As NBC rolls out season four of Friday Night Lights, we have major, exciting casting news on what will likely be the final season of this incredible drama.

Despite their characters having exited Dillon for various reasons over the last year or two, the following actors will make appearances on season five of the show, which is currently filming in Austin:

• Scott Porter will reprise the role of Jason Street on episode seven.
• Adrianne Palicki will return as Tyra for the final two installments.
• As Riggins, Taylor Kitsch will make the ladies swoon for four episodes.
• Zach Gilford (pictured), who is receiving Emmy buzz for his performance on "The Son," will appear for a multi-episode arc as everyone's favorite former quarterback.

Michael Ausiello of Entertainment Weekly talked with Gilford this week about his Emmy attention, FNL return and more. Excerpts from the interview are below:

On Emmy consideration: It’s nice to draw this kind of attention to the show. We’ve got a lot of street cred, but we’ve never really gotten the industry recognition. It’s nice that people are so excited and determined to get us [some Emmy love].

On shooting The Son: In my opinion, it’s the best script we’ve ever had... We have a lot of freedom to improv on our show and stray from the dialogue. We’re given the story and then we come up with the words. But with this one, we stuck pretty close to the script. It helped a lot to not have to be worrying about, 'How can I adjust the dialogue to make it seem more real or less cheesy.'

Why will Matt return to the show? I think it’s his relationship with Julie. They don’t tell us anything. I just found out last week that I was coming back for sure.

Will season five be the final season? To my knowledge, it’s pretty much done and they’re writing an ending to the show. I know a lot of people were not satisfied with the Lost finale - I personally loved it - but I think it’s nice when they can write towards a [series finale]. If you have a finite amount of episodes then you can come up with a satisfying ending.

Matt Richenthal is the Editor in Chief of TV Fanatic. Follow him on Twitter and on Google+.