Dutton Ranch took an unexpected detour last week. After Rip (Cole Hauser) and Beth (Kelly Reilly) slaughtered their entire herd—without the usual benefits of converting them into grade-A angus beef—the former Yellowstone couple was left without a functioning ranch to call home for the second time in five episodes.
I’ve heard from a lot of viewers over the past few weeks that it’s a bit strange the Duttons haven’t mentioned insurance yet. It’s a fair point! The simplest explanation I can think of is that it wouldn’t make for a good drama if they did. Still, fans are right to call out Beth for never insuring her property in case of wildfires or cattle disease. It’s possible that she did and they used the money to purchase the ranch in Texas. It’s also highly probable that they didn’t report their case of foot-and-mouth disease because such an epidemic—reportedly the first that America has seen since 1929—would probably make global news. But whatever the reason, it’s tough to see how walking into the mouth of the beast and offering to clean its teeth was the better play.
So instead of Rip and Beth building up the Dutton Ranch in episode 6, we watch the couple do the heavy lifting for Beulah Jackson (Annette Bening). Rip works the 10 Petal’s bunkhouse into shape while Beth heads back to Dallas to sell someone else’s beef to meat distributor Zane Nash. When Nash asks for stories about the Yellowstone Ranch and states that “John Dutton was a legend,” Beth responds that “the Yellowstone will be written about in the history books, but the 10 Petal and the Jacksons are still at it.” It’s all an awfully large pill to swallow, I’m sure.
Now that we’re six episodes in, however, I’m growing impatient that we still haven’t seen any proof that Beulah is up to some evil, illegal scheme to keep the ranch afloat. Every week, she feels less like a villain and more like someone I’ll actually feel sad for when she loses it all. In her eyes, she’s got two bona fide killers in her employ now. She’s back together with former flame Everett McKinney (Ed Harris). Her son Joaquin (Juan Pablo Raba) can afford to buy a fancy new Stetson. Oreana (Natalia Alyn Lind) and Carter (Finn Little) are genuinely hitting it off without any trouble. Plus, the Jackson ranch is throwing a party to
But the Jacksons do have some darkness brewing underneath all this good fortune. There’s still a greater power breathing down Beulah’s neck through threatening phone calls. She also has a monster named Rob-Will (Jai Courtney) as a son. He left rehab early and regrouped with his recently fired buddy Chet (Hart Denton), who spends the first half of episode 6 purchasing giant guns in revenge. “Nobody understands what we’d done to protect this ranch,” Rob-Will tells him. Outside of Wes’s dead body, neither do I.
So Chet returns to the 10 Petal later that night, gun in hand. He steps right into the light and points his weapon at Joaquin. With a deranged look in his eye, he yells, “Hey, motherfucker, I’ve got your attention now, huh?” Then he fires a round into Joaquin’s hand before someone named Miguel (Who is Miguel?) returns fire and nails Chet with a headshot. It’s a tragic story, even for a character that very clearly was never going to survive the rest of the season anyway.
Rip arrives just as the body hits the floor. It’s perfect timing, because it puts the Jacksons in a vulnerable enough position for Joaquin to spill the beans about the dead body he found on his ranch. I’m not so sure what comes next now that Rip is finally up to speed. There are two episodes left in the season, and our most pressing confrontation to end it feels like a standoff between Rip and Rob-Will. But at the same time, that sounds too predictable.
Instead, we end episode 6 on a far scarier note. While out for drinks with Beth, Beulah brings up Jamie—Beth’s adopted brother from Yellowstone, played by Wes Bentley, whom she fought to the death in the finale. She thinks that she might dig up some dirt on the Dutton family. Beulah just doesn’t know who she’s messing with. “I don’t think about him anymore,” Beth responds, stone cold. What about her father? He died rather strangely as well, right? “I don’t think about that, either,” Beth says. Sorry, Beulah. Try again next week.