Spoilers below for anyone who hasn’t already watched the latest episode of Yellowstone, so be warned!
With its first three episodes back following that lengthy hiatus, Yellowstone not only killed off John Dutton, but did so in a way that was free from the involvement of former star Kevin Costner, who exited the western drama over scheduling issues and more. Rare is the TV show that successfully pulls off a permanent character exit without the star on board, and it remains to be seen whether Yellowstone will nail the landing.
For now, though, fans are pretty much witnessing Taylor Sheridan treating the Dutton family patriarch as a narrative punching bag, with each episode whittling away at John’s proud, stoic and seemingly eternal influence. I’m not griping about it, mind you, as I’m as interested to see what plays out between the siblings as I am shocked that this is how it’s all happening.
But I do think it’s worth addressing the two biggest ways these episodes have already tarnished John’s reputation from a viewer perspective, and in ways that I don’t believe will be reckoned with in meaningful ways before the series has concluded. (Similar to how I don’t think Yellowstone will be paying off on Sarah Atwood’s fake name plot thread.)
John Was Apparently Gaslighting Summer About House Arrest Just For Sex And Company
In “The Apocalypse of Change,” Kelly Reilly put on her best “Why fucking me?” face when Beth once again begrudgingly crossed paths with Piper Perabo’s Summer in the current timeline. Expectedly, Beth just wanted to be rid of her late father’s paramour, who argued that she was required to stick around due to being under house arrest.
At this point, Beth dropped a truth bomb that should absolutely lead to some kind of criminal charges or at least a successful lawsuit. As she put it:
Summer, you know there is no such thing as clemency with an asterisk, right? He told you house arrest so you would stay with him, and you were dimwitted enough to do it. Never bothered to speak to an attorney. Never bothered to look at your own release documents. The ones stamped ‘released.’
Sure, there’s some plot tomfoolery happening here to make sure Summer got an official sendoff and didn’t just end up a forgotten, dust-covered plot fragment. But regardless of whether or not this was the plan from the beginning, this reveal makes John more of a pervert kidnapper than a sympathetic gentleman. Not that everyone on-screen and off thought positively about John taking Summer in after he was initially unable to keep her out of prison, but I think most would agree that lying to her about being under house arrest is extremely creepy and more than a little monstrous.
Also, combating both decency and common sense is the idea that Beth was actually aware of the truth behind Summer’s predicament this entire time, but just allowed the lie to continue because…her dad was nicer when he was regularly getting some? If anything, Beth would have knocked on the door and interrupted John and Summer’s coitus with court paperwork on Night #1 if it meant getting the woman off the ranch for good.
If there’s any kind of class action lawsuit against the Dutton family and the Yellowstone, expect Summer’s signature to be all over it. But in lieu of that, we can just reflect on what other life-stalling lies John has been guilty of telling.
John Was Killed In His Sleep And Couldn't Fight For His Life
John Dutton is the kind of dude who, after getting shot up and hospitalized, tried to refuse nearly all further medical assistance and got right back up on a horse no matter how many stitches it might have ruined. And Kevin Costner reportedly requested (or demanded) a "moral death," for the character during the back-and-forth conversations before production started up anew. So many fans like myself no doubt expected John to die in a literal blaze of glory, probably with a bunch of cows and horses standing on their hid legs and clapping their front hooves together.
And so it's absolutely wild to me that the show chose to kill John off by having him accosted while he's sleeping, carried awkwardly into a bathroom, shot in the head without regaining consciousness, and then left next to the toilet. There's undignified, and then there's this.
Obviously without Kevin Costner around for filming, and no dialogue could be used in the moment, Taylor Sheridan's options for killing the character off were pretty limited. But couldn't John have been killed in a car "accident" that was set up by the people Sarah talked to, or a massive fire, explosion, etc.? Something that wouldn't have resulted in people dismissively questioning whether his leg bruises (suffered while being dragged out of bed) were the result of him falling randomly due to old age.
I think there are several other plot directions Taylor Sheridan could have gone to put John to rest that would have been slightly more dignified. Although I guess by pinning that turn of fate on Jamie whimsically voicing his wish for John's demise, any amount of dignity was already left at the door next to the pile of boots.
"Desire Is All You Need," the episode that kicked off this final chapter, brought in the show’s biggest audience yet, though it’s hard to tell whether or not John’s death will have a measurable impact on such stats when the finale airs. I could see longtime fans dropping out if there were still multiple seasons on the way, but when only a few episodes remain, might as well stay on the tracks until getting to the train…station.
On second thought, let’s just hop off these tracks until we’re out of town again. And don’t forget Yellowstone’s new eps air Sunday nights on Paramount Network at 8:00 p.m.
