Prime Video’s Fourth Wing has found its dragon riders. Esther McGregor will play Violet Sorrengail and Emilio Sakraya will play Xaden Riorson in the TV adaptation of Rebecca Yarros’ blockbuster romantasy novels, according to Variety, Deadline and The Hollywood Reporter, which all reported the casting on October 15. Here is everything confirmed so far about the Fourth Wing cast, who the two leads are, and when the show might actually arrive.
Who got cast in the Fourth Wing TV show?
The two leads, reported simultaneously by all three major Hollywood trades:
Esther McGregor as Violet Sorrengail, the 20-year-old forced by her mother, a military general, to leave her quiet plans behind and fight for a place among Basgiath War College’s dragon riders. McGregor broke out as Mirren in Prime Video’s We Were Liars, appeared in Disney+’s Obi-Wan Kenobi, and counts Babygirl and Pedro Almodovar’s The Room Next Door among her film credits. She is currently shooting Life Is Strange, also for Prime Video. And yes, she is Ewan McGregor’s daughter – the two starred together, alongside her sister Clara, in the 2023 film Bleeding Love.
Emilio Sakraya as Xaden Riorson, the brooding, shadow-wielding wingleader and Violet’s enemy-turned-love-interest. The German actor’s credits include Warrior Nun, Tribes of Europa, Rhinegold, Peacock’s Those About to Die, and the action film Sixty Minutes. He was most recently filming season 3 of Netflix’s One Piece, where he plays rebel leader Koza.
One detail fans will love: Sakraya was already a top choice in Fourth Wing fan casting lists long before this week’s news. For once, the fandom and the casting directors landed in the same place.
Is the casting officially confirmed?
Almost, with one asterisk. Variety, Deadline and The Hollywood Reporter each cited their own sources close to the production, which is as solid as entertainment reporting gets. But Amazon itself has not made an announcement – the studio declined to comment to all three outlets. Until Prime Video puts out its own press release or first-look photo, treat this as confirmed-by-the-trades rather than studio-official. There is no reason to doubt it; all three aligned within the same hour.
What we know about the series so far
The road to this casting has been three years long. Amazon MGM Studios snapped up the rights to Yarros’ Empyrean series in 2023, the same year Fourth Wing became a publishing phenomenon. The series was officially greenlit in May 2026, with Meredith Averill (Anne With an e, Locke and Key) as showrunner – she took over in September 2025 after original showrunner Moira Walley-Beckett exited. Lisa Joy (Westworld) is directing the series premiere.
The producing bench is stacked: Michael B. Jordan’s Outlier Society, Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy’s Kilter Films, and Premeditated Productions are all executive producing, and Yarros herself is an executive producer. The plan, if the show succeeds, is to adapt the rest of the novels over multiple seasons.
For the uninitiated: Fourth Wing drops Violet into Basgiath War College, where the only rule is “graduate or die.” Cadets compete to bond with dragons – and with fewer dragons willing to bond than cadets, most of her rivals would happily kill her to improve their odds. Xaden Riorson, the most powerful and ruthless wingleader in the Riders Quadrant, has extra reason to hate her: he is a descendant of the rebellion her mother helped crush.
The books, in order (and where the story stands)
Fourth Wing (May 2023)
Iron Flame (November 2023)
Onyx Storm (January 2025)
Threshing Day (September 2026) – a companion novella collecting 13 stories from the riders’ world
Books 4 and 5 – planned but untitled, with no release dates announced; Yarros is currently writing the fourth
What this means for fans
There is no release date yet. Casting the leads is the first major production milestone since the May greenlight, and the pilot still has to shoot. A realistic window is 2027 or later – nothing official has been said.
More casting is coming. Violet and Xaden are the two leads, but Basgiath is packed – expect news on fan favorites like Rhiannon, Ridoc, Liam and Tairn’s fellow dragons in the coming weeks and months.
Now is the time to start reading. If you want to finish the series before the show lands, the three main novels plus Threshing Day are the full current shelf, in the order above.
For Sakraya and McGregor fans: you do not have to wait. Sakraya appears in One Piece season 3 on Netflix, and McGregor leads Prime Video’s We Were Liars and the upcoming Life Is Strange.
