‘1883’ Review: Taylor Sheridan’s ‘Yellowstone’ Prequel Has The Same Rugged Wrangle, But That Malick Voice Over Has Gotta Go

Taylor Sheridan has his empire growing on Paramount+ with several irons in the fire, and his shows continue to engage. The writer/director/showrunner/producer’s latest series is “1883,” a prequel series to his modern-day, Montana-set “Yellowstone” series on Paramount Network. If “Yellowstone” is about cowboys living on borrowed time—the final breed of their generation, making their last stand to fight progress and protect their way of ranch living—then “1883” transports back in time, nearly two decades after the Civil War ended, when the Wild Wild West began to fade but still left plenty of space and time for pioneers to carve out their own piece of America.  

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“Yellowstone” centers on a hard-nose patriarch, John Dutton (Kevin Costner), and his highly dysfunctional family (we often describe it as “The Godfather” in Montana), and 1883 centers on Dutton’s ancestors. Those forefathers are John Dutton’s great grandparents, Margaret and James Dutton, played by country music icons Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, and the biggest question you may have—can they act and can they lead a series on their own?—is a resounding (and surprising?) yes (and yes, they’ve acted a lot in the past, especially McGraw, but they’ve largely been supporting roles). Honestly, in this gritty, hardscrabble milieu of rugged frontierspeople trying to fight and hold on for what’s theirs, the two fit like a glove.

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They are not alone either, and are assisted by iconic American cowboy, “Tombstone” alum and living Marlboro Man, Sam Elliott, playing Shea Brennan, a brusque, tough-as-nails Civil War veteran and wagon master who has recently lost everything near and dear to him thanks to smallpox (this series so far makes a timely case for the creation of vaccines).

The Duttons, with their young son, John (Audie Rick, the father of John Dutton decades later) and headstrong teenage daughter Elsa (Isabel May, the series’ narrator), are determined pioneers in Texas, trying to figure out their next move. Wagonmaster Brennan and his trusty sidekick, Thomas (LaMonica Garrett), a Pinkerton agent (aka an American independent police force) have been entrusted with a job that pays: guiding a mass of European immigrants to Oregon so they can settle some land (Montana seems to be the final destination, obviously, given where “Yellowstone” is set, but that state isn’t even mentioned in the first few episodes).

The journey will be rough, dangerous; the Dutch and German immigrants, loosely led by the figurehead Josef (Marc Rissmann), are completely inexperienced, naïve, and not ready for the gruelling travails of this trip. Death will shadow this caravan every step of the way. Worse, there’s a sizable herd of longhorn cattle that the parade of immigrants and chaperons have to bring with them that makes the expedition even more severe.

Needing experienced men to accompany their party, Brennan eventually recruits the reluctant and taciturn Dutton patriarch James to go along for the journey, but there are many caveats. Unlike some of the men that eventually join Brennan’s wranglers, like the young, cocky cowboys Wade (James Landry Hébert), and Ennis (Eric Nelsen)—the latter of which is quickly taking a shine to the young Dutton daughter)—James Dutton ain’t an employee and ain’t getting paid. His homesteading dreams of making a living out west align him with Brennan for now but there’s no clear leader and the two men are constantly butting heads, even though there’s clearly a mutual sense of respect between them (a worthwhile tension that feels like best friends in the making, but a long, hard road of getting there).

Supporting characters include Billy Bob Thornton as a harsh Texas Marshal seen in some early episodes before the odyssey begins in earnest and Dawn Olivieri as Claire Dutton, James Dutton’s sister, and Emma Malouff as Mary Abel, Claire’s daughter, along for the emigration, but the show’s key players are the aforementioned group (Tom Hanks also shows up briefly in the second episode, in a post-Civil War flashback playing General George Meade, which perhaps speaks to the reach and influence of the “Yellowstone” brand).

The Oscar-nominated writer of “Hell or High Water,” Sheridan has his modus operandi and it doesn’t change too much (he directs the pilot and writes all the episodes so far). His stories are about people, their relationships to the land around them, and the way they are products of their environment (and he favors the weathered, harsh, and unforgiving environs of the Mid-West and the steely and hard-bitten people it has produced over the decades). Sheridan romances the West, the time of self-reliant people living off the land, and the supposed purity of these days, before progress, technology, and modern culture put us on a different path.

The interpersonal dramas he creates within these settings—the emotional complexities, bonds, and loyalties of family, the interlopers on the outside, the jockeying for power plays, and the stubborn men who breed like wildfire in these places—is familiar, though never formulaic. The West, the Old West, The Mid-West, and the Wild West are all locales he seems to innately understand, and its subtleties, distinctions, and nuances are rich territories to play in.

The biggest miscalculation in “1883” is Elsa’s would-be poetic voiceover seemingly ripped right out of the pages of Linda Manz’s voiceover from Terrence Malick’s “Days Of Heaven” (1978). While making the entire perspective of the show come from a feminine POV—Elsa’s teenage worldview and how she admires her father and mother but is also curious about the world around her—is a nice way for Sheridan to switch up the mien of his generally craggy, manly, macho worlds, the voiceover itself is just a little too gossamer and precious. More importantly, it’s just extraneous and eye-roll-inducing—every time May’s Elsa begins her hushed and breathy soliloquies about the beautiful, but horrible ugly realities of the world, you can feel yourself straining to not tune out.

It’s as if the muscular, stout world Sheridan always constructs just can’t handle something so delicate and sheer, and the juxtaposition of these affected monologues with the brawny and flinty just immediately tears. Otherwise, “1883” feels like another durable, dependable show about broncos, cattlemen, and drovers trying to find their slice of the American dream and make their way in the world. This share of the storytelling land is obviously recognizable, but it’s also unique in its historical context, both the people at the time and their various preoccupations and codes. Sheridan ain’t reinventing the wheel with “1883,” but it is a bold-faced “Yellowstone” prequel, so it’s not like they were trying to hide the lineage. [B].

The first episode of “1883” is now available for free on YouTube and you can watch the full thing below.