Josh Brolin Doesn’t Like Comparing His Outer Range Series to Yellowstone

While Josh Brolin might be best known for his roles in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Dune, the actor recently made his return to television in a major way with Prime Video’s Outer Range. The science fiction series utilizes Western elements to tell an incredibly unique story, and it seems like the series has become successful upon its debut earlier this year. Of course, the show’s Western exterior has led to comparisons to Yellowstone, Paramount Network’s smash hit series that has spawned its own cinematic universe, and has been regarded by some as reigniting the Western genre. Brolin recently addressed those comparisons in an interview with Variety, arguing that Outer Range isn’t deliberately piggybacking off of Yellowstone.

“Yellowstone was the first – like we were with True Grit – in bringing back the Western, and that’s a great thing. If you piggyback on that trend, you feel like you are piggybacking,” he says. “But if you are coming with something within the genre that’s wholly original, then you feel good about it. There’s nothing other than horses and cowboy hats and maybe warring families in Outer Range that reminds me of Yellowstone.“

“I never want to do anything straightforward,” Brolin said elsewhere in the interview. “I find it boring. This felt like a major swing and it had all the room to fail, and I like those odds.”

Outer Range centers on Royal Abbott (Josh Brolin), a rancher fighting for his land and family, who discovers an unfathomable mystery at the edge of Wyoming’s wilderness. A thrilling Western family saga with hints of wry humor and supernatural mystery, Outer Range examines how we grapple with the unknown. At the onset of the series, the Abbotts are coping with the disappearance of daughter-in-law Rebecca. They are pushed further to the brink when the Tillersons (the gaudy owners of the neighboring profit-driven ranch) make a play for their land. An untimely death in the community sets off a chain of tension-filled events, and seemingly small-town, soil-bound troubles come to a head with the arrival of a mysterious black void in the Abbotts’ west pasture. Wild revelations unfold as Royal fights to protect his family; through his eyes, we begin to see how time contains secrets held in the past and unsettling mysteries foreshadowed.

The Outer Range cast includes Josh Brolin (Milk), Imogen Poots (I Know This Much is True), Lili Taylor (Perry Mason), Tamara Podemski (Four Sheets to the Wind), Lewis Pullman (Top Gun: Maverick), Tom Pelphrey (Ozark), Noah Reid (Schitt’s Creek), Shaun Sipos (Krypton), Isabel Arraiza (The Little Things), Olive Abercrombie (The Haunting of Hill House), and Will Patton (Yellowstone).

What do you think of the comparisons between Outer Range and Yellowstone? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!