That’s a wrap.
It’s the end of an era for the Dutton family as the Yellowstone Series Finale aired last night, capping off 5 seasons of one of the most popular shows in recent memory. Originally premiering in 2018, the show continued to gain viewers with every season, really exploding in 2020 with the premiere of Season 3. The Season 5 premiere brought in a whopping 12 million viewers.
Of course, the show’s final season did not come without controversy as a widely publicized dispute between writer/creator Taylor Sheridan and lead actor Kevin Costner (John Dutton) ultimately led to Costner leaving the show and not returning for the second half of Season 5. Although, Taylor Sheridan and Kevin Costner never publicly criticized each other, it was pretty well known that Taylor was taking his time with the scripts and unwilling to share them with Costner who was busy trying to work on his own movie series, Horizon, and didn’t want to commit to more Yellowstone without knowing where the story was going.
And to be fair to Costner, it’s hard for me to disagree with his position. I’m not privy to their private conversations or all the details behind closed doors, but if he was contracted to do 5 seasons (which he maintains) and during a certain filming schedule, and Paramount decided to throw in a Season 5 Part 2 curveball and argue that “it’s the same season,” even though it came 2 years later… one could make the argument they were trying to short-change Costner. And when Costner wanted to see the script to decide if it was worth continuing to shuffle around his schedule or delay Horizon even more, Sheridan said no… and the stalemate resulted in Costner leaving the show and Taylor deciding to wrap it up in a few more episodes.
As far as the actual finale goes… it seems like it garnered some pretty mixed reviews.
Some fans thought it was beautiful and poetic, and others thought it was lazy and predictable. I tend to think it’s a little bit of both. Sure, the land going to Rainwater and the Broken Rock Reservation was SO incredibly predictable, even before 1883 essentially confirmed it with the whole “7 Generations” thing. As soon as Taylor revealed that he knew the ending, way back in 2020, fans knew immediately what was going to happen. Personally, I was kind of hoping for the Jamie redemption arc… I know Beth hated him and he was the adopted black sheep of the family in many ways, but I never quite felt like he deserved it.
But for me, the best part of the finale was Kayce finally being free of the ranch that has haunted him for the better part of the entire series. A simple man who just wants to raise some cattle with his family, he’s always been torn between the ranch and Monica, so there was a bit of poetry that moment when the weight of the world is taken off his shoulders and returned to the Native Americans, his wife’s people. Which is interesting because the Native Americans claim the Duttons stole the land throughout the series, and there’s this animosity because of it, but they were actually given it… to borrow, and then return. Which they did… but nobody except the viewers know that. There’s a beauty in that, and perhaps a lesson about our own history. We don’t always know every detail about the past… there’s probably a lot more that we don’t understand.
But by the end, I think Kayce emerged as the best character, even though he felt like a ghost at times during the series… always taking a backseat to other characters.
Nevertheless, I don’t think Yellowstone will go down as one of the greatest shows ever… not a chance really. It was entertaining, and you wish Costner could’ve finished the job, but just not enough there for me to really put it in my Top 5… not my Top 10 either.
However for some fans, they’re calling it one of the worst final seasons of all time. Worse than Game Of Thrones… ouch.
This entire half season of Yellowstone was completely worthless. Game of Thrones levels of terrible endings.
— Craig Koshkin (@C_Kosh) December 16, 2024
The last season of Yellowstone was awful and damaged the series’ legacy in a way we haven’t seen since the disaster that was the last season of Game of Thrones. Too bad Sheridan and Costner couldn’t make it work.
— Scott Shuster (@Scottshuster11) December 16, 2024
@Yellowstone season 5 = Game of Thrones season 8
— Wes Champion (@pike1302) December 16, 2024
Yellowstone and Game of Thrones have taught me to not get emotionally attached to television shows
— A.Hud (@ahud2112) December 16, 2024
#YellowstoneTV I’m trying to decide which was worse, the final of Game of Thrones, or this final for Yellowstone.🤔
— Scott Whalen (@jswhalen1) December 16, 2024
Worse ending Yellowstone or Game of Thrones. I know which one disappointed me more
— uncle boo (@UncleBoo20) December 16, 2024
At least the Game of Thrones finale had some things I liked which is more then I can say for the shit show that was Yellowstone. Talk about crap made into crappie
— trevorstamp (@TrevorSoi) December 16, 2024
Yellowstone ending with a flat ass ozempic Lainey Wilson is the equivalent to the Game of Thrones ending…
— Grant Means (@gweezy72) December 16, 2024
It is official. Game of Thrones is no longer the worst final season of any tv show ever. Yellowstone has taken that award. What a disaster of a final season. #Yellowstone #YellowstoneTV
— Justin Raley (@JustinRaley_15) December 16, 2024
Ladies and gentlemen let’s congratulate yellowstone. It’s finale half season was so bad, with a finale so awful, that it will FINALLY make people go “ya know, s8 of game of thrones wasn’t that bad”
— Moth (@MothTraKaa) December 16, 2024
Yall ruined this end. Rainwater could have had all the land except what they needed to run cattle like they do at the new place with Beth and rip instead you tear down John’s house? How dare you!?! Awful crap game of thrones level awful ending
— J85 (@JoshuaN00980143) December 16, 2024
What do you think? Fair or foul? Was it on par with the terrible final season of Game Of Thrones?
Good or bad, the story continues… stay tuned:
the perfect ending to the perfect finale, thank you to the cast and crew for giving us this beautiful episode. happy is where we end up 🤎 pic.twitter.com/RZV8y9zph6
— e (@silenceevery) December 16, 2024
