Yellowstone’s Ice Queen was heavily criticized, but now she’s one of the best characters in the series

Anyone who watches Yellowstone knows that there are many reasons to be excited about the modern western series. One of them is named Beth. No matter whether you have just discovered the story of the Dutton family on Netflix or have been excited for a long time: The Beth Dutton, played by Kelly Reilly, is an elemental force. And like any elemental force, it can be terrible and beautiful at the same time. It is precisely the fluctuation between the poles of engaging and repulsive characterization that makes it (and therefore the entire series) so convincing.

Kelly Reilly enriches the Yellowstone cast enormously as Beth Dutton

Let’s be honest: the number of women in the Yellowstone cast is manageable. Each of them has to fight for their place in Taylor Sheridan’s tough world of men. And no one fights more impressively than Beth Dutton. With teeth and fists she has made her place as toughest family member hard-earned under patriarch John Dutton (Kevin Costner).

This is all the more impressive because Kelly Reilly’s character was originally criticized as unusable by HBO before series creator Taylor Sheridan looked for another home channel, Paramount. Reilly’s portrayal of Beth in the first episode too harsh, unsympathetic and aggressive, it was said at the time. Today, Beth Dutton is one of the show’s biggest fan favorites.

In her career, Kelly Reilly repeatedly played the “ice queen”, a strong one, albeit one aloof female figure. Her cool Caroline Bingley in Pride and Prejudice condescendingly schemed against the heroine and in Kenneth Branagh’s A Haunting in Venice she played the inscrutable landlady. In this respect, the radical Beth Dutton from Yellowstone fits Reilly’s role model perfectly. The tough bank expert could easily have become the image of a “power woman”, but the British actress gets more out of her Beth Dutton.

Yellowstone’s Beth Dutton receives and inflicts pain

The way Kelly Reilly keeps nailing the Yellowstone staff to the wall with her quick-witted sayings is part of the series’ great appeal. Because Only her tongue is sharper than Beth’s mind. Or as Taylor Sheridan sums up his main character: “Beth says what you wish you had said.”

At the same time, Beth Dutton, who swears unabashedly, is also a troubled character who has to go through a lot physically and mentally in Yellowstone. This mix of taking and giving gives it a
vulnerable strengthwho, alongside colleagues like Michael Fassbender and Nicole Kidman, only a few stars can portray as convincingly as Kelly Reilly.

A good example is a scene in the 9th episode of season 2, in which Beth rushes to the aid of her harassed sister-in-law Monica (Kelsey Asbille). Monica, the second major female character in Yellowstone, is gentle and engaging, the complete opposite of Beth. In a shop, the indigenous woman is treated uncomfortably by the shop owner and the police. Only Beth can free her from the “voluntary strip search” in the changing room. Kelly Reilly’s character manages to make fun of the perpetrators present and build Monica up in the same breath. Because in their harshness towards some, empathy for others shines through. At heart, Beth is a person who rebels against injustice.

Beth repeatedly becomes violent or has to take a beating herself. In between, Yellowstone doesn’t forget to show that Beth’s hard-fought independence also puts obstacles in the way of her personal happiness. Rare is ours compassion greater for the character than in the moments when she cannot open up to ranch overseer Rip Wheeler (Cole Hauser). Even though she so obviously wants it. Although his down-to-earth nature could tame her inner fury to the benefit of both sides.

The balance between tyrant and likeable character makes Beth the most complex Yellowstone character

Combining coldness and emotion is an art that Kelly Reilly has mastered. However, they are moments of Crossing bordersin which her Beth finally dies painful three-dimensional figure matures. Because everyone can love a strong-willed heroine, but what happens when that heroine becomes a bullying bully?

This agonizing ambivalence is best demonstrated in Beths poisonous Dealing with her brother Jamie (Wes Bentley). She hates him like hardly anyone else in Yellowstone. When she pulverizes him with words, you often take your breath away. The two’s enmity goes back to the moment in their childhood when Jamie convinced his pregnant teenage sister to have an abortion. Beth is also disgusted by the weakness of her family member, who, as a slick lawyer, is the least fitting of the modern cowboy image of all the Duttons.

When Jamie reminds Beth after one of their numerous run-ins, in the best Vin Diesel style, that she’s still one “Family” the sister counters sarcastically “this word does not qualify for absolution”. Because Beth has a difficult place in the structure of her family, which becomes apparent, for example, when she asks Jamie to finally “a man” to be. After all, this is a role that has come to her own frustration can never take in her father’s eyes.

Even if we don’t like Jamie Dutton and understand Beth’s motives for her constant torment, does that give her the right to be cruel? No. Anyone who has experienced suffering does not automatically receive permission to distribute it themselves. Here Beth’s strength also becomes her weakness. And we have to hold the mirror up to ourselves and ask, whether we have one Being able to admire a figure that often goes too far. Is it possible to root for someone like that, even in a fictional story like Yellowstone?

Game of Thrones’ Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey) was recently a similarly impressive series character who doesn’t have any easy empathy answers. Repulsive and attractive at the same time But it is precisely this facet that makes Beth Dutton so complex, so realistic, so human. And in Yellowstone we can only enjoy venturing into this fearless abyss called Beth Dutton and the Celebrate discord.

Because yes: Beth likes to argue and not always for a good reason. When she belittles a stranger who calls her “Miss,” she’s just trying to vent at the expense of others. She loves to make a scene and offend others. These are the moments when she has the power. Also the Power over us as viewers.