A Central Character Meets a Gruesome Death as Fate of Ranch Is Revealed

Warning: This post contains spoilers for season 5, episode 14 of Yellowstone.

After five seasons, Yellowstone wrapped its series finale with twists, turns and a dramatic death.

When patriarch John Dutton (Kevin Costner) was killed in the premiere of season 5, part 2, his family members vowed to avenge his murder. In the series finale, daughter Beth Dutton (Kelly Reilly) delivered on her promise — to save the land and make those pay who killed her father.

The episode begins by brother Kayce Dutton (Luke Grimes) following through with the plan he devised in last week’s episode to sell the Yellowstone land to the Broken Rock Reservation.

When Kayce meets with High Chief Thomas Rainwater (Gil Birmingham), he explains that his family can’t afford the inheritance tax on the ranch.

“My vision told me of two paths. On one, my family. On the other, the ranch. I could only save one. I used to think that meant that one couldn’t be saved, but then I realized it only meant that I couldn’t save it…. But you can,” says Kayce.

He proposes an offer to Rainwater — to sell the land at the price it was worth when his ancestors took it for $1.25 an acre. “That’s what it sold for when they took it. And that’s the price I offer you.”

And he adds two conditions, that East Camp be kept for his family and that they never develop or sell Yellowstone. “We can’t sell our land, Kayce, we have laws that forbid it,” says Rainwater.

He promises Kayce he will respect the land. “It’s sacred and that is how we will treat it.”

“That’s all that I ask,” says Kayce. They both draw blood with their pocket knives and give them to one another. “We are brothers now,” says Rainwater. “To each other and to the land.”

Later, the family lays John to rest. During the small ceremony, Beth has a private moment between her and her father’s coffin where she says she hopes that he sees that she saved the land. “We won,” she whispers to the coffin. 

“Breaks my heart that I had to lose you to do it,” says Beth. “Gonna let you rest now, Daddy.”

At the end of the ceremony when Beth lays a flower on his grave, she whispers, “I will avenge you.”

She rushes back to the house, changes clothes and peels away in her car. An hour later, husband Rip Wheeler (Cole Hauser) realizes where she’s going. He starts racing after her but she gets to the house of her adoptive brother Jamie (Wes Bentley) before Rip.

Jamie returns home after delivering a speech where he vows to carry on the legacy of his father. Beth is waiting and knocks him over the head as she attacks him with pepper spray.

He begins viciously fighting her and punching her in the face. As he tries to wash out his eyes from the spray, she hits him over the head with a crow bar as he kicks her to the ground. 

Beth tells Jamie that they sold the land to the reservation and he reacts by kicking her in the face and putting her in a chokehold. “You know what you’re about to become? Another one of this family’s secrets,” Jamie says just as Rip comes in and saves Beth.

Before Rip can kill Jamie, Beth gets up and yells “wait” — as she walks over and stabs Jamie the heart.

She calls 911 while Rip disposes of his body and sets Jamie’s car on fire. The police think Beth went to Jamie’s house after he didn’t show up to their father’s funeral. According to the story Beth told the cops, they think that Jamie started beating her, she tried to fight him off and when she woke up and he was gone. 

The series ends with sentimental touches, including Beth walking through the empty family home as she moves to Dillon, Montana with Rip. Kayce takes his son Tate to buy cattle for the land where they’re going to live. As he leaves his family property, he refuses to keep the Yellowstone Dutton Ranch sign, to create something new of his own.

In the last moments, the voice of Elsa Dutton from 1883 reflects on the evolution of the Yellowstone land as members of the reservation move onto the property. Mo, Rainwater’s right hand man, stops children who are pushing over headstones of Dutton family members’ graves and puts them each back in place. “They protected this land, they died for this land, and this land is where they’ll stay,” he says.

The final scene shows Beth and Rip on their new property, enjoying what their new, quiet surroundings will bring — and setting up a potential spinoff of their new life in Dillon.

Yellowstone season 5 airs on Paramount Network.