1923's [Spoiler] Dies In Heartbreaking Tragedy That Fundamentally Shapes Yellowstone — Read Finale Recap
The good news about 1923's Season 2 finale: Spencer and Alex do, in fact, manage to make their way back to each other. Yay! Lovers' reunion!
The terrible news about 1923's final episode: The lion hunter and his plucky bride have an infinitesimal amount of time together before one of them dies. Boo! Heartbreaking tragedy!
Read on to find out exactly what happens — oh, and whether the Duttons get to keep their ranch — as I recap the highlights of "A Dream and a Memory." Then make sure to check out my post-episode chat/grief support group with Brandon Sklenar and Julia Schlaepfer here.
WHERE'S JACK? | Cara is sipping tea on the front porch while Zane stands guard, waiting for Whitfield's men to attack. He'd feel better if she were safe inside, but she politely declines: She's preoccupied with worry over Jacob and Spencer. But she reassures him that the fight that's coming is justified, because "anything that's worth having is worth fighting for." He looks at her admiringly. "They don't make women like you anymore, ma'am," he says. "Yes they do," she quips, "It's the men they make different."
Just then, Elizabeth comes out on the porch to announce that Jack never came home the night before. Cara explains that Jack went rogue because he still thinks like a boy, but he's a married man/expectant father, and he's got to realize that his decisions affect many people now. "I just pray he's learned that lesson before it's burned into you, my dear," she says. As we know (and they don't), though, it's already too late.
Over at the Creighton house, Ellie is surprised to find her husband sitting in the dark in their parlor, having an existential crisis. Banner reasons that he's not a good man — but not a bad one, either. Jacob Dutton is a "taker" who owns a ton of land but doesn't relish another man's pain, he explains; Whitfield, on the contrary, "takes to make you suffer. It ain't the takin' he wants, it's the suffering." He gets teary as he tells Ellie that he can't continue working for Whitfield, because he won't be able to look their son in the eye if he does. "Get packed," he says. "We're leaving."
LITERALLY TAKEN TO THE TRAIN STATION | Jacob and Sheriff McDowell are still at the train station when Clyde and Alec stroll in; Jacob doesn't know them, because they were hired when he was healing from his gunshot wound, and he's a little suspicious. The sheriff says he and Cara interviewed them, and they seem OK. Still, Jake is on edge as tthe station begins filling with people ahead of the train's arrival. Three of those people are Banner and his family, who purchase tickets to Portland and then turn to see Jake staring them down.
"I'm taking my family, and I'm leaving. Had enough of this place," Banner tells Dutton, adding a warning: "Whitfield's just the first, you know. There's more where he came from. More of them than me, and way more than you." He adds that Whitfield's people won't ever let Spencer leave the station; Jake counters that he won't allow Banner to leave, because he started the war. Banner pleads for clemency, asking Jake to let Ellie and his son depart without incident; Jake grudgingly agrees. In exchange, Banner offers some intel: "They won't be just here, Jacob. Do you know what I mean?" He does.
SNOW HOPE | Alex seems to realize that she's going to die if she doesn't do something, so she takes Hillary's gloves and a silver vial (full of perfume?) from her purse, then runs to Paul's body and goes through his pockets until she finds his lighter. She then hurries back to the car and builds a small fire in the backseat, starting it with a newspaper and feeding it with Paul's handkerchief and pages from her journal.
When that kindling has turned to ash, she sadly turns to the pile of letters Cara wrote Spencer and sobs as she puts the first one on the flames. Then she turns her face to the sky and yells at God a bit. "Is this your plan for us?" she asks. "Let us know love, then rip it from us?" She's not done berating the Almighty when she's interrupted by a sound: a train, chugging through the great white expanse. She quickly hops back into the car, pours what's left of the booze on the small fire, and then stands outside the now much larger blaze as she waves her arms and screams for the locomotive to stop.
Spencer sees her from the window, somehow IMMEDIATELY recognizes his bundled-up wife in the blinding whiteness, then races through the cars and hops out the back. Alex is bent double, sobbing in the knowledge that she's halfway to a popsicle, when she looks up and sees him running toward her along the track.
They careen toward each other, eventually colliding in an embrace, and OK OK 1923, you got me: That was a highly satisfying lovers' reunion after so much time apart. But after Alex stops crying, there's reality to face: Spencer didn't ask the train's crew to stop, so Mr. and Mrs. Dutton are alone out there in Hoth. "So good of you to join me in this pickle, free from the burden of a solution," she quips.
But Spencer does have a solution, as he demonstrates while hoisting her into his arms: He'll carry her the three miles to Big Timber. "You've eaten well on this journey, my love," he teases her as he trots along, which earns him a light slap: "You may carry me from certain death, sir, but you may not joke about my weight while doing it." She adds that it's his fault that she's heavier, but it's clear he has no idea what she's talking about. "I suppose he'll be tall like you," she adds, and THEN he gets it.
REROUTING | Spencer hops them back onto the track and runs her to the train, which (thankfully) has halted. When a doctor traveling in first class examines Alex, we see that her fingers and toes are black with frostbite. Guys, this is Not Good. They strip her out of her frozen clothes and apply cloths soaked in warm water; the doctor is straight with the couple about the potential danger to the baby, but he also notes that women's bodies are miraculous things. When the newlyweds are alone, Spencer says he would have come and gotten her eventually. "Couldn't take the chance. If you found someone else, how could I kill her from England?" Alex jokes, shivering with all 94.something degrees in her body.
The doctor returns with hot tea and wise counsel: They should stay on the train in Livingston and instead disembark in Bozeman, where there's a hospital equipped to help Alex.
WHAT WILL BECOME OF TEONNA? | Marshal Fossett and her men find Pete and Kent's bodies and quickly realize that Pete didn't kill Kent, but — based on the boot prints and type of bullet — Father Renaud did. Then they come across Runs His Horse and Father Renaud's bodies and quickly piece together that the priest shot Runs His Horse, and Teonna killed Renaud. Mamie points out that Teonna is nowhere to be found, and besides, the warrant for her arrest is from "a judge we don't know and a territory we don't serve." Little do they know, Teonna is on her belly on a ridge nearby, pointing her gun at them. And since she can't hear that they're basically going to stop pursuing her, she shoots... which then makes them pursue her.
She shoots one of Mamie's men down, and she's ready to take out Mamie, as well, when the teen realizes she's outmanned. Teonna knows she's likely a dead woman, so she starts yelling in frustration and anger about the abuse she experienced at the school. Mamie is sympathetic, but she also asks if it's true that she killed, and Teonna admits that she ended the lives of those who hurt her and her cousin. So Mamie handcuffs her and puts her on the back of her horse.
Teonna is brought to court in Oklahoma, but with the witnesses dead and no evidence to support the allegations against her, the charges are dropped. "It means you're free to go," Mamie tells the bewildered teen, who is overcome by the fact that she has no home and no family left. Mamie's colleague, Two Spears, kindly gives Teonna a gun ("for deer") and advises her to go west toward California. (Will we see her in the franchise's next prequel, 1944? Hear what Amina Nieves, who plays the character, and some of her castmates have to say about the matter.)
MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE RANCH | The army that Banner assembled for Whitfield descends upon the Dutton ranch; inside, Cara is washing her face when she hears the distant pop of gunshots. She makes sure Elizabeth is armed, then — on Zane's advise — she takes Jacob's elk rifle and runs to upstairs to give the (four — gulp) guards out front cover from the carloads of men who are now making their way for the front yard.
"Of all the things I've had to do for this ranch, this takes the cake. Takes the bloody cake," Cara grouses, neatly taking a guy out from an attic window. (Side note: I love her.)
At a certain point, though, Whitfield's men retreat, giving Zane and his men a reprieve from the siege. But the development doesn't offer much relief: Zane is fairly certain they're planning to attack again after dark, and he's even more sure they plan to burn the place when they do.
ALL ABOARD! | Over at the station, with 25 minutes until Spencer's train arrives, a whole bunch of Whitfield's men enter the waiting are; Jake ducks his head and sneaks outside to let the sheriff know they're greatly outnumbered.
The train pulls into Livingston a little late, thanks to taking on their frozen passenger. From Spencer's vantage point at the window, he sees his uncle and a bunch of other men with their guns out. The sheriff orders one of Whitfield's guys to drop his gun. Then Jake and everyone else pulls out their guns. Clyde sees Spencer walking through the car and shoots at him through the window, which kicks off a gunfight and generally causes chaos. As Banner's wife and son try to get on the train as he instructed, they're nearly hit. They only board safely because Spencer lends them a hand when he appears in the doorway.
Then, a lot of things happen at once. Someone shoots Sheriff McDowell and he goes down. Someone else is about to take out Jake, but Spencer shoots that guy. And when Jake is distracted and momentarily taken aback after getting a fleeting glance of his nephew, Banner fires two bullets into Clyde before Clyde can kill Jake. THEN, the wounded sheriff rallies enough to shoot Banner twice in the torso — hits that his wife witnesses from inside the train.
When everything has died down, and nearly everyone has, well, died, Jake tells a fading Banner that he'll make sure his family gets to Portland. Then Jake climbs aboard, where the doctor who was seeing to Alex notices that the patriarch is bleeding from his abdomen. Jake dismisses the blood as "old leaks" but he knows the war is ongoing: "This fight ain't over," he warns Spencer, "and I ain't got that much fight left in me." Spencer says he needs to get Alex to a hospital before he can help at the ranch, but Jake warns there might not be a ranch to return to by then.
So he brings Jake to meet a thawing Alex, who realizes that her husband is going to leave her again. "War is what you came home for," she says, crying, before he kisses her and says he'll meet her in Bozeman. Elsa voiceovers that for Alex, seeing and tasting (ew) Spencer one last time was enough. Also? IT'S NOT ENOUGH FOR ME, ELSA. Then Spencer joins his uncle's guys and hops in a car bound for the house.
Whitfield's men do, indeed, return after dark, bolstered by fire and scarier guns. They launch a firebomb into the living room, but Zane is able to put it out quickly. Then two men enter, unaware that Elizabeth is under the table with her own gun. She shoots one, then Zane takes out the other.
Eventually, Cara is the first to see Spencer's car coming up the drive, headlights off. He takes down the guy with the automatic weapon, then singlehandedly kills everyone who's firing in and/or on the house. When he calls for Cara, she comes downstairs and launches herself into his arms. It's very sweet. She's relieved to know Jacob is away from the fighting, surprised to learn Spencer has a wife and worried when Elizabeth points out that Jack hasn't returned with the rest of the men.
END OF THE LINE, ALEX | Jacob rides in the back of the ambulance as Alex is carted to the hospital in Bozeman. Doctors take him into another room to get stitched up; he returns to Alex's room just as she's delivering her baby (!), which is severely premature and not likely survive outside the womb. In addition, the doctors are warning her that they need to amputate several of her body parts ASAP or she won't live another day. But our girl bears down, gets that kid out and then demands that the tiny infant be brought to her to nurse. It's a boy, and despite the doctor's insistence that the child's lungs won't allow it to live more than an hour, Alex's son yelps a surprisingly strong cry as she puts him to her breast.
Jacob intervenes when the doctors want to prep her for surgery: She doesn't want to go, and she insists that she doesn't need last rites, either. So they grumble about how stupid she's being as they leave her alone with Jacob. Alex smiles and says she's going to name the baby John, after Spencer's brother. Jacob says that'll be nice... but so will a world where John's mother is alive to care for him. She says if she's an amputee, she can't be a capable mother [side note: the ISSUES I HAVE with this plot point!] and she tells him she doesn't think she's going to see Spencer again. As she's tasking Jacob with delivering a message for her, Jacob interrupts: "You tell him yourself." But as he starts to cry a little, it's clear that things are BAD.
Spencer and Cara arrive later, when Alex's limbs are still intact, and the baby is still alive. Spencer slips into her room and is taken aback to see that the son he learned about a few hours before has arrived, but he also quickly realizes that there's no more spots on their "Get Out of Dire Situation" card for the universe to punch. He cries as she relates how she wouldn't let the hospital staff amputate, then he cries more as she whispers that he'll have to be patient with their son: "If he's anything like me, he'll be a terrible child." Exhausted and bereft, Spencer lies down next to his wife and son.
When Spencer wakes in the morning, Alex is dead beside him. John is still alive, though. Cara and Jacob are asleep on a bench in the hallway when Spencer calls for his aunt. "I don't know what to do," he says, seeming very young. "You're not supposed to, my dear," she says softly. "But I do." She gently lifts the baby out of Alex's arms, and Spencer grabs his hat and makes to leave. "Let's go," Spencer tells Jake, all business. "I want to meet the man who killed my wife."
WHITFIELD GETS WHAT'S COMING TO HIM | Let's back up a little bit, because things at Whitfield's mansion are even more depraved than the last time we were there. Earlier in the episode, Whitfield and Lindy violate Mabel — then pour hot coffee on her — before Whitfield pushes her down on the breakfast table and rapes her. The house staff in a nearby room hear her cries, give each other pointed looks and then do nothing.
Later on, Whitfield hosts a formal dinner for all of the rich jerks interested in his tourism model for Montana. Honestly, it sounds a little like a pitch for Westworld. "When you bed a woman, it is the animal in you doing it," he purrs. "That animal needs to wander. We will give it the chance." They're sold.
OK, now you're caught up. Whitfield is lecturing Lindy on self-control at the breakfast table when Spencer marches in, shoots the tycoon in the abdomen and Lindy in the throat, then lets a clearly traumatized Mabel go. Still, Whitfield prattles on about how they won't get away with what they're doing. So Spencer shoots him again, and then makes him say Alex's name before landing a final bullet in his skull. Jake and his nephew set the place on fire on their way out the door.
Question for the group: Did ANYONE need all of that highly misogynistic, gratuitously violent Lindy subplot to figure out that Whitfield was a bad man? I surely did not.
THE DUTTONS MOVE ON | The Duttons hold a funeral for Jack and Alex at the ranch. Soon after, Elizabeth prepares to move back to the city. She assures Cara that she'll always love Jack, but Cara — ever the pragmatist — says that's not true: Elizabeth will love memories of him until she makes new ones, and one day, she'll forget him. "That's all right," the older woman says as she feeds John. "I'll love him enough for the both of us."
As life gets back to normal, Spencer hops on his horse to ride up in the mountains and round up wild cattle. He asks Jake to join him, but the older man chooses instead to hang out at the house with Cara and the baby. They sit on the porch and Jake tells his wife that Alex was a lot like her, which seems to make her happy.
[Point of order: So Alex and Spencer's son must be the John Dutton who is the father of Kevin Costner's John Dutton, aka the elderly character played by Dabney Coleman in Yellowstone.]
Then, it's all over by the voiceoverin'. Take it away, Elsa! "Spencer never remarried. Took the comfort of a widow and made another boy, refused to marry her, and one day, the widow was gone," she says, adding that Spencer stayed in love with Alex for the entire rest of his life, which lasted 45 more years after Alex's death.
We watch Spencer and Alex reunite, all gussied up, on a crowded ballroom floor. He's wearing a tux. She's got on a white beaded dress. They dance. "Took you long enough," she jokes, her eyes all a-sparkle. And as they twirl in posthumous happiness at the center of the floor, the episode ends.
Now it's your turn. What did you think of the finale and Season 2 as a whole? Grade them via the polls below, then hit the comments!