Sheridan doesn't take Yellowstone's bandwagon-following as a compliment

The success of Yellowstone has brought ranches, cowboys and vast wilderness back into the TV series.In the past eight years, similar works such as Ransom Canyon and American Primeval have appeared, as well as Taylor Sheridan's own Landman, 1883 and The Madison to expand his creative territory.

These follow-ups didn’t sit particularly well with Sheridan.In an article on October 26, TVLine reviewed his response to a 2022 interview with Variety: “I don’t know if that’s a compliment, because I don’t think they’re doing it because it’s good.They did it because 15 million people watched 《Yellowstone》.”In his description, the industry's judgment is more like: Since so many people watch Western dramas, then make more Western dramas.

In the first half of 2026, "Oil King" received a total of 12.4 billion minutes of viewing time, ranking fourth among streaming original dramas in the current period.For the 2025-2026 TV season, three Sheridan dramas - Marshals, Oil Kings and Madison Valley - are in the top 25.

Sheridan now lives primarily on his ranch in Texas, where he spent his childhood on a 214-acre family ranch.In an interview with Texas Highways in 2020, he said that the place and way he grew up had a profound impact on him: “When you write, it always has an autobiographical nature... Our family's ranch shaped 《Yellowstone》 in many ways.”This personal experience has also entered his other works, including the non-western drama - Mayor of Kingstown.

Actors also need to be familiar with this kind of life.Sheridan will organize ranch training called “Cowboy Camp”, allowing participants to learn horse riding, ropes and other skills.Luke Grimes, who plays Keith Dutton in Yellowstone, told The Hollywood Reporter in 2022 about training, "Everyone tries to learn these things well, and when you can see the actor actually riding that horse, it really adds something to the performance on screen."

In the same Variety interview, Sheridan explained why he cares about personal experience in another sentence: “If I just sat down to write and then went to Wikipedia to look things up, it would look false when it came out, right?”