‘Yellowstone’ Finds Kevin Costner Fighting Turf Wars in Montana Wilderness

Alci Rengifo

The great American wilds have always been the setting for epic drama. Paramount’s “Yellowstone” is part old school western and part modern tycoon soap opera. Kevin Costner now joins the roster of television patriarchs who own immense estates and lord over squabbling children. But this show places these characters in a grand landscape of vast horizons and blood feuds, where politics mingle with colonial history and roaming cattle can provoke deadly firefights.

Costner plays John Dutton, owner of the largest ranch in Montana, which grants him great wealth and influence. His life is anything but leisurely and at heart he’s a rough cowboy, fighting off real estate developers seeking to gentrify the area. One of the rich developers already eyeing much territory is Dan Jenkins (Danny Huston), who salivates at the prospect of making a killing off the beautiful landscapes. Dutton also has tense relations with the local Native American community, which has a new leader in casino owner Thomas Rainwater (Gil Birmingham), who likes to stoke historical memory by reminding the Indian community of their history of oppression. Dutton’s own children are grown and stay close, including Jamie (Wes Bentley), a lawyer with political ambitions,  Beth (Kelly Reilly), a ruthless business representative and Lee (Dave Annable), who takes after dad and works on the ranch. Dutton’s other cowboy son is Kayce (Luke Grimes), who keeps his distance and lives on a reservation with his Native American wife, Monica (Kelsey Asbille). Tensions flare when some Native American ranchers tear down a fence Dutton had erected, provoking a stand-off over migrating cattle. A shoot out erupts, resulting in Lee being killed and Kayce shooting his own brother-in-law, with the hope of helping his brother.

The season premiere, titled “Daybreak,” follows the recent tradition of opening shows with behemoth, 2-hour episodes. But the visual scope of the show justifies the technique considering it is aiming for epic drama. This is Paramount’s first attempt at a big, Peak TV series, following the recent, respectable miniseries, “Waco.” The writer and creator, Taylor Sheridan, is one of the key architects of a new approach for the western. He wrote the Oscar-nominated “Hell or High Water,” about West Texas brothers turning to crime to save their farm. Sheridan also penned 2015’s “Sicario,” about the drug war in Mexico. With “Yellowstone” he is aiming high for the kind of near-melodrama you get in movies like “Giant” and “Legends of the Fall,” but combined with his gritty, modern feel for contemporary issues. Old western sensibilities mingle with the urgent theme of gentrification, corporate takeover of land and water. In one scene Kayce takes his kid out for ice cream at a new, trendy spot and admits these outsiders know how to make a good snack, but they remain outsiders to him. This theme adds an interesting complexity to Dutton himself, because Sheridan challenges us to flirt with supporting the man, even as he practices cynical, heavy-handed tactics towards the Native Americans. On the one hand he wants to protect the territory from greedy suits, but on the other his own relations with the Indians are not exactly admirable.

“Daybreak” gets off to a slow, but interesting start. As with most pilots it’s all about the exposition. The world of Dutton is established in detail as we go inside his ranch and its vast, oak interiors. A recurring image is the ranch head flying into place or situations in his helicopter, marked with his official brand. Speaking of brands, apparently Montana power players require their henchmen to literally be branded like cattle. Enforcer Rip Wheeler (Cole Hauser) recruits a scrawny loser and holds the brand forth, showing him his own proud mark before carrying out the duty. But this is great stuff right out of a good, red-blooded paperback. In a strange way “Yellowstone” has a kinship with recent shows like “Succession” and “Trust,” where the very lifestyle of powerful men becomes the main character. There’s more frontier violence and tension here, but Kevin Costner’s Dutton is similar to Donald Sutherland’s J.Paul Getty or Brian Cox’s Logan Roy. They command fear and respect, they barely notice the scope of their resources because they are so busy trying to beat their opponents. Costner plays the role with a subdued aura of intimidation. He conjures Dutton like a man who has little need to show off. He is serious about his legacy, almost beyond greed.

In “Yellowstone” the offspring have a soap opera flare as Beth spends her time doing corporate power plays, then declaring loyalty to dad. She has little need for men and when her hook up asks if she would like to actually go out somewhere, Beth cruelly mocks him before walking away. Kayce is the required black sheep, living with his Indian wife and almost siding with the enemy, until a shootout forces him to side with his own blood. Jamie will no doubt evolve as the suit-wearing outsider who can never quite relate to Dutton and Kayce’s rancher ways. The supporting roles are memorable. Danny Huston is a natural at playing nefarious power players, oozing his usual reptilian malevolence.

“Daybreak” simply introduces everything with two hours of widescreen vistas and boiling emotions. Even the music by Brian Tyler sweeps and soars with western romanticism, especially during one shot where Kayce embraces Monica to the swirling winds of a departing helicopter. It offers more of the same when it comes to tycoons on TV, but with a welcome change of genre and locale. With shorter episodes it could turn into quite the entertainment. It is a big show with large potential.

“Yellowstone” season one premieres June 20 and airs Wednesdays at 10 p.m. ET on Paramount.