For those holding out hope that the long rumored Yellowstone spinoff – 6666 – would still come to fruition, Taylor Sheridan delivered some not-so-great news on that front in a recent interview.
Ever since the flagship series took the world by storm, the Yellowstone universe has slowly expanded (both into the past and into the future). One spinoff that has been talked about ever since the western series started branching off was 6666, which was first teased in February of 2021. An official report in 2022 revealed that the spinoff series would be joining the Paramount Network and Paramount+, and that the show would focus on Jimmy (Jefferson White) and Walker (Ryan Bingham).
There was even an official synopsis for 6666 that was released a couple of years back:
“Founded when Comanches still ruled West Texas, no ranch in America is more steeped in the history of the West than the 6666.
Still operating as it did two centuries before, and encompassing an entire county, the 6666 has inspired a new scripted series where the rule of law and the laws of nature merge in a place where the most dangerous thing one does is the next thing.
The 6666 is synonymous with the merciless endeavor to raise the finest horses and livestock in the world, and ultimately where world-class cowboys are born and made.”
Sounds like a great show that would easily peak the interest of Yellowstone fans.
But we can go ahead and start talking about it in the past tense, because Sheridan recently confirmed that 6666 will never happen on Dale Brisby’s Rodeo Time podcast. When the prolific writer, director and creator was asked to provide an update on what was supposed to be a Jimmy White-focused spinoff, he confidently said that 6666 will never happen:
“There’s never going to be one. I would never fictionalize that ranch… People thought that that was going to be a thing, but I would never do that. Because at some point, what you have to do to sustain it — I’ve actually got on my computer all the scenes of Jimmy at the Four Sixes pulled out and strung together, and it makes its own perfect little movie.
Where you watch him go there as this misfit, and leave as a man and a respected cowboy, and for the people who were in the cowboy world, that’s Heath Ellerby that walks in there. That’s not an actor, that’s the general manager of the Wagon Ranch, and so, for the people who know, that rings really true to them. ‘That’s Heath! That is the guy!'”
It appears that the main reason why Sheridan chose not to move forward with 6666 was simply didn’t want to tarnish the real-life, still-active ranch.
He went on to say that it would have been strange for him to “make up lives” and “invent drama” that fit the 6666 ranch, when in reality, that could turn out to be offensive or intrusive to those that actually work there:
“So, those little things, if I was going to try and make some kind of show about the Four Sixes, now I’m making up lives, now I have to invent a drama, we can’t just watch some kid learn how to rope every single episode. So now, I’m trivializing and fictionalizing something where real people work, and they raise their families there, and I could never do that to them.
I could never do that to the cowboys that dedicated themselves, and everybody that works on that ranch. I’m very protective of the Sixes, and it’s a big responsibility to be the person who has to protect that ranch, so I have to be very, very careful with it.”
If you ask me, it’s a real shame that 6666 is never going to happen. It would have been really cool to see more from Jefferson White and Ryan Bingham in their respective roles. But I do understand where Taylor Sheridan is coming from with his argument, and the obligation he feels to show the real life ranch a lot of respect.
You can hear the Yellowstone creator talk more about the decision to official axe the 6666 spinoff (if it were ever actually planned) in the interview below:
