At the end of Yellowstone season 5, John’s kids, Beth (Kelly Reilly) and Kayce (Luke Grimes), trade in their family’s legacy to protect it, with John’s son selling the Yellowstone Ranch to the Broken Rock Tribe, the ultimate preservationists. Kayce’s decision brought Yellowstone full circle, fulfilling Taylor Sheridan’s prophecy in 1883 that said the Duttons would give the land back to the ancestors of its Indigenous stewards. Still, some elements of Yellowstone season 1 stand out now that the series has concluded.

8. Jamie Dutton Was The Best Lawyer For The Yellowstone Ranch

Jamie Dutton Dies In Yellowstone Season 5 After Betraying The Family

Of course, Jamie doesn’t subscribe to the family’s commitment to preserving the land like his father and siblings, one of the many reasons that Jamie becomes an antagonist as Yellowstone progresses. Still, despite having a different vision, Jamie is happy to please his father and follow through on orders successfully and without question until Beth’s arrival. Beth is hostile toward Jamie, disrupting his status quo in tandem with Lee Dutton’s (Dale Annable) death.

7. Taylor Sheridan Dropped Monica’s Storyline As A Teacher In Yellowstone

Monica’s Life Outside The Ranch’s Drama Is Non-Existent By Yellowstone Season 5

In Yellowstone season 1, Monica Long-Dutton (Kelsey Asbille) has a robust story outside of life on the Yellowstone Dutton Ranch. Kayce’s wife is a teacher at the school on the Broken Rock Reservation, which gives her purpose and fulfillment outside of her ties to Kayce’s family. While Monica is ultimately assaulted by a student at school, injuring her and shaking her career, she perseveres, taking on a career as a college lecturer while maintaining her commitment to her students.

We don’t hear anything about Monica’s teaching storyline after Yellowstone season 2. Amid this transition, Monica also becomes emotionally unstable after Tate’s (Brecken Merrill) kidnapping, fighting with her husband about their role in his family’s operations. Ultimately, Taylor Sheridan missed an opportunity to further develop Monica’s story outside the Dutton family’s war, showing what’s at stake for the Broken Rock Tribe’s most represented member.

6. Yellowstone Never Follows Up On Thomas Rainwater’s Backstory

We Don’t Learn More About Thomas Rainwater Before Yellowstone Season 5

Thomas Rainwater’s story also could have been fleshed out more to better round out Yellowstone and its message. In Yellowstone’s premiere, Rainwater tells a Montana senator that he believed he was Mexican until he was 18, only learning about his Native American heritage after his adoption records were unsealed. When Thomas threatens John Dutton in Yellowstone season 1, we learn about his extensive business background, attending Harvard before working at Merril Lynch.

5. John & Tate Never Get A Proper Goodbye

Tate Was A Significant Source Of Peace For John Dutton

Rewatching Yellowstone season 1 is a reminder of how much John Dutton’s grandson meant to him. In Yellowstone’s series premiere, John asks Kayce to spend more time with his grandson, likening quality time with his kin to a salve that would heal the perils he faces protecting the ranch. While Kayce hesitates to let his father get to know his son, John and Tate develop a relationship in Yellowstone season 1 that is vital to both parties.

4. John Dutton Asked Too Much Of His Kids

Yellowstone Season 5 Shows Us How That Ends

As Kayce says in Yellowstone’s premiere, another harsh reality of looking at the show from the beginning is that John Dutton asked too much of his kids. Rewatching Yellowstone season 1, episode 1, reminds the audience of this truth. Kayce’s conversation with his brothers, Jamie and Lee, reveals that John’s youngest son was so affected by the father’s words that he permanently moved away from the ranch.

Kayce’s remarks about John’s expectations are validated as Yellowstone progresses. Despite Kayce’s reluctance to open back up to his family, John eventually persuades Kayce to take over as the ranch’s foreman and assume his role as Livestock Commissioner. Additionally, Jamie blames John for making him into a lawyer, and Beth’s mission to please her father causes her cognitive dissonance until John Dutton’s death in Yellowstone season 5.

3. Kayce & Monica Wanted Another Child For 5 Seasons

The Realization Makes Monica’s Loss In Yellowstone Season 5 All The More Heartbreaking

Rewatching Yellowstone season 1 is a reminder that Kayce and Monica have wanted another child since the series began. However, throughout five seasons of the original show, Kayce and Monica never welcomed another child. In the premiere, the Yellowstone power couple discusses having more offspring, since Monica does not want to see Tate leave the nest, and Kayce suggests they have more children to offset the loss.

Knowing that Kayce and Monica have wanted another child for at least seven years is all the more devastating in the context of the whole show. In Yellowstone season 5’s premiere, Monica is pregnant with her second son, John Dutton IV. Monica’s baby dies when she gets into a car accident on her way to the hospital, and season 1’s context shows how many years of hopes and dreams this event crushed for Kayce and Monica.

2. Monica Loses Her Family In Yellowstone Season 1

Monica Is Surrounded By The Duttons By The End Of Yellowstone

By Yellowstone season 5, Monica has lost her whole family, except for her immediate clan and her grandfather, Felix (Rudy Ramos). Monica begins to lose her kin in Yellowstone’s premiere, when a range war between the ranch and her tribe causes a hostile conflict, ultimately forcing Kayce to shoot Monica’s brother, Robert Long (Jeremiah Bitsui), in self-defense. After Robert dies, his wife shoots herself, and the loss of Monica’s relatives contextualizes why Kayce’s wife has so much trouble adjusting afterward.

1. Yellowstone Is More Dramatic Than Its Counterparts

1883 & 1923 Strike A Different Tone

Looking back at Yellowstone’s earliest scenes, it’s clear that Taylor Sheridan’s original series has more melodrama than its successors. After Yellowstone became one of the biggest television shows, Sheridan followed it with two prequels, 1883 and 1923, which detailed life on the ranch for John’s ancestors. While Yellowstone became an instant classic with subversive neo-Western themes, some would argue that 1883 and 1923 are better than Yellowstone.

Yellowstone’s spinoffs have more traditional Western elements and are more sophisticated in their plights and drama. Therefore, where the prequels are more universally highly regarded, Yellowstone is sometimes equated to a soap opera despite its popularity. Rewatching season 1 reminds audiences that Sheridan’s original series leaned into exaggerated moments from the start, with the earliest conversations between Yellowstone’s characters sometimes missing the mark that shows like 1883 raised the bar with.