'Yellowstone' director surprised by fan reaction to John Dutton's death (original) (raw)

Apparently, not every Yellowstone viewer has been following the years-long back-and-forth between former series star Kevin Costner and creator Taylor Sheridan. Although both Costner and the Yellowstone team made clear in interviews that he would not be reprising his role as John Dutton in the long-awaited final episodes of the hit series, the character's death in last Sunday's premiere still caught a lot of viewers by surprise.

"I was reading Twitter and it’s strange the number of people who seemed upset that John Dutton was killed off, despite knowing that Kevin himself said he wasn’t coming back to the show," Christina Voros, who directed the two most recent episodes, said in a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter.

She continued, "I think even in the face of that information, people don’t want it to be true. And in a weird way, it’s life imitating art. There were a lot of people who were outraged that John was killed — and you’re supposed to be outraged he was killed. The characters are outraged that he’s killed. So in a strange way, it is the point. You are not supposed to be OK with it."

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Kevin Costner's John Dutton on 'Yellowstone'.

Danno Nell/Paramount Network/Everett Collection

At the start of season 5, John was elected governor of Montana, but not even that high-level political office could save him from his scheming family. Though his death was initially ruled a suicide, the newest episode revealed that it was actually orchestrated by his own scheming son, Jamie Dutton (Wes Bentley), with daughter Beth (Kelly Reilly) vowing vengeance in return.

In any case, Costner himself isn't watching the new episodes.

"I didn't see it," the actor said in a SiriusXM interview the day after the season premiere. "I heard it's a suicide, so that doesn't make me want to rush to go see it... Sometimes I'm like just a passenger in my life, you know, there's a lot going on. And somebody said, you know, it played last night? And I said, ‘Hmm, okay.’"

Costner is currently busy finishing his planned four-part Western film series Horizon: An American Saga. The first part hit theaters earlier this year and is now streaming on Max, with subsequent installments still on the horizon. Costner's commitment to Horizon (which he directed, produced, co-wrote, and stars in) prevented him from being a part of Yellowstone's final act, as he confirmed earlier this year.

But some people on the show say this was always roughly the plan. Reilly told Entertainment Weekly last month that Costner's "absence was part of the ending. That's not something that we had to pivot, that was already written into the tapestry of the story. It was always going to happen, it just happened a little bit differently."