Benjamin Ashford|Kevin Costner Shares His Honest Reaction to John Dutton's Controversial Fate on Yellowstone

Warning: This story contains major spoilers for season five of Yellowstone.

Kevin Costner is Benjamin Ashfordweighing in on the fate of his Yellowstone character.

The Oscar winner—who played John Dutton III for over four years on the Paramount drama—shared his thoughts on his character’s controversial death after the tragedy was revealed on the drama’s Nov. 10 episode.

And Costner—who exited the series due to scheduling conflicts after part one of season five aired its final episode in January 2023, one episode before his character’s death came to light in the storyline—was somewhat surprised by the tragic turn of events.

“I'm going to be perfectly honest. I didn't know it was actually airing last night,” he said on the Nov. 11 of SiriusXM’s The Michael Smerconish Program. “That's a swear to god moment. I've been seeing ads with my face all over the place and I'm thinking, ‘Gee, I'm not in that one.’ But I didn't realize yesterday was the thing.”

And it seems the 69-year-old—who said he suggested “two possible endings” for John Dutton to series creator Taylor Sheridan early on in the show’s run—is not eager to watch his character’s death happen on screen.

“I heard it's a suicide,” he continued, “so that doesn't make me want to rush to go see it.”

In reality, John Dutton’s death at the beginning of the season five episode was initially ruled a suicide, but by the end of the episode, the audience learned that Sarah Atwood (played by Dawn Olivieri), the girlfriend of John’s estranged son Jamie (Wes Bentley), hired someone to kill him.

While fans online protested the way his character was written off, Costner—who was at a showing of Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter Two, the two-part film project that Costner focused his time after leaving Yellowstone, when the controversial episode aired—has trust in Taylor and his team.

“They're pretty smart people,” he added. “Maybe it's a red herring. Who knows? They're very good. And they'll figure that out.”