How The West Was Lost

If the Western genre can tell us something about America, the bumpy rollout of the initial chapters of Kevin Costner’s Horizon: An American Saga, a planned four-part epic on the settlement of the Western U.S., is a cautionary tale that Hollywood power players should probably leave the entertainment beefs to the likes of rappers Kendrick Lamar and Drake. It seems the very public tensions between Costner and Taylor Sheridan, the director of Yellowstone, the show that resurrected Costner’s career, has not only left the television juggernaut with an uncertain future, but it has likely hobbled Costner’s Horizon right out of the gate.

In the past few weeks, Costner confirmed that, despite hopes otherwise, he will not be returning as John Dutton for the final episodes of Yellowstone, one of the most popular television series in history and a popular culture touchstone. One of the major reasons why Costner will not be returning is because he, Sheridan and Paramount engaged in a surreal, months-long battle around Costner’s availability to shoot the final episodes of the series.  Costner’s time was at a premium because he was pursuing a three decades-long dream to write, direct and star in Horizon: An American Saga, a four-part theatrical film focused on Western expansion.

Costner even decided to fund a good chunk of the $100-million effort himself, betting on his abilities to produce another hit Westen as he has done previously in his storied career. Costner maintains he also wanted to complete Dutton’s character arc (albeit on his editorial terms), but complained that Sheridan never had scripts ready when Costner was available. He also alluded to Sheridan’s massive workload, including involvement in nearly ten other television series, including several Yellowstone prequels and sequels. Either way, he won’t be around to finish the leading role he started (sound familiar?)

Despite hopes in early 2024 that Costner would return to film a few final scenes as John Dutton, even by last June, Sheridan made clear that he did not expect Costner to return to his Dutton role. In a widely read Hollywood Reporter profile, Sheridan noted, “I’m disappointed.…his [Horizon] movies seem(s) to be a great priority to him and he wants to shift focus. I sure hope [the movie is] worth it—-and that it’s a good one.”

Well, one year later, it’s not clear if, in fact, Horizon was worth it, or at least the timing of the release of the first of four chapters of the epic. Last week, the first chapter in Costner’s saga, became unexpectedly available by digital streaming via premium on demand services. But this was never the plan. The first Horizon film debuted on June 28th. The second chapter of Horizon was originally supposed to arrive in theaters on August 16th, with chapters three and four to arrive every six months thereafter. That plan is now on the shelf, and it isn’t clear when chapter two of Horizon will be viewable, whether it will ever be in theaters like the first chapter, or whether it (and future chapters) will only be available via streaming.

Why the shift in the strategy?  Because Horizon- Chapter One has fared pretty poorly in the theaters and Costner and Warner Brothers (the films’ distribution partner) hope to tap into the Yellowstone audience conditioned to seeing Costner on streaming TV. Many more people need to see Horizon’s first chapter to ensure that large enough movie goers will return for future chapters. But a bigger problem for Costner and Warner is that not only do they need to build a bigger audience for future Horizon episodes, they need to retain viewers who make it through the first three hour installment. And that could be a challenge, because the movie is a bit of a confusing mess. Since premiering at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year, Horizon has been met by lukewarm reviews and general shrugs. And for good reason.

Set in the late 1850s and early 1860s in Arizona, Montana and Wyoming, the film focuses on the challenges early American settlers faced in establishing frontier towns in the West during the U.S. Civil War. The film is a classic Western as much of the action focuses on battles with the indigenous Native Americans who aren’t keen on the white eye people (the Apache term for white people) moving into their territory and lands. When there isn’t fighting with the Natives, there are scenes of growing frontier towns, military forts, shootouts, rough living, and, of course, shady brothers in dusty clothing intent on punishing the local prostitute who is always looking for a good time. Costner enters the film about a third of the way in as Hayes Ellison, a cowboy prospector rolling through a frontier town before the prostitute tempts him. That turns complicated and they need to ride off into the rugged mountains on horseback to escape.

Throughout the film, there are references to the settlement town of Horizon, in modern day Arizona, and it seems that this growing settlement will serve as a narrative web that connects the disparate stories and characters that Costner introduces over three hours. But it is never quite clear if all roads do, in fact, lead to Horizon. Instead, there are four or five sets of characters that appear in set pieces and scenes that don’t all flow together in a tight narrative web yet. Now, some of this is somewhat understandable because Costner always intended this to be a four-part story. However, this first film introduces strands and pieces of stories that have varying levels of intrigue, but it isn’t totally clear which characters are the most important and which stories are worth following.

Perhaps most frustrating is that Horizon completes none of the storylines, and that seems to be Costner’s deliberate plan.  The film cannot stand alone without its follow-on episodes, so you need to watch future episodes to see what happens, much like a television show. Sure, maybe there is attachment to one storyline and one character that might be worth following up on in the next episode. But it is a big maybe and a big bet on the attention span of the American adult consumer, as opposed to teens and young adults who are a better target market for such a Marvel-like strategy.

Most disappointing in Horizon: Chapter One is that really brings nothing new to the moment. We have literally since this all before in Westerns for countless decades, including from Costner himself. The only really unique and interesting element of the first episode is a two or three minute scene that features Chinese laborers riding up to a settlement with the image of railroad tracks behind them and facing anti-Chinese sentiment.  It’s a historically accurate shout out to the role that Chinese immigrants played in the development of the Transcontinental Railroad, but even with this short storyline, it’s not clear yet how this (or much else) connects to the larger Horizon story. And, somewhat baffling, this first Horizon film concludes with a strange several minute preview of all the excitement to come in future Horizon episodes. But this Horizon sizzle reel is just as hard to follow as the entire meandering film that preceded it.

Obviously, Costner wants viewers to watch all four Horizon episodes so they can understand his vision for inspiring Americans through the settlement of the West. There is no question that Costner is a brilliant actor and director, one who has used Western mythology to win awards and advance understanding of the founding of the country. And like other Westerns, Horizon is beautiful as a visual product. But, right now, Horizon seems like a complicated jumble of misguided intentions and planning. Fans haven’t flocked to the film yet in droves, its success on streaming is yet to be determined, its second installment has been delayed, and though he remains committed to them, it’s near impossible to think about episodes three and four of this saga yet.

In some respects, the Horizon saga is now the mirror image of the problems with Yellowstone. After five seasons that captivated the nation and put the series at the center of American culture, both high and low, the show is barrelling towards an ending without its major star and most essential character nearly two years after the conclusion of the first half of season five. The future of Yellowstone now lies in its sequels and prequels (1923, 1944 and 2024), and whether fans will return in the same numbers as before for these shows is a big question without a strong finish with Costner as John Dutton. Horizon, meanwhile, is struggling out of the gate, its future as unclear as Yellowstone’s ending.

Just think of an alternate universe where Yellowstone fans could count down the days to November to see what happens to the vindictive and often lawless businessman who ascended to public office, faced impeachment threats, survived an assassination attempt and who is obsessed with protecting the finances of his family and preserving his vision of the American way of life, leaving many onlookers aghast (Sound familiar?) Then, with the original Yellowstone completed and John Dutton out of the picture for the sequel (2024), millions of Dutton fans would then be excited to follow Costner’s Horizon saga—with a 2025 rollout—even with the uneven first chapter. Needless to say, this didn’t happen.

Obviously, the one constant with Yellostone and Horizon is Coster himself. It would be easy to blame him for the messes with both franchises right now, and he certainly shoulders some of the blame. But there are larger factors at work, too, including Sheridan’s massive ego and workload. Just as important, there are the powers that be at Paramount and Warner Brothers who never seemed to be able to act as the adults in the room who could either help land the Yellowstone plane with Costner onboard after its incredibly successful multi-year journey, or help Horizon take off in such a way that honored Costner’s huge investment. It seems no one could speak truth to power at the right time in either instance

Maybe, by the end of the year, all of this will make sense. Perhaps Sheridan will stick the Yellowstone landing without Costner and the future spinoffs of the series will all be big hits Maybe Costner will hook millions of viewers onto his Horizon saga through streaming, and his project that he has been working on for more than three decades will have been worth it. But there are plenty of reasons to be appropriately skeptical at this point that there will be happy endings for either of these projects. It looks like we will have to wait until November to really determine the direction and future of these two series. Almost like this great country itself, it’s not clear how these sagas will end.