The Handmaid's Tale season 3 is happening at Hulu. The streaming service has officially renewed the critically-acclaimed series for another season, following the success of the premiere episodes of the show's sophomore run. Hulu made the reveal during an annual upfront presentation to Madison Avenue ad buyers. It's no surprise that they would want to drop this news for people buying ads, as the series has been a massive hit for the streaming service and confirming that the show will be back for at least one more season doesn't hurt anything.

Hulu recently debuted the first two episodes of The Handmaid's Tale season 2, so they were quite quick to pull the trigger on season 3, but that shouldn't come as much of a surprise. The series was the first made by a streaming to win the Emmy for Outstanding Drama Series. In total, the show has won 30 major awards and was nominated for 13 Emmys. That makes it easily Hulu's most high-profile drama series to date and has helped them compete with the likes of Netflix and Amazon.

The Handmaid's Tale follows Offred, played by Elisabeth Moss. The show takes place in a dystopian near future that comes around as the result of the Second American Civil War. In this new society, certain women called Handmaids are forced into sexual and child-bearing servitude. Fertility rates have plummeted, thanks to sexually transmitted diseases and pollution, which has led to this system of servitude. The series comes from Bruce Miller and is based on Margaret Atwood's 1985 novel of the same name. Moss, for her part, won a Golden Globe for Best Actress.

Hulu says that ratings for The Handmaid's Tale season 2 have doubled, as compared to the first season. Netflix and Amazon historically don't release ratings for their original content, but Hulu was happy to brag about the success of their marquee drama. Hulu is doing their best to assert themselves as a major player in terms of original content. In addition to the season 3 renewal for this series, they're also getting ready to unleash Castle Rock this summer, which takes place in the Stephen King universe and is produced by J.J. Abrams. They also recently announced a new Blumhouse horror anthology series, Into the Dark, which will consist of 12 feature-length, standalone episodes. That series is set to debut this October.

There's no word yet on when Season 3 will debut, but April 2019 seems like a safe bet. Both season 1 and season 2 of the series debuted in April, so that seems like a safe bet. Then again, they could pull a Westworld on us and make us wait a year and a half or more for new episodes once season 2 wraps up. With hit shows like this, networks these days would rather get it right as opposed to rush it. Whatever the case, The Handmaid's Tale season 3 is happening. This news comes to us courtesy of The Hollywood Reporter.