be that shows always had to wait months and sometimes even entire TV seasons to find out whether or not they'd been renewed. But with the advent of streaming and the full-season drop, the timeline for when we get new episodes hasn't just sped up — so has the news of renewals and cancellations. Ramy is a perfect example of this new TV ecosystem. Hulu officially debuted the first season, which consisted of 10 episodes around a half-hour in length, on April 19, 2019; on May 1, less than two weeks after its release, the streamer announced that it had renewed the series for a second ten-episode season (via Variety).

It was presumed that due to the relative ease of producing a half-hour comedy, it shouldn't take more than a year to complete and release the second season, and our best guess was that the series would return in spring 2020, probably sometime between March and May. That guess turned out to be pretty accurate. On January 17, 2020 — just over a week after Youssef's win at the Golden Globes — Variety reported that Ramy's second season would premiere on May 29, 2020. Hulu will release the entirety of Ramy season 2 on that date, rather than dropping single episodes weekly, as several recent streaming series have.

In an interview with Variety, Youssef revealed that when developing the golden-globe winning first season, he approached its ten-episode arc as if it was going to be the only one. That involved filling it with as much as he could say about our present issues as possible. In terms of story lines, that meant covering "Trump, or how unstable things are globally [such as with] global warming, the financial crunch, the job market and other massive anxieties that sit on the mind of humanity right now," Youssef said. 

Ramy season 1 had a lot going on — from extramarital affairs to the lives of Lyft drivers — but it wrapped with its titular character traveling to Egypt on a journey to connect with his Egyptian Muslim roots. To find the person he truly wants to be, Ramy ventured to a small village where his grandfather lived in more simple and less frenetic surroundings than New Jersey. During the trip, he connected with various family members along with his grandfather, whom Ramy soon after found dead on his living room floor. While at the funeral, he met a cousin who took him on the spiritual journey he'd been seeking throughout the entire first season. 

Because the series was initially penned as a self-contained project, its narrative path forward isn't entirely clear. But the fact that it's topical — and that there's still so much that TV hasn't explored about the identities and faith of Muslim-Americans — the show is far from being without direction. As the first season also played with perspective, telling the story from the view of characters close to Ramy, we may continue to see timely and universal issues through their eyes, as well.

In a series starring, written, co-created, and executive produced by Youssef, it only makes sense that he and his central character will be back for the series' second go. But because of where season one ended and how it was written, the second season's supporting cast is somewhat up in the air. Still, one can make a few qualified guesses as to who audiences will see once the series returns in May. The stars who make up Ramy's inner circle of friends, family, and love interests, including Amr Waked, Mohammed Amer, Hiam Abbass, Dave Merheje, May Calamawy, Rosaline Elbay, Steve Way, and Shadi Alfons, are pretty good guesses in terms of returning cast.

Also, Deadline has reported that 24: Legacy actor Laith Nakli, who plays Ramy's misogynistic, diamond-dealing Uncle Naseem, wouldn't just be returning for the second season, but had been made a series regular. While there are still limited plot details about the second season, this means that Naseem will play a more prominent role — and perhaps be a larger source of conflict for his nephew — in the upcoming batch of episodes. 

The biggest casting news leading up to the second season, however, came when Oscar-winner and Blade star Mahershala Ali was announced as part of the season 2 cast. In a special guest star role, Ali will join the ensemble of the series (of which he's a "huge fan"), according to Variety. There are currently no details about Ali's character — but it'll be exciting to see the new ideas about identity, culture, and spirituality that he, Youssef, and the rest of the cast bring to Ramy's upcoming season.