Creator Taylor Sheridan crafted plenty of memorable characters in “Yellowstone,” but a good villain can often be more entertaining than a hero. Since the Dutton family face plenty of threats throughout all five seasons, picking the best “Yellowstone” villains can be trickier than getting Beth Dutton (Kelly Reilly) to stop drinking Tito’s Vodka.
The franchise has exploded since the world was first introduced to the Dutton family in 2018, with Sheridan adding “1883,” “1923,” “Marshals,” and “Dutton Ranch” to the roster of shows in the Duttonverse. But the best “Yellowstone” villains helped the main show stand head-and-shoulders above the rest.
The neo-western show featured plenty of bad guys in the six-and-a-half years it was on television, but these five were the biggest threats to the Dutton family in “Yellowstone.”
5. Roarke Morris
In Season 3, Roarke Morris (Josh Holloway) is introduced as a scheming hedge fund manager who attempts to take the Duttons’ land from under their feet. He works for a company called Market Equities, and happens to own the Cross Creek Ranch. While his threat of stealing the land is fairly generic, his business sense and hands-off approach to scheming makes him stand out from the more violent characters the family comes across.
Who else does naked yoga and drinks green smoothies before hiring ranchers to do his dirty work? There’s a modern eccentricity to Morris that is refreshing in a world of cowboys, drug dealers, and real estate moguls. His goal was to take the Duttons’ property and redevelop it into hotels, golf courses, and even an airport. At least he was ambitious, even if he was a schemer.
Morris even has one of the most shocking deaths in “Yellowstone,” when Rip Wheeler (Cole Hauser) throws a cooler with a rattlesnake inside at the villain’s face while he’s out fishing. It bites Morris, and he dies from the venom. It’d also be criminal to forget the fact that Holloway played Sawyer in “Lost,” so what’s not to love?
4. The Beck brothers
Malcolm Beck (Neal McDonough) and his brother Teal (Terry Serpico) are the big bads of “Yellowstone” Season 2. Their aim is to stop Dan Jenkins (Danny Huston) and Chief Rainwater (Gil Birmingham) from developing a huge casino. From there, the sneaky duo deploy all sorts of damning tactics to exert their control over the valley. Their greed is balanced well against their tenacity, determination, and disregard for anyone who gets in their way. They poisoned the Dutton cows, after all, which is more than enough to earn the Beck brothers a place on the list!
The tragic deaths of all the cows aside, the Beck brothers even put out a hit on Beth Dutton, which is pretty brazen in itself, since she’s one of the fiercest characters on the show. Ultimately, they go too far by hiring a neo-nazi militia to kidnap Tate (Brecken Merrill), so the Duttons take the fight to the Becks in one of best episodes of “Yellowstone.”
Kayce Dutton (Luke Grimes) kills Teal to get Tate’s location, while John shoots Malcolm in the gut and lets him bleed out alone. But it takes an entire squad of police officers, the Duttons, and enforcer Mo (Moses Brings Plenty) to stop the Becks and the militia … Which proves just how formidable they truly were.
3. Garrett Randall
Some may say that the Beck brothers were better “Yellowstone” villains than Garrett Randall (Will Patton), but his grim connection to the family makes him far more interesting as a character. Garrett is Jamie Dutton’s (Wes Bentley) biological father, and he murdered Jamie’s mother, Phyllis, shortly after he was born. Garrett claimed he beat her to death because she was using sex work to fund her drug addiction. That’s pretty heinous regardless, but it set off a tragic chain reaction.
John Dutton adopted Jamie, setting the young boy on a path filled with self-destruction, bitterness, and murder (more on that shortly) — which would not have happened if Randall hadn’t murdered Phyllis. Unsurprisingly, Randall goes on a ruthless revenge tour when he gets out of prison, and even briefly manages to turn Jamie to his side. He’s a master manipulator, and has no qualms with ordering the Montana Free Militia to target John, Beth Dutton, and Kayce Dutton, but all three make it out alive.
Jamie later executes his biological father in Season 4, but this only makes his life more complicated as Beth uses the murder to blackmail her adopted brother. Randall’s introduction is essentially a stick of dynamite that has a domino effect on Jamie’s life in the worst way.
2. Jamie Dutton
Jamie Dutton secured his place as a “Yellowstone” villain years before the show even started. He let the Broken Rock Reservation abortion clinic sterilize Beth Dutton when she was a teenager, after she fell pregnant with Rip Wheeler’s baby — but Jamie kept that information hidden from her for years. Although he was trying to help at the time, he took away her agency, which explains why she hates him so intensely.
His impulsive nature is what makes him a liability and a major villain on the show, despite being a part of the family. In Season 2, John Dutton chooses not to support Jamie’s run for Attorney General — something his adopted son feels betrayed by. He retaliates by spilling various family secrets about corruption on the ranch to journalist Sarah Nguyen (Michaela Conlin).
When he realizes he can’t stop her from publishing the expose, however, he strangles her to death. It’s one of the most undeserving deaths in the entire show; Sarah did nothing wrong and was just a casualty of Jamie’s reckless, selfish nature. Of course, some of that can be attributed to his adoptive father’s toxic bullying, but Jamie still chose to be a terrible person on numerous occasions.
1. John Dutton
If this were any other show, John Dutton would be the outright main villain of “Yellowstone,” but because the story revolves around him and his family, he’s an anti-hero. Sure, he does good things as a way of helping the locals and the people around him, but it often has drastic consequences. Then, there’s the way he actually runs the ranch itself … He brands his employees so that they’re forced to be loyal to him! Is there any wonder several ranchers either left or betrayed John to his rivals?
John also has countless people murdered, with their bodies dumped at the “Train Station.” But that’s nothing compared to the way he manipulates and uses people just for his own ends. Take Jamie Dutton, for example. John raised him as his own son, which makes him seem like a good person, but didn’t tell him he was adopted. Instead, he kept the young boy at a distance and bullied him while he grew up.
This turned Jamie into a bitter person who only wanted his father’s approval. It’s ironic for someone who constantly preaches about the importance of family and protecting what’s theirs, but he prefers to treat his children like employees and subordinates instead of loved ones. John is his own worst enemy, and he sits at the top of the best “Yellowstone” villains.
