Hey, everyone, it's Jefferson White here. And if you're hearing my voice, you know you're listening to the one, the only, the official Yellowstone Podcast. And of course, what would this show be without my amazing co host Jen Landon.
Jeff, you seem really excited today.
Yeah, I'm jazzed up.
The nineteen twenty three season finale was insane.
I'm stoked. I'm still buzzing.
I know it was major. I felt like I felt like it was every big event in history in one episode.
It's really wild. This show has traveled, a lot has happened. There's a lot to talk about.
We're gonna dig real deep into it, and so just know that if you haven't seen all of nineteen twenty three, you are entering into spoiler territory.
You've been warned. And because we're doing a deep dive.
We're bringing in a heavy hitter, some professional help to straighten us out and keep us on track. We have once again, we are very very lucky to have our dear friend, Lynette Ris from Deadline dot Com joining us today.
I am so looking forward to this episode. But first we need to step aside really quick and take a break. We will be right back.
Incredible episode in nineteen twenty three.
This week a lot to unpack, a lot to explore, a lot to talk about, and in order to talk about it from an informed, thoughtful, conscientious journalistic perspective, we brought in our ringer, Lynnette. Thank you so much for being here again.
Heavy journalism here, bringing the heavy journalism to this Yelestone podcast.
I think of you as the Spencer Dutton of entertained news. Yeah, you are to stories what Spencer Dutton is to every animal on the continent of Africa.
Wowie, well, I hope you think I am I as hot as Spencer Dutton. That's what I really want to know.
I don't think you understand like what a compliment like. It's a compliment in and of itself, but I don't know if you know, like how much of a compliment it is. Jeff hasn't stopped talking about Spencer Dutton for like five or six weeks now, and not just on air, Like I get random texts like do you really think do you think Spencer? Do you think I can be cool like that? I mean, we both are obsessed.
He's given me a complex.
I watched the show with my fiance And this is what I think my therapist would probably call projection, because I'm kind of watching her watch the show and projecting onto her the idea that I'll never be the man that Spencer Dutton is. I'm not even I'm not even Alex's old fiance, the Duke of whatever. Because that guy at least had the balls to challenge Spencer Dutton. I am walking away from that counting, I think.
So that's the right call. That dude should not have called for a duel. It was so stupid, but it was great TV.
As soon as he called for the duel, I was like, this dude's going off the boat. This dude is going headfirst off the boat. That's the only way this ends. You think you're going to get Spencer Dutton when an African elephant couldn't.
Yeah.
Yeah, I felt bad for Arthur, Like I mean, I feel bad for him now that he died, But I felt bad for him before that, do you know what I mean?
I didn't at all. I didn't at all. I was so glad that she ran out with him. And what an incredible way to set up for the second season, setting up so many steaks, so many places to go it's been a great ride.
I'm always amazed at how different all the shows are. You know, they're dealing with some of the same subject matter, but the tone is so dramatically different. This is such a like adventure series in such an exciting way. I think the tones of the shows are in part defined
by the era in which they take place. You know, eighteen eighty three was such a like honest to God faithful Western, and nineteen twenty three has this feeling of this big, open world, which is what it must have felt like to be alive at that time, this moment of discovery, of exploration. There's such a kind of adventurous tone to it. I can't help but feel like that's
informed by the decade. So, speaking of which we've touched on Spencer and Alexandra's epic journey back home to the ranch, let's talk a little bit about what's going on at the ranch and whether or not there will be a ranch there by the time Spencer gets there, which at this point could take him years, even before.
We get into the Debton part of it, which is in itself has been so juicy. When I joined this show, that's all I expected that we were just going to live there. We're gonna live at Yellowstone and hear this story. And so what has been so great about this journey is that that was just one third, and that you've got these two other stories that I didn't expect to
love so much. And and you know, there's obviously the romance with our beloved Spencer and Alex, and then this whole other story, frightening, scary ass storyline with the Catholics and and the way they treated the indigenous women, and and every week it's something more horrific. Uh, that's been so great. It's like just when you know, he cuts to that world and then we're just getting into it
and then boom, you know, we go someplace else. H what a master a class and like keeping the story flowing, good editing and not making us feel lost. I never have once felt lost. So yeah, I wanted to be able to say that at the Ranch, Jacob at this point doesn't seem quite as ruthless as what the family
develops into as the decades go by. And so I'm wondering if this is going to be, you know, a changing point for the kind of man that Jacob is, because he seems like he's for the most part by the law.
Do you think, well, that conflict rages within him because they did string those guys up via vigilante justice. Early on, it feels like he's torn between this old world justice and this new world justice. And it feels like, you know, Donald Whitfield is trying to use this kind of cool, impartial, you know, logical mode of attack, and Jacob feels caught
between these two things. You know, he's he's got a little bit of Jack Dutton in him, the you know, the desire for revenge, and he's also got a little bit of that cool, calm, impartial, perhaps Kara Dutton energy.
The Donald Whitfield character feels capable of true ruthlessness, where Jacob because he's so heart centered, even if it is vengeance and it looks like ruthless and us outwardly at campy, it's not cold enough, it's not disconnected enough, it's not heady enough.
Now that we're in the Dutton household, I do want to give a shout out to that moment where we see Elizabeth she lost her baby and she's lying in bed with her Jack played by Darren Mann, and that has to be his best scene from this season. First of all, he was the total dream man in that moment, making her feel better about losing her kid and just saying all the right things. And while he doesn't rise to Spencer level for me, he got dang close in that moment.
I totally agree. I thought that really showcased a whole different kind of journey. You know, Spencer's been on this like geographical journey, But to me, Jack has grown so much. It felt like when we first met him he was a kid. You know, he was a sort of impetuous, angry kid, ready to run off for revenge, ready to neglect his larger responsibilities. But I couldn't agree with you more. I thought that was an incredibly well acted scene that
also showcased a lot of growth from the character. It feels like Jack has been on this journey of growth. He's been one of the very few characters who stay in one place physically over the course of the season. But it feels like he's really grown into a man in an amazing way.
Why did Taylor take her baby? Like, was he trying to set up this is what ranch life is going to be like, honey, and you know, get ready for it?
I appreciate what Taylor is doing in terms of approaching like one just like honoring like how painful that is for women. And you know, like that's a perspective that like he doesn't necessarily need to like tap into, and he does it, and I think it's really valuable and really important. But then also to carry it into the fact that, like your whole value as a woman isn't just like having a kid, that like that is not
the only way that you mother. And I thought that was that was really just very cool of him to put in.
Well, I wonder if he's also trying to throw us off because all of us are trying to figure out the family tree. We want to know who's related to who, and if he keeps throwing us off with this, then we won't figure out the math the bloodline. Who is the true grandfather of John Detton and so. And that's what's so fun to talk to the actors about because they're having the same dang conversation. They're doing their own family trees on set and and they don't know either.
So do you guys know?
Do you know? I don't know.
I don't know anything.
You don't know. I also I also have to tell you personally, I don't care like I don't like I don't need to know who the dad is like I Karen, so much as like maybe being invested in who dies Jen.
I could argue with you about this all day because I'm a compassionate, empathetic person. But let's take a break really quick, and when we come back, we'll keep getting
into it. You're right to identify that what matters is who is going to survive the act the events of nineteen twenty three, because they basically it was like a clean cut on eighteen eighty three, So we're all sort of rooting for our respected that the main goal of figuring out who you know who Costner's predecessors are figuring out,
oh god, who's going to survive. I want to believe that all these characters are going to make it through, but based on the model of eighteen eighty three, that would be it all dies.
It makes it fun, No, it just makes it all fun's But it was fun washing House of the Dragon. You want to know the relation to the later characters that we met in Game of Thrones. It just makes the viewing experience that much more fun. To tie it all together, and so we can look for those little easter eggs. We can look for those signs in a character, like any little gesture, the way they say something, is
that something that's carried on into the bloodline. I mean it's it's yeah, it's not brain surgery, but it's fun stuff. It's the fun stuff.
Speaking of brain surgery, how about Tiana Rainwater's absolute killing spree as she you know, seeks to escape her captivity. So the brain surgery connection is watching her absolutely dismantle that man's brain with a rock that was that was graphic, but also gratifying. I gotta say watching her sort of it does feel like she's on this incre edible Like you know, Spencer is on a journey. Tiana is on a journey and being pursued the entire way by these
kind of ruthless captors. So it's so fun watching her escape and also kind of get vengeance. You know, there's this real spirit of vengeance feeling to the whole thing that I cherish After those first few episodes when she was stuck in the residential school being absolutely abused and traumatized and taken advantage of. It's a really gratifying thing to see her out in the open air, you know,
escaping and on her own terms. She had a beautiful line this episode she said, they've been trying to kill me since they took me. I don't believe in later, I believe in right now. I thought that was so powerful. That actor is also fucking amazing. I'm amazed by her every episode of Mina.
She rocks. This is Scott.
This is something that I would just love to have dinner with Taylor about and why he decided to go down this road. I can recall after the first episode when all of a sudden, the action feared to that school and it was so violent, and I remember reading message boards and it was hard on viewers and they were like, what the hell just happened.
I think we spoke with mobrings plenty a couple of weeks ago about this kind of the responsibility to be honest in our depictions of this time period, of responsibility and obligation to honestly confront this incredibly painful history.
Because it is it is brutal.
It's hard to watch sometimes. I found that to be the case in eighteen eighty three. In nineteen twenty three, for sure, and part of it is this sort of honest, clear eyed reckoning with our history, you know, and that's all there is to it. And I also I feel for the actors involved in this, because as hard as it is to watch, I'm sure it takes an incredible toll to reenact this brutal history on both sides of
the equation. But I also salute and admire their commitment to honesty and to sort of bringing whatever humanity they can to these incredibly difficult, painful circumstances. So good on them. And also, especially now that Tiana's out of there and kind of, you know, getting some revenge, it is particularly now it's taken a turn in a way that I enjoy. I really look forward to her stuff now. For the
first few episodes, they were incredibly well done. I would sort of cringe when we would cut to her stuff because I was fucking terrified to confront that history. I
was terrified to see what would happen next. But now that she's out on the open road, I'm really looking forward to it, and I'm really looking forward to seeing what's next because we know that Priest is getting his fucking just desserts, right I'm like, Bro, you should get off that horse, turn around, go home, and forget about Tiana. You don't want to catch up to her. All I want to say to that guy is, Bro, don't catch up to her.
That's a mistake.
I'm fraid they're going to find her. They're totally that the dude that signed on with them, they're gonna find her.
I'm afraid for them that they're gonna find her. I'm not afraid for her. Oh yeah, they shouldn't find her. They should let that one go because that's bad news for them.
She's a she's a killer.
I'm I think she's fo I mean, it's it's gonna also be pretty gratifying to watch them get exactly what they have come in. But if I were them, I would go home let this one go.
Yeah, speaking of like brutal things that and I mean one that I didn't know about at all. But when the Montana State Police come and arrest Alice Chow.
For miscegenation, yeah, just when Zaye got some fun shit too. I've been waiting for zaying that. That's my buddy Brian Garretty, who's like one of the best actors on the planet and just when he got to take off his hat. You get to you get to take off your hat, you get to sit down at a table, you get to do a little bit of dialogue, finally, finally getting Zane's in her life.
And he got busy in the shower too. He had like a little nude scene there.
He was saving water. Yeah, come on, grow up, they were Lennet. There's a drown.
But just when we get to see this other side of Zaye, which I'm so excited about, of course, classic tailor. You get a little bit of good stuff and then you gotta take your medicine. Uh so, Yeah, amazing, amazing sequence. Also, these goddamn these goddamn henchmen. This dude with the beard sort of stalking around observing everybody being a narc. That guy's gonna get it too. Talk about brain surgery. I think that guy's.
Got a special.
He's got a little meeting with Jack Dutton sometime down the line where Jack Dutton will finally get to exercise some of his demons.
That's all tied to Donald Whitfield, right, all those those henchmen that came and got him, Is that all tied back to Timothy Dalton's character.
Somehow exactly Yeah, he was, Well, it seems like Timothy Dalton had sent his his henchmen to sort of spy on Zaane. Zaye fought that henchman, followed Zaane back to his house and then reported him to the police. So so it was, you know, it was legal. What they were doing in separating that family was tragically legal. But it was Donald Whitfield who sort of orchestrated bringing that to the authorities attention.
So said, all right, shall we jump to Spencer? Can we jump to Spencer?
Now?
Can we go on the boat the ship?
Let's get into it. Spencer and Alex, they're further along on their journey than they've ever been. They finally got a little bit of comfort for once. They're like riding on this big, amazing ship. They're not having to hoof it through the wilderness. They're actually sort of it would seem, full steam ahead towards their final destination, when, of course some shit gets in the way.
Well, I've enjoyed this trip. It's thrown me off because I didn't think it would take them this long to get home, But it makes sense because it's not you know, an overnight trip. So I've enjoyed that it's taken so long. It's nice to see them in clean clothes. And that dress. When she walked out of her room wearing that bejeweled number, Oh my god, she looked like a million bucks. I loved that, just loved it.
Alex's ex awkward. Alex's ex is on the boat too. He can't quite swallow his pride, so he challenges Spencer Dunton to a duel?
What are you thinking?
I liked how they set that up too, in that he said to the dad, you don't want to have your son do this because I could kill him. And I mean, I really appreciate that moment too. But you know, him, being who he is, you know, in the masculine side of him, took over and said, okay, fine, I'll do the duel. I loved how quickly it ended. In that first round, he just punched him and took him down, and I thought that would be the end of it.
Yeah, he fucking grabbed the sword. He wrapped a towel around his hand and grabbed the sword.
That's pretty cool.
The dad was trying to be a voice of re I appreciated that the dad was like, son, This guy's a total badass. This guy's the son that I never had. Please don't let him kill you for your own sake, because that's gonna be embarrassing. And his son still couldn't quite still couldn't quite muster the dignity to just run away, and he got his ass thrown off the ship. And those are tall ships. Every shot of that ship, I'm like, that's a tall ship.
So I'm assuming they didn't find him.
Then, right, he's dead, yeah, they say, they say later.
The bad thing about the bad thing about a ship like that, sorry, is the motor is really strong, right, so you go off a ship next to it, it pulls you down and you get pulled.
Yeah, so it's over.
We got to take a quick break. We'll be right back.
I didn't see that coming. I mean, I knew this was not gonna go well, but I didn't see coming to where he would throw off He would throw him off the ship and then there was like no turning back there too.
Spencer really tried not to. I also respected that Spencer, the logical part of him, really tried not to get in this fight. It It took this guy calling Alex a whore for Spencer to even accept the duel in the first place. He knocked him down a few times and I kicked his sword away, really tried to not have to kill him, and the guy just couldn't accept it. Yeah.
Yeah, Spencer also like didn't even want to leave the room. He's like, what happened to that plant?
Yeah?
I was really with him on that. I was also like a little bit like, come on, don't rub it in little Arthur's face, Baby Arthur boy, Like, come on, I.
Was ready to be a woman. She didn't want to be. She wanted to be a woman. I guess that's She's.
Like, I don't I don't want to hide it anymore. But like, how long are you really hiding it? Right? Like, if you been hiding it that long, please, I've had things for twenty right, all right? Did you guys come?
Did you guys see him flash the gun? That scene went so fast. I didn't see the gun.
You pulled out something. It was a little hard to tell.
It was a quick He kind of rushed him from behind and was carrying something in his right hand.
Right. Well, that was such a brilliant setup to set up. Obviously, more steaks for the two of them, and it gave us that great final moment of them yelling at each other across the water, I love you, I love you, which was pretty dang romantic.
Yeah, that was that was really powerful.
It was really beautiful. Also, what did they say is somebody commented on it it that like though the marriage might be hard to prove.
The yeah, there, you can't question their sincerity or something like that.
It's beautiful.
So back on the continental United States of America, back in North America.
Wait, you guys real quick before we leave this, I'm so sorry. Like besides yelling I love you, she holds up I believe the letters and says I will see you in Bozeman. I will see you in Bozeman, Montana, which is setting us up for this storyline in the next season of nineteen twenty three that we know yet right where these two lovers are going to be on these journeys solo and these an incredibly dangerous one completely
on their own. I mean, whether we'll see that or not, but that is what's going to happen.
Yeah, I have to think now it's going to be this is going to be split in fours and so We're going to watch her journey to get to Bozeman and watch what happens to him. And where did they land? By the way, do we know where they landed?
They'd only traveled like one day. They had been on the coast of Italy before, and they'd only traveled for like one day, so he got he didn't get kicked out very far away from where they had been previously.
Also, I know that I might have said earlier that I'm not all that concerned about like who's the parent of whom? But I do care about who dies in the event it we find out in like the first episode of the next season that Alexandro is pregnant or something like, all bets are off in terms of like Spencer's safety, right or who's who? Were like the concern about that? Do you know what I mean?
Spencer's the only guy I'm not worried about. Nothing's bringing down Spencer.
Well, this is a great love, and no great love lasts forever, so I don't think this union is is in it for the long haul. Somebody's gonna die.
Speaking of great love, Lynnette, how about Kara and Jacob. She's been nursing him back to health. He's now sort of back up on his feet. He's kind of capable of once again taking responsibility for the ranch. This episode opens, I believe in this incredible courtroom scene where Banner has been arrested, but there's this he's immediately released because there's this kind of complicated relationship between vigilante justice and the
law at this point. So their their their argument is, hey, a few days before Banner shot Jacob, Jacob strung up Banner and left him to die. So all of a sudden, these two different kinds of justice, you know, courtroom justice and cowboy justice are directly in conflict. And Banner says to Jacob in the courtroom, he says, you know, this doesn't end here. It doesn't end in a courtroom. This ends on your front lawn, which I thought was like
a pretty good, pretty good line. And Jacob's like, hey, man, if that's where you want to die, I'll see you there, which I thought was pretty sick, also really good. These are two guys. I could watch these two dudes growl at each other all day. We got two legendary growlers, and.
Definitely feel like they've set him up. So he's at a helpless place, and we need Spencer to swing in and save the day because it feels like he has no place to go Jacob to fix this. I mean, what's left? He has no money? Right, does he have many cattle left to sell? He's screwed.
Yeah, kind of all he has is the cattle. A lot of his cowboys left, his sort of army. You know, when we first met him at the beginning of nineteen twenty three, he had a pretty substantial group of cowboys who were loyal to him, if nothing else. But now as the hard seasons have crept on, he's even lost a number of his faithful soldiers. And he lost obviously, he lost John Dutton Senior. So he's really stretched thin.
It's a bit of a parallel between nineteen twenty three and the actions of Yellowstone, where in the actions of Yellowstone, now you know, Kevin Cosner, John Dutton is facing this kind of complicated battle that's getting increasingly political. It's getting further and further from the ranch itself, and it feels
like the same conflict is facing Jacob Dutton. You know, his forces are spread very thin, and winter is coming, you know, not too glibly call on Yeah, exactly, I know, but winter's coming, right, And Whitfield has this incredible line to Jacob where he's like, you know, all you can really think is the seasons, man, You depend on the seasons.
Me.
I just think about the future. You know.
I'm gonna come and buy up all this land. I'm going to take this all over, and nobody's going to remember you. It's a really exciting place to leave it because there are all these conflicts just simmering and winter is just setting in. So it's really an exciting place to leave it, and I cannot wait to see what happens next. Lynette, I can't thank you enough for joining us again today to dig into all this stuff. It's
an incredibly exciting time to be a Yellowstone fan. There's Yellowstone coming, there's more nineteen twenty three coming, There's so much to look forward to, and I'm sure our listeners agree. We really can't wait. So I'm looking forward to speaking again Lynette, hopefully soon. And thank you so much for joining us.
Oh my pleasure, so much fun.
Thanks Lynette.
As always, thank you all out there so much for listening as we very eagerly await the return of the second part. Of Yellowstone season five. We're going to continue to drop new podcast episodes every month. Stay tuned for more insider interviews and behind the scenes looks at the world of Yellowstone, and be sure, please please please leave us reviews about what you want to hear. This whole thing is a conversation between us and you, and we
can't wait to hear from you. The Official Yellowstone Podcast is a production of one oh one Studios and Paramount. This episode was produced by Scott Stone. Brandon Getchis is the head of Audio for one oh one Studios. Steve Rasis is the executive vice president of the Paramount Global
Podcast Group. Special thanks to Megan Marcus, Jeremy Westfall, Ainsley Rosito, Andrew Sarnow, Jason Red and Whitney Baxter from Paramount, and of course David Glasser, David Huckin and Michelle Newman from one oh one Studios