Spoilers below for anyone who hasn't yet watched both episodes of Yellowstone's Season 4 premiere.
Thankfully, Yellowstone didn't keep fans waiting for very long before the long-awaited Season 4 premiere revealed how each of the main characters fared after the attacks that went down in the Season 3 finale. The only Dutton family member — perhaps the only character with any connection to the Duttons — who came away unscathed was Wes Bentley's legal eagle Jamie. In case anyone in the audience thought that seemed a bit too coincidental, you definitely weren’t alone, and fans found in Episode 401 that Kelly Reilly’s vengeance-fueled Beth was so assured of Jamie’s guilt that she put a countdown clock on his life.
Now, Jamie is 100% used to this kind of shit by now, and I’m sure he spends a good part of each day instinctively ready for Beth to suddenly appear with non-stop accusations. One might assume that kind of verbal and physical abuse (by mousetrap) has to take its toll, though, so when CinemaBlend spoke with Wes Bentley going into Yellowstone’s Season 4 premiere, I asked how he felt about Jamie getting presumably unwarranted blame from both Beth and a fair amount of viewers. As you can see in the video above, here’s how he answered:
That's such a well-put way of saying that question, that's great. Yeah, I mean, he's got the potential, right? I mean, he is hurt. He is rejected entirely now. I mean, even before, he thought he had bloodline, even though they rejected him, but now he's not even bloodline. So now he's out, and I think he knows what that means when you're out. And he's powerful. Maybe he sees it as protection. I don't know. It's like, he knows who the Duttons are, and now he knows he's not a Dutton and he knows what that means. So what are you going to do? And that's where Jamie's at: what are you going to do, man? He's looking for family, and love. He's turning to Garrett, who's not a great influence. He's not thinking clearly. But he just wants what he wants, which is acceptance.
Essentially, Wes Bentley is laying out the character beats orchestrated for Jamie during the first two episodes of Yellowstone Season 4. He was already a family outcast after his adoption and history with Beth were revealed in Season 3, and Jamie’s two big early scenes involved Beth vowing to murder him, and him expanding his resources outside of the Dutton ranch’s reach. Albeit partially guided by his not-quite-trustworthy-yet biological father Garrett, as played by the hard-not-to-instantly-trust actor Will Patton.
Even though viewers watched Kayce and John talk about how Jamie likely wasn’t involved in working with the militia to plan the attack, Jamie isn’t necessarily aware that others in the family feel differently from Beth. I’m sure he isn’t expecting Kayce to spray him with bug poison or anything, but if he thinks the rest of the family harbors such suspicions, that would just make him lean harder into the one person around who lends a listening ear. And that could lead to instant trouble.
While I’m not quite convinced that adult Jamie is truly capable of committing purely malicious acts against the family he grew up with, he now knows exactly what it looks like when someone brings the mayhem to the Y and its branded ranch family. And so he can, if he would so choose, learn from the mistakes that were made, so that they might not be a worry if Jamie ever does decide to go on the offensive against Beth and the others. I’m not saying that’s the best way for Jamie to find acceptance, but I guess it depends on who’s doing the accepting at that point. On that note, I can’t wait to see him sharing a metaphor-laden dialogue with Jacki Weaver’s smooth-talking Caroline Warner, who would certainly have an instant Yes Man in Garrett.
Having given fans two episodes’ worth of big moments to chew on until the next one rolls around, Yellowstone airs Sunday nights on Paramount Network at 8:00 p.m. ET. Stay tuned after Episode 403 for a linear simulcast of Tyler Sheridan and Hugh Dillon’s new drama Mayor of Kingstown, which will drop new episodes weekly on Paramount+.
