The dinner table returns. The motif, the Dutton family’s ebbing presence and absence around the ranch’s dining table, has been used each season on Yellowstone, sometimes to show division, other times to signal reunion. In Season 5, Episode 5, the dinner table is used to exorcise some of the series’ philosophical conflicts, mostly involving the clash between cultures we’ve seen these past couple seasons—the two ways of American life, represented by the Duttons and by Summer—between Montana and California, between red and blue America, between people who watch Yellowstone and people who probably don’t.
The episode is (mostly) quieter than previous ones, and it feels more like a meditation on American values than a series of scenes meant to push Yellowstone’s story forward. (That said, we expect the following episodes to be especially dramatic, given the somber tone of Episode 5; it’s preparing us for something.)
We might as well get the bare bones recap out of the way first before discussing some of the themes the episode hopes to wrap around its fifth season.
First, the plot.
The ranch rides out to gather cattle for branding, a yearly exercise that is remembered first by Beth, who recalls saying goodbye to Rip during the same event decades ago. The episode moves toward the present-day goodbye, when everyone, including John, who has decided to take a break from Helena, rides out in the early morning. Before this ride, the family gathers at the ranch. Kayce, Monica, and Tate join despite Kayce’s growing distance from the Dutton side of his family. Both Carter and Beth also decide to join, Carter for cowboy reasons and Beth as a kind of penance—all season she has been reevaluating her childhood, which includes her fraught relationship with her mother (whose death, by means of a horse, was partially due to Beth) and her treatment of a young Rip. (We suspect the Beth-centric nature of this season signals some impending doom.) Also joining the cattle-herding party is John’s assistant. Notable absences include Jamie (because: fuck him, we guess?) and Summer, who is the episode’s focus.
Summer Higgins, released from prison (though, not granted clemency) in order to help John better understand the environmentalist pressures on his ranch and office, finds herself among wolves. She’s the guest in the Duttons’ house where meat is served like water. Summer makes snarky comments to the Dutton chef—who appears occasionally on the show and should really be recognized for his hard work; the Duttons never seem to actually eat anything, their meals mostly ending prematurely with some fight. During this dinner, the fight is between Beth and Summer. They leave the table and kick the shit out of each other in the front yard. Rip goes out to scold them, telling Beth she’s setting a terrible example (fighting is his job, apparently) and telling Summer not to insult her hosts. Rip’s talk is something like a bipartisan’s wet dream for Congress, where everyone puts aside their differences and uses civility to argue their point. Anyway, Summer returns to the table and eats mashed potatoes—some kind of victory over veganism. (The potatoes have butter.) Beth spits out a tooth.
And that’s pretty much the episode. Jamie gets a visit from Sarah who continues to seduce him even though Jamie claims to understand her ploy—to use their relationship as a means to force Jamie to recuse himself from the case. After that, we return to the awkward Dutton dinner. The next morning, the cowboys all ride out. Monica and Summer watch them leave. Monica cries.
(Oh, and that song played when Beth drives up to the ranch: “Interwine” by Senora May. We immediately looked it up, too. It’s a banger. Carry on.)
Yeehaw Cowboy Shit
While not much happens narratively in Episode 5, lots of stuff goes down thematically.
The series has consistently set up a tension between Montana’s environmentalists and the state’s ranch owners. That tension has always felt like something of a false dichotomy; we suspect family-run ranching is not really the target of these environmentalist groups. But, anyway, this seems to be the ideological divide the series is committed to exploring—with Summer playing the role of staunch eco-Nazi and the Duttons playing the role of didactic farmers.
Early in the episode, Beth warns John that Summer is no different from any land developer, given that she’s also just trying to wrestle the land away from the Duttons; Summer, like the rest, is simply a threat. John wants Summer to help him understand why environmentalists are up his ass about wolves and land and everything else. Summer, so far, has been able to clarify nothing—mostly because her own position is a laughable strawman of animal activism, but also because no one in the Dutton household cares to listen. We suspect she’ll have a sort of come-to-Jesus moment next episode where she realizes how the Duttons are actually the stewards of Montana wildlife and cattle production. (Honestly, we’re not really sure what’s supposed to be odious about the Duttons’ ranching practices—and most of us watching are coastal NYC liberals. We think Summer is just stupid.)
The episode’s commentary about labor and animal ethics then turns to a discussion about masculinity and leadership. John bemoans the state of politics in America where everything is run by “cowards.” Coward laws, victim culture, legal trickery—that’s what’s ruining things. No one stands by their word. No one has a spine. Actions are dictated by a slave morality that asks us to reject life in favor of meek servitude. Oh wait, sorry, that’s Nietzsche. Let’s get back to John Dutton: Basically, America is run by a bunch of beta pussies.
John thinks that the world should see how real leadership and ranching is done, so he invites some news crews to watch them brand cows.
We’ll see how that turns out next week. Disastrous—we suspect.
Assistant Editor
Joshua St Clair is an Assistant Editor at Men’s Health Magazine.
