The Finale of 1883 Offers a Massive Clue About the Future of Yellowstone

Time has a way of catching up with people, though when the amount in question is seven generations’ worth, it’s easy to get caught unsuspecting. When the Dutton clan returns for Season Five of Yellowstone later this year, that could be exactly what happens to them.

Let me (by way of an ace fan theory) explain.

In the bonus features of the DVD release of Season Four of Yellowstone, Tim McGraw is interviewed about James Dutton, the role he plays in 1883. In that feature, he confirms that he’s playing the great-great grandfather of John Dutton. For the mathematically impaired (you’re not alone), let’s get our fingers out. That means that John Dutton (played by Kevin Costner) is the fifth generation of Dutton to live on the Yellowstone ranch. Kayce is the sixth. Tate is the seventh. Why is all of that important? Okay let me turn it over to a brilliant fan on Reddit, which points out the follow:

In the finale of 1883, as Elsa is dying (spoiler alert, sorry), James is searching in desperation for a place to lay his daughter to rest. He speaks with an American Indian named Spotted Eagle (fun fact: actor Graham Greene was also in Dances with Wolves with Costner and also Taylor Sheridan’s Wind River) who tells him that he will allow the Duttons to settle on their land, but in seven generations, his people will rise up again and take it back. To that, James says, “You can have it.”

Woof.

Jump forward 130 some odd years and there are other signs as well that this time is coming. At the beginning of Season Four, after John has been shot, the opening shot features seven (!!) crows circling above John’s lifeless body. One of them drops to the ground and picks up a shell casing. This could all potentially be coincidence (crows do, infamously, love shiny things), but the specifics there are pretty spot on.

Later, during the season finale, we also have the journey that Kayce goes on with the Broken Rock tribe. When he returns to Monica at the end of the episode and she asks him what he’s seen, Kayce tells her that he’s seen the end of the two of them. Does that mean their marriage? Their lives? Who knows. The death of Tate could also be a player there. There’s no hard confirmation that the Crow people and the people of the Broken Rock reservation share the same lineage, but for the sake of plot machinations, let’s say they do.

That would mean that the only bloodline heir to the land that we’ve met is Tate—from both the Dutton side and the Crow side. As we’ve long suspected, Tate is almost certainly a key to the series’ end, but exactly how much blood will the Dutton family shed before the Crow people come back and snatch what is theirs?

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