Why isn’t Kevin Costner in the new fifth season episode of “Yellowstone”?

Picture this: you’re watching the show Yellowstone – particularly part two of season five – and wonder if, when and how much Kevin Costner will grumble and growl across your screen. If you want a guaranteed look at our boy Kevy Costmeister, you’ll have to turn to Max and tune in Horizon part 1because that’s what he filmed when they made this particular volume Yellowstone episodes. It’s a good film, although it wears a very different hat than the one we’re used to from John Dutton.

For those of you who are dealing with all of this right now Yellowstone V. Costner drama, here’s a rundown of the whole story, or at least everything we know about the state of affairs with the patriarch of the Dutton family.

Yellowstone is famously written by a lonely man named Taylor Sheridan who refuses to accept help. The problem, of course, is that Sheridan is now the sole writer of multiple series, and writing five bajillion television episodes a year takes time, no matter how good you are at riding. According to Costner, Sheridan was not present for the finale when he was available to film Yellowstone The scripts were finished, so they missed their valuable Costner window.

According to Costner, he did. During a child support hearing in September 2023, reported by PeopleHe told the court that he had already changed his schedule for filming the first half of season five, noting, “This is a big deal in this world.” Costner’s horizon is a $35 million self-funded passion project Yellowstone has already been delayed – the first half of season five premiered in November 2022! Both projects involved many people who also have lives and schedules to keep. And honestly, by the time this all came to light, relations between Team Costner and Team Sheridan had already deteriorated, making further concessions unlikely.

Oh darling, that’s what we’re having for dinner. In February 2023, when the first reports about it emerged Yellowstone As we know, it would end after the fifth season, sources said deadline that Costner was only willing to spend a single week filming the final episodes. Costner’s team was outraged when his trial attorney, Marty Singer, told Puck, “The idea that Kevin was only willing to spend a week working on the second half of Yellowstone’s fifth season is an absolute lie,” in the same issue of Puck It was pointed out that Costner’s longtime assistant and collaborator Glenn Kleczkowski had posted (and then deleted) harsh criticism of another Sheridan show several months earlier. Tulsa King, on Instagram: “Stay Western, bro. You don’t know SHIT about THIS life. Stay in your lane, country boy. I’m actually ashamed of you as a writer and creator.” Hoo boy!

Details continued to emerge that clearly intended to portray Costner as a Divo whose unreasonableness was stifling production. He wanted to have “veto power”. Yellowstone In the scripts, he had a “moral death” clause in his contract that didn’t allow them to kill John Dutton in a way that Costner found personally embarrassing, and then he contracted COVID-19 during production, which limited its availability again.

Still, some hope remained when Sheridan addressed the drama in one Hollywood Reporter Profile in June 2023. “My opinion of Kevin as an actor hasn’t changed,” he said, adding: “Once lawyers get involved, people can’t talk to each other and start saying things that aren’t true .” and try to shift the blame to the reaction of the press or the public.” He even gave Costner credit for how he handled the bad press: “He took the piss out of a lot of it, and I don’t know that Someone deserved it.”

Did he! The press tour for horizon was for the ages, as each Costner appearance brought us new knowledge of the Oscar-winning film star. It started positively, the actor said Entertainment tonight in April 2024 that he would apparently be willing to return to the show. “I thought I would do seven seasons, but right now we are at five,” he said. “So how it works out – I hope it works out – but there are a lot of different shows going on. Maybe it will be like that. Maybe I’ll remember that again. If that’s the case and I’m really comfortable with it, I’d like to do it.”

Later, in May, he gave deadline in a bit more detail in a profanity-laden interview full of shady gems like “Writing is really hard, I get it.” When asked if it was horizon That made it impossible for him to finish any more of it Yellowstonehe was clear: “That’s not true. There were periods where we couldn’t finish 10 episodes. Basically we started in April and May and usually continued through August. We did 10. We didn’t even manage 10 in that time. I only worked 43 days. So that’s nonsense. That’s a lie. That’s not correct.”

He also cleared up the rumor that he was only willing to work for a week: “There were no scripts. I said, “If you want to finish this gracefully, the best I can do is give you a week.” And if you can think of a storyline…” I usually work six or seven days at a time, whatever it may be. And they picked up on that and a source on their site deduced this: Well, he just wants to work for a whole season for a week. Do you think that’s me? I’ve never missed a day of work. I never left before fulfilling my contractual obligations. I often stay as long as I can. In fact, I worked nine days just to try to help them in July when I started [Horizon] August 1st. I worked for them one Saturday and Sunday and they needed four more days.”

We won’t find out until the show premieres on Sunday night. While Costner is featured in the trailer for upcoming episodes, it’s unclear whether this is reused footage or new scenes, or just moments on set where he randomly turned around and mumbled things. Will he be a force ghost? A CGI monstrosity? A guy we just never see again after an off-screen death? We’ll just have to tune in to find out.

As we know it, yes. While a revised sixth season is being negotiated, Kelly Reilly told New York Just this week that when it comes to her character Beth Dutton, she’s ready to move on and that she’s also “very happy to let her go.” But don’t worry. The Taylor Sheridan universe is constantly expanding, so you’ll have a lot of grizzled dudes on horses making cultural commentary in the future.