Now in its fifth season, Paramount Network’s Yellowstone may be one of the most popular shows on television, but for the Dutton family, things are more complicated than ever on the ranch. There are more outside challenges than ever before for the Duttons and the Yellowstone and even with John Dutton now the governor offering some level of protection from those increasing threats, the position gets more and more precarious all the time. And with the series this deep in, some fans think that it could be starting to wind down and lead to its narrative conclusion — which in turn has led to an interesting fan theory about who some fans think will come out on top in the end and it may not be someone you expect.
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A fan theory shared on Reddit’s Yellowstone fan subreddit suggests that, in the end, ownership of the Yellowstone ranch and land will end up going to Jamie (Wes Bentley). The primary crux of the theory is pretty simple: Jamie is the member of the family who functions as the family fixer, the keeper of all the secrets and as the person who knows all those secrets combined with the fact that he hasn’t always been treated very well by the rest of the family, it puts him in a position to be the ultimate victor when everything comes down.
“Think about it for a minute and play it out in your head,” the theorist writes. “Who do they always turn to when they need to be bailed out of a legal situation? Who knows all their secrets? Jamie is highly educated and extremely good with the law. He understands contracts, state/federal/local laws, environmental law, real estate law, tax law, etc. Jamie has the knowledge to eventually take it ALL! He will find some way to bind up that ranch and hold it over Beth’s head. Whatever he schemes up, it will be ironclad, and they won’t be able to do anything about it.”
It’s an intriguing theory and one that most fans seem to generally agree with in terms of Jamie ending up the ultimate victor, some think that the actual way it will go down will probably be a bit different. These fans point to something series creator Taylor Sheridan previously said about a clue to the ending being in the first five minutes of the series pilot. That pilot saw John kill a horse and also saw Kayce move a stray horse away from the drilling site. The symbolism here, at least for some fans, is that Kayce is moving away from the family in a sense and that in the end, John will have to “put down” the ranch, creating the opportunity for Jamie to take charge. Fans also suggest that however Jamie ends up the victor, when he does take control, he will likely return the land to the Native Americans, nodding back to something in 1883 where it’s mentioned that the land will resort to the tribe by the seventh generation — and some fans see this as the most possible ending as it would dissolve the Dutton dynasty, letting Jamie have his freedom.
Ultimately, there’s no real way to tell exactly how Yellowstone will end up, but the idea that Jamie will end up taking it all either for himself or to return it to the tribe and be done with the legacy once and for all is an intriguing one, especially as things get more and more complicated for everyone as Season 5. Of course, things have gotten increasingly complicated for Jamie as well. Fans will just have to keep tuning into see if their theory is right — or if there are more twists still to come.
What do you think? Do you think Jamie will ultimately the “victor” of Yellowstone? Let us know your thoughts in the comment section!