NEW UPDATE: Yellowstone Fans Dealt Yet Another Blow About Season 5, Part 2

Yellowstone is Paramount’s successful Western drama that follows the real-life Dutton family, who own and operate the Yellowstone Dutton Ranch, the largest ranch in the state of Montana. The fan-favorite series premiered in 2018 and features frontrunner Kevin Costner, who plays the one and only John Dutton III, the six-generation patriarch of the Dutton family. Throughout the series, John and his family are constantly protecting the Yellowstone ranch from those attempting to take their land, including an Indian reservation and wealthy land developers.

Season 5 of Yellowstone kicked off with a two-hour premiere in November 2022 on the Paramount Network. We saw the first eight episodes and an explosive mid-season 5 finale on January 1, 2023. In an interview with Entertainment Tonight in September 2022, Sheridan teased that more characters will die in Season 5. “If you look at everyone as a chess piece, in Season 5 it is impossible to keep playing the game without taking pieces off the board,” he told the outlet.

Without revealing Yellowstone Season 5 spoilers, the mid-season finale focuses on the rivalry between John, Beth Dutton (Kelly Reilly) and Jamie Dutton (Wes Bently). Bentley spoke with Entertainment Weekly in February 2023 about what could happen with the estranged siblings moving forward. “We’ve got something coming. We’re both threatening each other now in some serious ways,” Bentley told the entertainment site. “It’s a mystery to me too where it’s going. I just know this is an inflection point….Something major will come of this moment between Jamie and Beth. This is kind of the final straw. He didn’t much how much Beth was really fed up with him until really recently, and I think that is now flipped a switch in Jamie that he feels similarly.”

It would be an understatement to say that fans are dying to know when new episodes of Yellowstone are coming out. We’re sharing everything we know about the Yellowstone Season 5, Part 2 release date, including whether the neo-Western drama is ending after the fifth season.

When does Yellowstone return for Season 5, Part 2?

When does Yellowstone return for Season 5, part 2? According to Variety, the final episodes of Yellowstone Season 5 are scheduled to be released in November 2023, but the ongoing writers’ and actors’ strikes are making this timeline seem unlikely. Originally, the final episodes were supposed to air sometime during the summer of 2023, but drama around Kevin Costner’s exit and the ongoing writer’s strike pushed production. Now that the actors are on strike too, it’s unknown whether we’ll get the remaining episodes at all.

Luke Grimes, who plays Kayce Dutton on Yellowstone, gave an update on the status of filming in an interview with People (conducted before the actors’ strike). “We have not [started filming the second half of season 5] because of the writers strike,” Grimes confirmed to the site.”I think we would be if it weren’t for that. But that takes precedence over everything. They got to get that all sorted, and then we’ll be getting after it.”

On July 13, 2023, the national board of the Hollywood actors’ union SAG-AFTRA approved to strike. The union represents 160,000 television and movie actors. During the strike, actors are not allowed to work union jobs, promote their respective films and shows, attend press junkets and premieres and more. The actors’ strike comes two months after the WGA began their strike on May 2, 2023. The demands requested by the actors and writers are similar: They want better compensation for TV shows and movies, increased residual payments for their work on streaming services and regulations on artificial intelligence.

So, what do we know about the remaining episodes of Yellowstone? In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter in June 2023, Yellowstone creator Taylor Sheridan hinted that the six-episode second part of Season 5 might be expanded to 10. “If I think it takes 10 episodes to wrap it up, they’ll give me 10,” Sheridan said. “It’ll be as long as it needs to be.”

As for Costner’s involvement in the final episodes, it’s unknown whether he’ll return to finish the season. The Hollywood Reporter said that there are currently ongoing conversations to try to convince Costner to film a few scenes to wrap up his character, but the scripts are not yet completed. 

“I don’t do [beep]-you car crashes,” Sheridan said. “Whether [Dutton’s fate] inflates [Costner’s] ego or insults is collateral damage that I don’t factor in with regard to storytelling.”

In April 2023, the Yellowstone cast who attended PaleyFest confirmed that the second half of Season 5 “has not yet started filming and they have not been given a start date,” according to Variety. Costner, Sheridan and other Yellowstone cast members were noticeably absent from the event after it was previously confirmed that they would be attending.

Is Yellowstone ending after season 5?

Is Yellowstone ending after Season 5? Yes, Yellowstone is ending after Season 5. Our sister publication, Variety, reported on May 5, 2023, that Yellowstone will be ending after Season 5 and there will not be a sixth season of the successful Paramount series. “Yellowstone has been the cornerstone on which we have launched an entire universe of global hits – from 1883 to Tulsa King, and I am confident our Yellowstone sequel will be another big hit, thanks to the brilliant creative mind of Taylor Sheridan and our incredible casts who bring these shows to life,” said Chris McCarthy, president & CEO of Showtime and MTV Entertainment Studios, in a statement.

Instead, Yellowstone will be replaced with a sequel series, Paramount announced. The untitled series has been ordered and will debut on Paramount Network and Paramount+ in December (but we anticipate this project will be delayed as well). In The Hollywood Reporter interview, Sheridan also spoke about the Yellowstone sequel series which is in talks to star Matthew McConaughey (who is currently in the late stages of negotiations). “He [McConaughey] seems like a natural fit,” Sheridan described. “We had a few conversations over the years, and spitballed a few ideas. Then he started watching Yellowstone and responded to it. He was like, ‘I want to do that.’ And by ‘that’ he meant diving into a raw world clashing up against the modern world. And then I said, ‘Buddy, that we can do.’”

While previous reports said that the new spin-off prequel series will star the same cast of Yellowstone, Sheridan hinted that may not be the case. In fact, it might rely on an entirely new cast and location. “My idea of a spinoff is the same as my idea of a prequel — read into that what you will,” he said of the matter.

The Kevin Costner Yellowsone drama timeline began in February 2023, when Deadline reported that “Costner, who had originally limited himself to 65 days of shooting on Yellowstone, only wanted to shoot for 50 days for the first part of the current season.” This scheduling conflict supposedly impacted the second batch of episodes in the show’s current fifth season, as Costner “only wanted to spend a week shooting.” 

Costner’s lawyer, Marty Singer, told Puck.News in February 2023 that reports that “Kevin was only willing to work one week on the second half of Season 5 of Yellowstone is an absolute lie.” Singer also called the allegations “ridiculous — and anyone suggesting it shouldn’t be believed for one second.” While nothing has been confirmed by Paramount, a spokesperson from the network also told Deadline in February 2023 that they hope Costner will be a part of the show moving forward. “We have no news to report. Kevin Costner is a big part of Yellowstone and we hope that’s the case for a long time to come.”

Costner currently has his hands full directing and starring in the Western “epic” Horizon, a four-part feature film spearheaed by Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema. Horizon has a demanding shooting schedule of 220 days, which could be impacting the actor’s already jam-packed schedule.