'Outlander' season 3 spoilers, news: next season airs April 2017 with flashbacks after Battle of Culloden

Sam Heughan on the set for Outlander season 3Starz

Starz's highly successful "Outlander" series is gearing up for its third season set for airing next year, and it is expected that Sam Heughan's character Jamie Fraser will be older after a twenty-year time jump.

According to Heughan, this means that he will survive the Battle of Culloden, which will also be tackled in the third season of the show.

Fans need not worry that they missed the last 20 years in Jamie and Claire's (Caitriona Balfe) story as the season is expected to fill in the blanks about what happened during the time of their separation through many flashbacks. This is expected to give the fans the lowdown about what happened after the battle. In an interview with HofMag, Heughan said that the events of the upcoming season will be "very strong, very exciting."

In a separate interview, Executive Producer Ronald D. Moore said that show will be headed all the way towards the Caribbean.

"Our home base will always be Scotland. We're looking at various options for where to shoot the ships and where to find tropical beaches and jungles to play the Caribbean section of the story. Hopefully, we'll find a place that has both things at once so we'll only have to make one big trip for the company," he explained.

He added that the highlight of the season will most definitely be the reunion of Jamie and Clare after they face different challenges apart. Of course, the separation and the years will take its toll on them after Jamie suffers through loneliness after the battle and it will be interesting to see whether they could overcome these new changes and make their reunion a happy one.

This early, it has already been announced that John Bell has been cast to play the young Ian Murray. Wil Johnson will be playing Joe Abernathy.

"Outlander" season 3 is expected to return to Starz on April 1, 2017.