With Actor Kevin Costner’s exit from the award-winning neo-Western drama Yellowstone, the series has been abruptly cut short. No longer are we getting a Season 6; rather, Season 5 Part 2 will be the finale of the series. Speculation is running wild, as it always does when a major series is nearing its end. Here are some of our favorite theories on how this megahit drama will end.
John Dutton Goes to Prison
The end of Season 5 part 1 shows Jamie (Wes Bentley) about to release a variety of information on his father’s (Kevin Costner) crimes, to impeach him from his new position as Montana governor. But the thing is, the full list of John Dutton’s crimes is worthy of a lot more pain than impeachment. He’s committed multiple murders to retain his hold on the Dutton family ranch.
Could John go to prison instead of merely being impeached? We know Costner won’t be returning, we also know he might not be in the series finale at all, and we know he really didn’t want showrunner Taylor Sheridan to kill his character. With these considerations in mind, the most logical end for the Dutton family patriarch is spending a nice long time behind bars.
With the senior Dutton out of the way, infighting for the ranch (read: worse infighting than there already was) ensues among his three surviving children.
Beth and Jamie Kill Each Other… Sort Of
At the end of Season 5 Part 1, the feuding siblings Beth (Kelly Reilly) and Jamie Dutton have plans in motion to kill each other. We bet that both plots will at least be somewhat successful, with Beth’s more so.
Beth arranges the death of Jamie. It goes off with only one small hitch: Jamie’s wife, Christina (Katherine Cunningham) (who hasn’t been introduced to the rest of the family), also dies, caught in the (literal or metaphorical) crossfire. As for the assassins sent by Jamie to kill Beth, well, they’ll be a little less successful.
Rip Returns – and Sacrifices Himself for Beth
For most Yellowstone fans, Beth is the character everyone loves to hate. Cruel, vindictive, and petty, the only daughter of the Dutton clan seems to have a heart of ice. But this sociopathic, slimy, scheming snake has a soft spot for at least one person: her husband, the ranch hand Rip Wheeler (Cole Hauser).
Some fans are rooting for Beth to die, but we at Streaming Now think it might be a better punishment for her to lose the only person she cares about. Have Rip sacrifice his life for his beloved wife – perhaps complete with a cinematic shot of Beth standing over Rip’s body, realizing that her scheming and wickedness have cost her the man she loves.
That leaves one sibling left, Kayce (Luke Grimes) – a former Navy SEAL, member of the Broken Rock tribe by marriage, and apparently the only person in the Dutton clan above the age of five who’s actually somewhat of a good person. That also leaves one villain left: the developer Market Equities, who we’ve seen is not above murder to get their hands on the ranch.
Kayce’s Killed by Market Equities’s Hitmen
And presumably goes out in a blaze of glory, given his past as a Navy SEAL.
With Kayce dead, his widow Monica (Kelsey Asbille) inherits the ranch, thus fulfilling the promise that James Dutton made when he founded the ranch: that the land would return to Native hands after the seventh generation. Monica and the rest of the tribe challenge Market Equities in court and win, and the land is set to be inherited by Monica and Kayce’s son Tate (Brecken Merrill) – who, as both a seventh-generation Dutton and a Native American, ties the two claims together, ensuring lasting peace.
But Wait, What Happens to Beth?
When we left off in our hoped-for ending plan, she’d just seen Rip die saving her. But there’s one other plot thread that remains unaddressed. Unbeknownst to the rest of the family, Jamie and Christina had a son, John Dutton IV. But the seventh-generation prophecy can’t come into play here, as his father Jamie isn’t a biological Dutton – he was adopted. So what’s going to happen to the kid?
Well, remember that the whole reason Beth hated Jamie so much and spent years trying to ruin his life was that he forced her sterilization? With Jamie, Christina, and Kayce all dead, and John Dutton III imprisoned, Beth would be the boy’s only remaining relative. She’d have to contend with a great irony – that the man who rendered her sterile, the man she despised all her life, just gave her a son to raise as her own.
Beth takes her little nephew and leaves for Texas, maybe to run 6666 Ranch in Rip’s stead. Will she redeem herself, or will she raise Jamie’s son to be just as evil as she was? This could be the sequel.
While you’re waiting for the final episodes to air, catch up on Yellowstone on Peacock or Paramount+.
