Kelly Reilly and Cole Hauser returned to their “Yellowstone” characters with a specific condition: the show had to feel like a genuine new beginning rather than a corporate lifeline for an ailing franchise. By most critical accounts, they largely got what they asked for.
“Dutton Ranch,” which premiered Friday on Paramount+, picks up Beth and Rip Wheeler after their Montana homestead burns to the ground, forcing the couple and their adopted teenage son Carter (Finn Little) to rebuild from scratch on a cattle ranch in the fictional South Texas border town of Rio Paloma. The show — created by Chad Feehan, not Taylor Sheridan, who serves as a producer — immediately sets them on a collision course with Beulah Jackson (Annette Bening), the ruthless owner of a rival slaughterhouse empire who had designs on the property the Duttons now occupy.
Reilly said the deciding question during early discussions was how deeply the show could explore Beth beyond what “Yellowstone” allowed. “Who is Beth now that she’s put the weapons down and stopped fighting for a minute?” she said. “He gave me clues throughout six seasons. I knew that she wanted a whiskey and a meadow and Rip.” Hauser said the conversations moved slowly and deliberately — “they slowly walked the dog,” he explained — before both actors committed. The shift from Montana to Texas was hard. Both said they love Montana. They agreed anyway.
The casting of Bening and Ed Harris as Everett McKinney, a Navy veteran turned local veterinarian, has drawn the most attention from critics. Harris brings a quiet decency that lends the show a welcome gravitas, while Reilly described working alongside Bening — whose character Beth calls “a grizzly in Gucci” — as “eating a full meal every day.” Hauser forgot his lines the first time he shared a scene with Harris. “I just looked at Ed, and I was like, ‘Holy shit,'” he recalled. “He smiled at me. And then the scene continued.”
Early critic reviews placed “Dutton Ranch” at 86 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, putting it ahead of the flagship “Yellowstone” and behind only the prequel series “1923” and “1883” in the franchise’s critical standing. That reception stands in contrast to “Marshals,” Luke Grimes’ Kayce Dutton spinoff for CBS, which holds a 42 percent score and has drawn criticism for settling into a generic procedural format.
Both stars serve as executive producers on “Dutton Ranch,” which Reilly called “the hardest job I’ve ever done.” Hauser said renewal is entirely the audience’s call. “The audience is the beginning, middle and end to our success,” he said. The nine-episode first season runs through July 3 on Paramount+.
