It’s been quite a while since we’ve had a new episode of Yellowstone to bring us back to the largest ranch in Montana and the family who would do anything to protect it, but that doesn’t mean there’s nothing to hold your attention in the meantime.
The first part of the fifth Yellowstone season—Taylor Sheridan’s incredibly successful neo-Western drama—finished airing on January 1, 2023, and while the latter half of the season—the last one to include Kevin Costner as the patriarch of the Dutton family—is set to pick back up in November of 2024, we know that the last stretch is the toughest part of waiting.
So if you’re looking for something to bring you back to the American West and to murderous families, then this list—divided into thematic categories for your perusing convenience—might just be the help you need in finding something new to watch to tie you over.
Yellowstone ‘Verse
1883 and 1923
Let’s start with the most obvious recommendation if you’re looking for something similar to Yellowstone—the first two of the show’s many planned prequels and spin-offs. Both 1883 and 1923, set in their respective titular years, tell the story of the Dutton family and how exactly they came to find themselves in Montana and owning the state’s largest ranch.
1883, which aired from December 2021 to February 2022, follows James Dutton, his wife Margaret, and their children—headstrong seventeen-year-old Elsa and five-year-old John—as they make their way from Tennessee to the West along the Oregon trail with all the hardships and the heartbreak that it entails. The family eventually settles in Montana, in the valley that will become the home of the Duttons—of which James is the patriarch since he’s the great-great-grandfather of Costner’s John Dutton III.
1923 currently has one season, with another one set to be released. Set during the Prohibition and Great Depression, the show stars Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren as Jacob Dutton and his wife Cora as they fight to keep the ranch from being torn apart. Jacob is James’s brother, who traveled to Montana to take care of his kids which include a grownup John and the baby of the family, Spencer, who is working as a hunter in Kenya by the time the story begins.
Family dramas with a touch of the criminal
Succession (2018 – 2023)
While the setting is definitely what sets Yellowstone apart, the show remains at its core a family drama where no one can communicate their feelings properly and everyone is way too ready to resort to violence—both against the family’s enemies and against each other. So of course, Succession must have a place on this list. If you enjoyed all the tension between John Dutton and his disaster children then you’ll enjoy the very same drama between Brian Cox’s Logan Roy and his own four children, who are all trying to wrestle control of the family company for themselves as Logan’s health declines.
House of the Dragon (2022 – ongoing)
If Yellowstone is a Succession but make it Western and Succession is Yellowstone but make it New York high finance, then House of the Dragon is their fantasy version. This time, the fight is over the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms and the two people laying their claim over it—Emma D’Arcy’s Rhaenyra Targaryen, eldest child of the former king, and Tom Glynn-Carney’s Aegon Targaryen, who was the king’s first son. While the Targaryens might not have guns they do have fire-breathing dragons, which ups the stakes of the conflict in a way that only a fantasy show can. Throw in the fact that they are notorious for marrying each other to “keep their bloodline pure,” and you have the perfect foundation for a family-fight-turned-civil-war of colossal proportions.
Peaky Blinders (2013 – 2022)
If you want your criminal, murderous family to move through a more historical setting then Peaky Blinders is the drama for you. Starring an ensemble cast comprising names like Tom Hardy, Anya Taylor-Joy, Sam Claflin, and Josh O’Connor and led by Cillian Murphy and the late Helen McCrory, the six seasons of Peaky Blinders follow the Shelby family and their rise to power in early 20th century Birmingham. The Shelby brothers—led by Murphy’s Tommy—start out as leaders of the titular street gang and make their way up in the world all the way to politics, all the while using the violence they’ve become so infamous for.
Sons of Anarchy (2008 – 2014)
Maybe period dramas aren’t your thing—in that case, you might want to give Sons of Anarchy a try. This time around the criminal family is actually a motorcycle club, which was founded by protagonist Jax Teller’s father and who evolves throughout the course of the show’s seven seasons in a metaphor for human nature. The titular Sons of Anarchy club operates out of a fictional town in California but its members move far and wide as they live through romantic and familial relationships.
The Sopranos (1999 – 2007)
Of course, The Sopranos had to be featured on this list—after all, the show is one of the great starters of the criminal family drama genre. Everything that came after is modeled, one way or another, after Italian-American Tony Soprano, a mobster based in New Jersey who has to deal with his family members on one hand—troublesome as all family members usually are in these particular types of shows—and his criminal organization. On top of it all, he has a particularly difficult relationship with his psychiatrist. It’s also worth mentioning that the show features a particularly iconic and infamous finale.
Neo-Western
Dark Winds (2022 – ongoing)
The last section of this list is, of course, dedicated to the neo-Western genre of which Yellowstone is very much part. If you like the atmospheres of the cowboys and the vast land that surrounds the Duttons, then you might be interested in Dark Winds, set in the Four Corners area in the 1970s. The show follows two Navajo Tribal Police officers, Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee, who find themselves dealing with a particularly gruesome case—a different one for each of the two seasons that have currently been released.
Longmire (2012 – 2017)
Another show of the crime drama variation, Longmire takes its title from its protagonist, Walt Longmire, a sheriff in a fictional Wyoming town who often works together with his best friend Henry Standing Bear, a Cheyenne man who helps him when it comes to dealing with the local tribal police. The show follows the two friends as they deal with everything their town throws their way.
Outer Range (2022 – present)
If you want your Western to have a touch of the paranormal, then Outer Range could definitely be what you’re looking for. The story follows a Wyoming rancher, Royal Abbott, who one day discovers a mysterious black void in one of his pastures. The appearance of the black void is coincidental with the arrival of a drifter who is connected with Abbott and his ranch, and it unleashes a whole series of events—from the disappearance of the Abbotts’ daughter-in-law to a rivalry with their neighboring family who is trying to take over their land.
Justified (2023)
Closing this list off is another crime drama, this time following Rayland Givens, a Deputy U.S. Marshal who is something of a man out of time—since he lives like a 19th-century style lawman even though the story is set in modern times. His ways, of course, make him a target of his superiors who eventually assign him to Lexington, in Kentucky, where he has jurisdiction over the place he grew up in and that he hoped he had left behind forever.
