Why Taylor Sheridan's Yellowstone Prequel Series 1923 Won't Get A Third Season

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Taylor Sheridan has become TV's golden man. "Yellowstone" had relatively humble beginnings as an upper-tier cable show at a time when the Western genre wasn't exactly popping off in terms of popularity. Yet, here we are a handful of years later, and Sheridan has built an entire empire based around that show, with several spin-offs to support it. One such spin-off, the prequel series "1923," recently wrapped up its second season on a tragic note.

Fans of the franchise are likely wondering if "1923" season 3 is in the cards. In short, it's not. Sheridan had a story he wanted to tell, and given that the title of this particular series is based on a specific year, there was always going to be a finite number of episodes he and Paramount+ could get out of it. Much like "1883" before it, this is going to be more of a limited series than an ongoing one.

"1923" focuses on the Dutton ranch in the early 1900s. The second season picked up after a rough winter brought forth new challenges and unfinished business to Jacob (Harrison Ford) and Cara (Helen Mirren). Harsh conditions and adversaries threaten to end the Dutton legacy, with Spencer (Brandon Sklenar) embarking on a perilous journey home, racing against time to save his family.

To be clear, it's not as though Paramount doesn't want anymore stories centered on the Dutton family – they absolutely do. Sheridan also has more of these stories to tell. It's just that this particular show has run its course. The "1923" season 2 finale solved a big "Yellowstone" mystery and served as a fitting end to the show. In a 2023 interview with Deadline, Sheridan explained that "1923" was really a part one and a part two, with both halves telling a complete story.

"It's really the second half of the season. This one is different than 1883 where I had the whole thing blocked out in my head. This one, I had no idea what I was going to do. I just went on a journey myself and I'm the one that made the call to the network, which is probably the greatest call they ever got. Hey, I need to make more episodes to finish this story. I need to do this in two blocks. An eight episode block and a second eight episode block to wrap this up. I can't wrap it up in two episodes and do the story justice. For them, it is great because they get more content. For me, I get more runway."

"It's bookend. It's still limited, but I think of it as one piece — there's just a split in the middle, but it's all one piece. It will conclude," Sklenar said to The Hollywood Reporter in 2023, which was right in line with Sheridan's comments. In other words, the story is over.

That said, the "Yellowstone" prequels aren't over, and the story of the Duttons is far from over. Aside from the "Yellowstone" sequel series centered on Beth Dutton and Rip Wheeler, Sheridan has also already confirmed plans to head back to the past to tell another story and fill in some more gaps in the Dutton family timeline.

In November 2023, Paramount announced that two more "Yellowstone" spin-offs were in the works. One was titled "2024," which later became "The Madison." The other was titled "1944" and is the logical successor to "1923." Per Variety, at the time of the announcement, Chris McCarthy, president and CEO of Showtime & MTV Entertainment Studios, had this to say about it:

"On the heels of '1883' and '1923's' success, our new planned spinoffs, '1944' and '2024,' will take audiences on a thrilling, new and unexpected journey with the complex and compelling storytelling that has become a hallmark of the franchise and has helped turn it into a worldwide cultural phenomenon – thanks to the creative mastermind of Taylor Sheridan."

For the time being, plot details for "1944" are being kept firmly under wraps, but this means we'll be seeing the Dutton family during World War II. An older Spencer Dutton could, in theory, appear in the show, but nothing has been confirmed at this time. Yellowstone executive producer and director Christina Voros, speaking with TVInsider in December 2024, offered a little update on the show's progress. In short, it's all in Sheridan's hands. As he explained:

"I honestly don't know how Taylor chooses to tell which stories he chooses to tell when. I think he has closed a lot of doors on Yellowstone this season. There are obviously characters that we will not see again because they have been dispatched. But I think he has left some doors open, and there's some doors that I can't tell if they're locked or not yet. But we will know when we cross through them."

For the time being, Sheridan is very busy. He also has "Landman" season 2 to worry about, among several other non-"Yellowstone" shows. Not only that, but it was recently revealed that Paramount is looking to make shows more cheaply, which could have an impact on Sheridan's shows moving forward. How that does or does not impact "1944" remains to be seen, but for fans of the franchise, this show will effectively take the place of "1923" season 3, whenever it comes to fruition.

You can grab "1923" on Blu-ray or DVD from Amazon.