A Potential The 100 Prequel Series to Air as a Backdoor Pilot This Season

If you've been super bummed ever since the news dropped thatThe 100 Season 7 would be the show's last, we've got some good news for you: the potential prequel series just got one step closer to happening.

TV Guide has learned that an upcoming episode of The 100 will serve as a backdoor pilot for the possible spin-off, which will be set 97 years before the events of The 100 pilot and right when the nuclear apocalypse wipes out most of the human population on Earth; The 100 fans will recognize this event as the original Praimfaya. While the human survivors on the space stations above come together to live in peace and harmony (at least for a while), the survivors on the ground don't have it as easy. The potential new series will follow people on the ground, aka those who will one day be known as the Grounders, struggling to survive in this dystopian new world while also fighting to create a new society with what's left of humanity.

The 100 showrunner Jason Rothenberg mentioned this potential spin-off at WonderCon earlier this year, after Richard Harmon suggested that a good spin-off would start with the first bomb that launched the nuclear apocalypse. "We may be working on something. Can't talk about it," Rothenberg teased. "I'll probably get in trouble for saying that."

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So far, there are no details about when this backdoor pilot will air during the course of The 100's final season.

The 100 will return for its final season in 2020 on The CW.

(Disclosure: TV Guide is owned by CBS Interactive, a division of CBS Corporation.)