Sell it all seems to be the mantra in Yellowstone season 5’s Give The World Away. Here’s our spoiler-filled review.
Spoilers lie ahead. Our review of the previous episode is here.
For a while, it looked like we were moving quickly. The penultimate episode of Yellowstone season 5 got itself back onto strong ground following a ponderous previous installment. It’s the longest episode of this current clump of episodes, and I think the one with the shortest pre-credits sequence. But in the seven minutes before the titles rolled, positions had been taken.
The contents of the Yellowstone ranch? Up for sale, as Beth tries to get things onto a workable economic footing. Chief Thomas Rainwater? He’s looking at pipeline running across the land, and seems determined to get something done about it, although not for the first time of late, that’s all he gets to do in an episode.
Then there’s the news reports about the murder of John Dutton, with a mention that Jamie stands to benefit from the planned leased of the land. Throw in Detective Dillard storming into the officers of Market Equities with a juicy warrant, and shit is clearly being arranged around the metaphorical fan.
Cue the credits, cue the brakes being applied.
When it was revealed that Kevin Costner wasn’t coming back for this final bunch of episodes, there was a question mark over what show creator Taylor Sheridan would do to fill the gap. Turns out part of the answer was to write scenes for, er, Taylor Sheridan. In the role of Travis, he gets to play strip poker, drink, ride a horse, and win over Beth. Fun, certainly, but an interesting choice too.
Travis is part of the broader narrative of Beth stripping down the ranch’s assets to try and offset the sizeable tax bill that’s been overhanging matters for a long time. The eventual sale of horses raises $30m, which she reconciles will be enough to keep things going for a year. But then: what’s next? A couple of lines from Kayce, and there’s a staring-at-you-in-plain-sight answer that the ultra-savvy Beth missed?
Hmmm. Earlier in the episode, Beth and Teeter were in a posh bar with the former lamenting the tourists who basically buy local land as a tax dodge. Now, she’s presented with a fairly straightforward tax dodge, the kind that might save the ranch and also give season six a further way forward.
The more interesting element of the episode concerned, as always, Wes Bentley’s Jamie, the most interesting character in the show since John Dutton’s demise. Living by his wits as always, this time he goes back to the mother of his child, Christina, and she gives him a suggested path forward. Where have any of us heard the idea of admit nothing, attack your attackers, and spread misinformation before? There’s anger in the writing here, and it’s not – deliberately I presume – very well hidden.
We’ve got a season finale next week, and it’s still not confirmed if it’s the finale for the show as a whole. The big event looks to be John Dutton’s funeral, and the retrieval of his body is the only thing of note Monica has been given to do in weeks. She’s on the list of relatively sidelined characters, of which Rip remains very much one.
Still, there’s enough for next week to focus on. The Sarah Attwood investigation, Market Equities’ Ellis reacting to that, Jamie making a career- and life-defining speech, and perhaps the ultimate showdown between Beth, Kayce and Jamie. They’ve all got possible exit points as things stand.
Give The World Away though follows the pattern of a traditional Yellowstone episode for the most part. Give us some plot stuff to think about, absorb the gorgeous landscapes, stop for a musical number, and then leave us with the kind of setup that weekly television enjoys feasting on. As much as I don’t really think the show has found the same footing since the loss of its patriarch, I’m as intrigued as anyone as to what comes next.
Jamie for the win…
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