Kevin Costner might not ever feel satisfied with how his time on Yellowstone ended.
When the news was announced that Costner – the leading man of the hit Taylor Sheridan series – would not be returning for the flagship show’s final season, Yellowstone didn’t take long to reveal John Dutton’s fate. After taking almost two years in between parts one and two of season five, they barely took even two seconds to shock fans of the show with (SPOILERS AHEAD) the death of John Dutton.
The first episode of the back half of the final season started with John Dutton being found dead from a gunshot wound. It was set up to look like a suicide, but it was later revealed that he was murdered through a plot laid out by lawyer Sarah Atwood – who just so happened to be sleeping with Jamie Dutton.
Obviously, the expedited, thudding finality of Costner’s character upset a lot of fans… but what was the show supposed to do? Just not mention the main character of the show for a couple of episodes, then kill him off? Anyone who has watched the show knows that even if Costner was able to return for the final episodes, John Dutton wasn’t going to make it out alive.
Funny enough, we’ve learned through a number of interviews that Kevin Costner was even caught off guard by John Dutton’s death – mainly because he didn’t know when Yellowstone was airing its final episodes.
In an interview on The Michael Smerconish Program a day after his character’s fate was revealed, Costner was asked if he “was cool” with how his Dutton’s arc ended on the show.
Here’s what he had to say:
“Well, I’m going to be perfectly honest. I didn’t know it was actually airing last night. That’s a swear-to-God moment. I swear to God. I mean, I’ve been seeing ads with my face all over the place and I’m thinking, ‘Gee, I’m not in that one. I’m not in this season.’ But I didn’t realize yesterday was the thing. Somebody said, ‘It played last night?’ And I said, ‘Hmm, okay.’ So no, I found out about it this morning actually.”
Costner didn’t watch the episode, as he was actually pre-occupied with a private screening of his passion project Horizon: Chapter 2. He made it clear that he didn’t tune in, but he had heard how John Dutton came to an end, and weirdly assured fans that the Yellowstone writers will figure out how to justify the decision:
“I heard what it was, but no, they’re smart people. Whatever they’re doing, they’ll figure it out.”
Costner was probably never filled in about what actually turned out to be a murder-plot, but what does he care really? He did his time on the show, and has since voiced how much he loved being on it. But unfortunately, Costner wasn’t able to get on the same page with the Yellowstone production – or vice versa – and the writer’s were somewhat backed into a corner.
They did what they had to do to move the series forward.
And by all accounts, it certainly seemed like Kevin Costner had moved forward – and on – from the hit television show. Though it’s tough to tell if he was really okay with separating himself from the show that was somewhat of a late-career-revival for the Oscar-winner. Any quote that he has provided has made it seem like he’s at least putting on a brave face and acting as if he’s bigger than Yellowstone itself.
In a video that the Daily Mail obtained last year of Costner, the 70-year-old actor allegedly gave this dismissal of the series that gave him so much:
“I’m not thinking about (Yellowstone’s finale). I don’t think I’ve given it any thoughts, we’ll just let it go.”
All in all, it’s a shame that Taylor Sheridan, Kevin Costner, and everyone else at Yellowstone couldn’t make things work out to bring the John Dutton storyline to a satisfying close. If the rumored tension between the show’s creator and Yellowstone’s leading man were even the slightest bit true, it makes sense that Costner has always acted relatively unbothered and removed from the ending of the hit western drama series.
And it’s a damn shame, because Kevin Costner was truly one of a kind as John Dutton:
The post Kevin Costner Says He Never Gave A Single Thought To The ‘Yellowstone’ Finale first appeared on Whiskey Riff.