Walker

This is all my personal opinion based on the content we've received so far. I'm operating off of The season 3 trailer, the episode descriptions for episodes 1-3 (here, here, and here), and the promo stills for episodes 1 and 2 along with some of the review content we've been given.

Looking at the promo pictures and the episode descriptions, we know that the show will be picking up right where it left off: just after Cordell was kidnapped. We also know that he will be held in captivity for the first two episodes and return home for episode 3. I'm a little concerned about the timing since they'll have to cover not only Cordell's captivity but also work in military flashbacks AND introduce us to a new character (Cordell's fellow captive), but we'll just have to wait and see how they pull that off. We also have to consider how Liam going missing in episode 2 will factor into all this (ie will he be captured by the same people or is it unrelated?). The good news is that episode 3 is going to give us Cordell dealing with his trauma rather than the show trying to sweep it under the rug.

I do think that there will be a time skip sometime in the first two episodes. Clips of the ranger investigation in the season trailer show Cassie getting more and more agitated and we also have Abby warning James not to come to her house without her son. How long that time skip will be is unclear but I'd like to think it would be at least a few weeks.

I am curious to see what Stella and August are going to be up to. The episode 1 and 2 descriptions both tell us that the kids will be carrying out their own investigation to try and help their father. It would be interesting if they ended up being successful, but I do want Cordell to break himself out of this mess. He's a perfectly capable ranger (and an alleged war hero to boot); it would be very strange for a couple of teenagers to be better at his job than he is (though not terribly off brand for the show).

I think one of the big Themes for this season is going to be how dangerous Cordell's work is and how much his family worries about him. I think there's going to be at least one episode that has someone (most likely Stella) trying to convince him to quit and go into a safer profession. Obviously he won't, but I'd like to see the internal struggle he goes through in this case, especially considering his new trauma.

We also know that Denise, Dan, and Colton will be returning at some point this season as showrunner Anna Fricke said their stories aren't quite done yet. There's more to see from Colton and Stella's relationship, Denise is still currently the DA, and there is still the matter of who owns the Davidson property. I hope it's the Walkers but that's not my call to make.

Odette Annable will be taking a break this season to give birth to her child (Congratulations to the Annables!) so there will be a block of time without Geri. There was a featured extra casting call put out to play the daughter of Becca Ferguson. In case you forgot, Ferguson was first mentioned in 1.17 as one of Cordell's high school girlfriends (and not as a fond memory either). I think this is likely a love interest plotline to fill in the time that Geri will be absent (and possible cause some extra drama).

I think it goes without saying that we'll be seeing more of Ben and Liam's relationship this season. Whether they will last is still up in the air but so far, I'd say their chances are pretty good.

And, of course, there is still the question: Will Trey take up James' offer and become a Texas ranger? As much as I would personally like the answer to be "No", it looks very much like he will. Anna Fricke has mentioned how they would fit Trey into the Ranger crew and the idea of him being partnered with James came up. I did prefer the idea of him being a therapist but I am curious to see how he and James would be as partners. They do have good chemistry together as friends but that doesn't necessarily equate to good coworkers. It would also be nice for James to have someone on his team to question him and his double standards.

It's difficult to predict how this season will pan out before we get to the show itself but I'm very excited to see where these breadcrumbs will lead us.