New Taylor Sheridan Western Show Just Beat Yellowstone With 1 Shocking Rotten Tomatoes Record
Taylor Sheridan's new popular Western series Lawmen: Bass Reeves has already broken an impressive Yellowstone record after just one season.
- Lawmen: Bass Reeves has received critical acclaim and has surpassed Yellowstone and its spinoffs in terms of audience score on Rotten Tomatoes.
- The series has aired six of its eight episodes and is not expected to continue with Reeves as the main protagonist, instead becoming an anthology series with new characters and narratives.
- Extending Bass Reeves’ story into a second season might be worth considering due to its popularity and potential for massive success.
Taylor Sheridan’s new Western series Lawmen: Bass Reeves has surprisingly outranked Yellowstone and its spinoffs in one key category. The new Paramount+ series starring David Oyelowo as the real-life Old West lawman Bass Reeves has received critical acclaim after premiering on November 5, 2023. With all of the dramatic shifts that Yellowstone has undergone throughout 2023, Lawmen: Bass Reeves has provided somewhat of a relief to fans who are eager to see how Sheridan’s celebrated Yellowstone series will finally come to an end.
Lawmen: Bass Reeves has currently aired six of its eight episodes as of the time of writing and is not expected to continue into a second season with Reeves as the main protagonist. Recent reports have stated that Lawmen will instead become an anthology series with new characters, cast members, and narratives similar to HBO’s True Detective if the series is picked up for season 2. It would portray different American lawmen throughout different eras of United States history, meaning that the next installment of the Lawmen series could take place during a more recent era.
Lawmen: Bass Reeves Has A Higher Rotten Tomatoes Audience Score Than Yellowstone
Despite Yellowstone being a phenomenal success, Lawmen: Bass Reeves has outranked it and its two prequel spinoff series in one key metric. Lawmen: Bass Reeves’ audience score on Rotten Tomatoes far surpasses any of the previous Yellowstone installments at an impressive 96%. Yellowstone, which has a Rotten Tomatoes critic score of 84%, surprisingly has only a 76% audience score on the platform, while 1883 and 1923 have an audience score of 82% and 54%, respectively.
Lawmen: Bass Reeves’ staggering 96% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes indicates that it may have just as much potential for massive success as the original Yellowstone
How Sheridan’s Lawmen Anthology Series Could Surpass Yellowstone’s Legacy
Lawmen: Bass Reeves has already proven to be a hit for Sheridan, Oyelowo, and Paramount out of the gate, becoming the most streamed series of Paramount+ in 2023. Lawmen has seemed to have benefited from the absence of the planned Yellowstone season 5 part 2, which was expected earlier this year to air around this time. At first glance, the Lawmen anthology concept seems like it has no limits and could run continuously for as many as 8-10 seasons by seamlessly transferring the role of the law-abiding protagonist. Alternatively, fans have made it clear just how much they like the characters, setting, and storylines of Lawmen: Bass Reeves as it currently stands.
With such a high Rotten Tomatoes audience score and a record-breaking viewership, Paramount+, Oyelowo, and Sheridan seem to have found another winning formula that could surpass the legacy of Yellowstone. The decision of whether to expand Lawmen into an anthology series or keep it contained within the world of Bass Reeves is a critical one that will likely make or break the success of the series altogether. The high Rotten Tomatoes audience score for Lawmen: Bass Reeves after just one season could reevaluate whether ending Bass Reeves’ story is truly in the best interest of the series moving forward.
