Yellowstone, Paramount Network's incredibly popular neo-Western, returned from its incredibly long "midseason break" — which lasted almost two whole years — with its final run of Season 5 episodes in the fall. These six episodes were expected to be the hit show's last, but the network quietly switched to calling the Season 5 Part 2 finale a season finale instead of a series finale. One thing is for sure: This franchise isn't quite ready to hang up its cowboy hat.
Star Kevin Costner did not appear in the second half of Season 5, as the actor moved on to a new passion project of his own, a series of Western films. But his departure left behind a lot of unfinished business to take care of for the other Duttons. In fact, a spin-off starring Yellowstone regulars Kelly Reilly and Cole Hauser is reportedly in the works.
Below, we'll go through everything there is to know about the second half of the fifth season, including the streaming release date, cast information, and everything we know about the franchise's spin-offs.
Kevin Costner, Kelly Reilly, and Wes Bentley, Yellowstone
Paramount Network
Is Yellowstone Season 5 Part 2 streaming?
The last episodes of Yellowstone are finally coming to streaming! Peacock announced that Season 5 Part 2 will join the rest of the series on the platform on March 16, 2025. Currently, Peacock is the only subscription-based streaming service Yellowstone is available on.
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Yellowstone Season 5 Part 2 release date
Yellowstone Season 5 Part 2 premiered on Sunday, Nov. 10, 2024, on Paramount Network. Before that, the last time we saw a new Yellowstone episode was Jan. 1, 2023. Internationally, Yellowstone Season 5 Part 2 debuted in Canada on Paramount+ on Nov. 10, and in the U.K. on Nov. 11.
Yellowstone Season 5 episodes
SEASON 5 PREMIERE - Episode 1: "One Hundred Years Is Nothing," Nov. 13, 2022 at 8/7c
Episode 2: "The Sting of Wisdom," Nov. 13, 2022 at 9/8c
Episode 3: "Tall Drink of Water," Nov. 20, 2022 at 8/7c
Episode 4: "Horses in Heaven," Nov. 27, 2022 at 8/7c
Episode 5: "Watch'em Ride Away," Dec. 4, 2022 at 8/7c
Episode 6: "Cigarettes, Whiskey, a Meadow and Fog," Dec. 11, 2022 at 8/7c
Episode 7: "The Dream Is Not Me," Dec. 18, 2022 at 8/7c
SEASON 5 PART 1 FINALE - Episode 8: "A Knife and No Coin," Jan. 1, 2023 at 8/7c
SEASON 5 PART 2 PREMIERE - Episode 9: "Desire Is All You Need," Nov. 10, 2024 at 8/7c
Episode 10: "The Apocalypse of Change," Nov. 17, 2024 at 8/7c
Episode 11: "Three Fifty-Three," Nov. 24, 2024 at 8/7c
Episode 12: "Counting Coup," Dec. 1, 2024 at 8/7c
Episode 13: "Give the World Away," Dec. 8, 2024 at 8/7c
SEASON 5 PART 2 FINALE - Episode 14: "Life Is a Promise," Dec. 15, 2024 at 8/7c
Yellowstone Season 5 recaps
Need to catch up on the recent episodes? Read our full recaps and cast interviews for the Season 5 episodes.
In the first full trailer for Yellowstone's new episodes, tensions are high in the Dutton family as Beth and Jamie go to war with each other. "I can't do this anymore," says Beth. "Well, you're gonna have to, honey," her husband, Rip, warns. "Or we're gonna lose this place."
Along with the trailer, Paramount Network dropped a behind the scenes featurette about the making of the back half of Season 5. (For the record, it looks much less dramatic than the reports that surfaced from set made it sound.) "This is the greatest office in the world," says Cole Hauser.
The first footage from Yellowstone's new episodes was released on Aug. 30, 2024. The teaser — which opens with an old quote from Kevin Costner's John Dutton, taken from Season 2 — shows the feud between the Dutton siblings heating up, as Jamie warns, "You destroy me, you destroy yourself."
Yellowstone Season 5 Part 2 first look photos
In late August 2024, Paramount released a first look at the show's long-awaited return.
Cole Hauser and Kelly Reilly, Yellowstone
Paramount Network
Gil Birmingham and Mo Brings Plenty, Yellowstone
Paramount Network
Finn Little and Cole Hauser, Yellowstone
Paramount Network
Kelsey Asbille, Brecken Merrill, and Luke Grimes, Yellowstone
Paramount Network
Wes Bentley and Wendy Moniz, Yellowstone
Paramount Network
Yellowstone Season 5 production
On May 21, 2024, Deadline reported that Yellowstone had resumed production on Season 5 Part 2 in Montana. Thankfully, it seems that even after a long time away, everyone remembered how to ride a horse.
Season 5 was expected to be the last for Yellowstone, but in promos, Paramount Network has begun referring to the end of the fifth season as the "season finale," rather than the "series finale," adding to speculation that Yellowstone isn't ready to ride off into the sunset after all.
In December 2024, Deadline reported that stars Kelly Reilly and Cole Hauser have closed deals to lead a new Yellowstone spin-off series (more on that in the spin-off section below), adding that a source had indicated that "doing another season [of Yellowstone] is not completely out of the question" either. However, Deadline's report suggests that right now, the focus is on continuing the story in a spin-off.
For a while, it seemed possible that Reilly and Hauser would keep the main series alive as its new leads. On Aug. 27, the Hollywood insider newsletter Puck reported that stars Reilly and Hauser were in talks to star in a sixth season of Yellowstone. Per The Hollywood Reporter, Paramount Network did not comment on the report.
The initial announcement that Yellowstone would end with Season 5 came in May 2023. At the time of the announcement, the show's final episodes were scheduled to premiere in November 2023, while a sequel series was confirmed to be in the works and set to debut in December of that year. However, the writers strike and the actors strike delayed both projects.
The news that the show would be ending came after months of speculation surrounding the question of whether Kevin Costner would return for the remainder of Season 5.
In an eye-opening interview with The Hollywood Reporter in June 2023, Sheridan insisted that his intended ending for John Dutton was still in play even if Costner did not return to the series. "I'm disappointed," Sheridan said in the Hollywood Reporter interview. "It truncates the closure of his character. It doesn't alter it, but it truncates it."
Will Kevin Costner return to Yellowstone?
In June 2024, Kevin Costner confirmed that his days in John Dutton's cowboy hat were over, posting a video on social media announcing that he would not return to Yellowstone for Part 2 of Season 5.
"Hi everyone," Costner said in the video. "I just want to reach out and let you know that after this long year and a half of working on Horizon and doing all the things that's required, and thinking about Yellowstone, that beloved series that I love, that I know you love, I just realized that I'm not going to be able to continue Season 5B or into the future."
The actor continued, "It was something that really changed me. I loved it. And I know you loved it. And I just wanted to let you know that I won't be returning, and I love the relationship we've been able to develop, and I'll see you at the movies."
In an interview with GQ in May 2024, Costner claimed that the reason he left Yellowstone was that delays in production interfered with his schedule and some filming contracts he had surrounding his Horizon Western films.
Costner essentially said he had tried to come up with an amicable solution, offering up his time to finish out his arc before he was committed to shoot Horizon: An American Saga. He said he was even willing to come in to film John Dutton's death scene, if it needed to come to that. According to Costner, "I said, 'Well, if you want to kill me, if you want to do something like that,' I said, 'I have a week before I start [shooting Horizon], I'll do what you want to do.'" But Paramount and Sheridan didn't take him up on his offer.
Costner also bemoaned how he was portrayed in the media, with some outlets saying he was only willing to give the show a week of his time, when he feels it was the delays in production and scripts that left him feeling stuck while his passion project waited in the wings, so he moved forward on Horizon.
"What am I supposed to do? I'm just not a dog that waits in a driveway not knowing when the person's going to come home," he said. "I want to know. And I also understood that their universe was really big, so I just decided not to sit in the driveway, but to be busy myself and be available when I could. It didn't end up happening."
Costner had previously indicated that he would be open to returning to the series under the right circumstances. In April 2024, Costner was interviewed by Entertainment Tonight at CinemaCon, where he was promoting Horizon. "I'd like to be able to [return to Yellowstone] but we haven't been able to," he said. "I've loved making that series. I made five seasons of it, I thought I was going to make seven [seasons]. So how it works out — I hope it does — but they've got a lot of different shows going on. Maybe it will. Maybe this will circle back to me. If it does and I feel really comfortable with [it], I'd love to do it."
Yellowstone prequels and spin-offs
Buckle up! The Yellowstone universe keeps expanding. Kelly Reilly and Cole Hauser, who starred in Yellowstone as husband-and-wife duo Beth Dutton and Rip Wheeler, are set to lead a new spin-off series, Deadline reported in December. After plenty of historical spin-offs have delved into previous generations of the Dutton family, the franchise is sticking much closer to home with this series, which will reportedly be the first spin-off with Yellowstone in its title. According to Deadline, the new series is expected to feature other familiar characters from the flagship show.
And it's not the only modern-day Yellowstone spin-off in the works. In November 2023, Paramount officially greenlit two spin-off series: 1944 and a contemporary spin-off then called 2024. In August 2024, Paramount announced that 2024 was retitled The Madison, and it will star Michelle Pfeiffer, who will also executive produce. In a release, the series was described as "a heartfelt study of grief and human connection following a New York City family in the Madison River valley of central Montana." Paramount also did not mention whether The Madison will air on Paramount Network or Paramount+.
The news on The Madison was first broken by TVLine, which reported that the show will follow "wealthy matriarch Stacy Clyburn and her family as they leave New York City and head to Montana in the wake of her husband and brother-in-law's tragic deaths in a plane crash." The premiere is reportedly expected in 2025.
So far, the cast of The Madison is also confirmed to include Matthew Fox, Patrick J. Adams, Elle Chapman, Beau Garrett, and Amiah Miller.
At one point, Matthew McConaughey was reportedly in talks to star in a Yellowstone spin-off, though it is unclear if he is still involved in any Yellowstone spin-off.
A prequel limited series, 1883, aired on Paramount+ late in 2021 and revealed the origin story of the Dutton family arriving in Montana. The series starred Isabel May as the brave and adventurous teenager Elsa, elder sister to John Dutton's great-grandfather, John Sr., and Tim McGraw as her father, James.
A second Yellowstone prequel, titled 1923, premiered in December 2022. It picks up 40 years after 1883 with the next generation of Duttons tending to their ranch during the aftermath of World War I and the start of Prohibition. The series, which is slated to return for Season 2 on Feb. 23, 2025, on Paramount+, stars Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren as Jacob and Cara Dutton, the brother and sister-in-law to Tim McGraw's James Dutton from 1883. The premiere of 1923 also revealed some hidden secrets about the Dutton family tree.
The Sheridan-produced limited series Lawmen: Bass Reeves, starring David Oyelowo as Bass Reeves, was originally expected to exist within the Yellowstone universe as a prequel to 1883 but was changed to function as its own standalone series.
Sheridan is also writing a Yellowstone spin-off called 6666, which takes place at the real historic Four Sixes Ranch in Texas (which Sheridan owns) and tells the story of how the ranch has continued to operate in the same way today as it did over a century ago. That spin-off is currently on hold, however, as Sheridan has said he is assessing the ranch's heritage — as owner, from a front-row seat — to honor its history.
The showrunner has previously said he had several more Yellowstone prequels in the works. "[The prequels are] time capsules of life in Montana as a microcosm of the world as a whole," Sheridan told The Hollywood Reporter in June 2023. "They're big spectacles, and the more that you move into the modern era, the bigger that spectacle becomes. I know these are huge bets Paramount makes on me every time. I'm asking them to give me Game of Thrones Season 6 money for what is essentially a pilot every year, and that's a big ask. As long as I do my job well, and people don't bore of the genre, I think there will be enough for many more [prequels] — three or four."
Yellowstone Season 5 cast
Kevin Costner did not appear in the second half of the season, but Season 5 brought a mix of familiar and new faces to the ranch. Josh Lucas returned as young John Dutton for the first time since Season 3. He was joined by Kylie Rogers as young Beth and Kyle Red Silverstein as young Rip. Jacki Weaver also returned as the Duttons' latest business foe, Market Equities CEO Caroline Warner, with Mo Brings Plenty and Wendy Moniz promoted to series regulars as Thomas Rainwater's (Gil Birmingham) right-hand man Mo and governor-turned-senator Lynelle Perry, respectively.
Four new characters arrived on Yellowstone as well. Kai Caster played a young cowboy named Rowdy. Lainey Wilson played a musician, Abby. Lilli Kai played Clara Brewer, Gov. Dutton's new assistant. And 1883's Dawn Olivieri joined the cast as Sarah Atwood, a Montana newcomer and "corporate shark" who has attached herself to Jamie.
Before the season premiered, it was announced that Kathryn Kelly, who plays Jimmy's fiancée, Emily, had also been promoted to series regular and returned to the show alongside Jefferson White as Jimmy.
After four seasons of manipulation, scheming, and fighting for power against the backdrop Montana's relatively untouched beauty, new governor John Dutton began the season calling the shots, with Beth (Kelly Reilly) running the show behind him.
Yellowstone Season 5 picked up after the bloody events of the Season 4 finale; Beth (Kelly Reilly), who we all know is the real brains behind every operation on the Yellowstone-Dutton Ranch, manipulated her adopted brother Jamie (Wes Bentley) into killing his biological father, Garrett (Will Patton). After it was revealed that Garrett was the one who ordered the attempted hits on John, Beth, and Kayce (Luke Grimes) back in Season 3, Beth figured he had it coming. She also made sure to hang onto the evidence, so now she's got Jamie under her thumb and out of the governor's race, clearing the way for their father to be the only Dutton running for office. She also just got hitched to Rip Wheeler (Cole Hauser) and watched her father's new, confusing vegan special friend (Piper Perabo) head off to jail, so basically, it's Beth's world and everyone else is just living in it.
Complicating Beth's quest for world/Montana domination was the fact that Kayce had been on a heck of a spiritual journey that showed him a vision of two paths. At least one of those paths, as he told Monica (Kelsey Asbille), would result in "the end of us."
Yellowstone went BIG for the Season 5 Part 2 premiere. CBS aired the episode at 10/9c on Nov. 10, just hours after it premiered on Paramount Network. The move was obviously a play to get as many eyeballs on the show's return as possible, and CBS is no stranger to the series, having aired its first three seasons during the actors and writers strikes of summer 2023.
In its first week on CBS, Yellowstonedrew 6.6 million viewers, much more than the 2.8 million who tuned into the series premiere when it debuted on Paramount Network back in 2018. (As the audience grew, episodes on Paramount Network peaked at almost 10 million viewers.)
30 fun facts about Yellowstone
If you think you're a fan of Yellowstone but want to become a super fan, then check out TV Guide's compilation of 30 (and counting) fun facts and behind-the-scenes secrets about the show, including how you can visit the real Dutton ranch and what it takes to be a cowboy on a Taylor Sheridan show.
