‘Dutton Ranch’ Stars Tease What’s Next After Cattle Disaster (VIDEO)

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Beth and Rip have to start over (again). Dutton Ranch Episode 4 delivered another crushing blow to Kelly Reilly and Cole Hauser‘s characters and their new ranch in Texas. With the new future they made for themselves ruined, will Beth and Rip be forced to make an ally out of their Texan rival, Beulah Jackson (Annette Bening)? The Dutton Ranch cast teases the second half of Season 1 in the video interview above. Warning: Spoilers for Dutton Ranch Episode 4 ahead!

Veteran and veterinarian Everett (Ed Harris) confirmed to Rip that his cattle that came with the highly sought-after Edwards Ranch came down with foot-and-mouth disease. It was the steer they bought at auction earlier this season that plagued their herd. The steer’s clean bill of health was a forgery, and it had devastating consequences for the Dutton Ranch.

Foot-and-mouth is a disease of cloven-hoofed animals like cattle, pigs, and sheep. It’s a highly contagious and fast-spreading viral disease, but as Rip says, North America has been free of the disease for years. Animals can survive it, but it takes weeks to recover, meaning a huge loss in production for ranching businesses. To prevent it from spreading, Rip had to kill the entire Dutton Ranch herd, wiping out its historic lineage stewarded by the Edwards Ranch for generations before them.

Rip, Beth, Azul (J.R. Villarreal), and Zachariah (Marc Menchaca) dug a trench and prepared for the cattle to be killed. Rip shot them one by one until the entire herd was gone, and then they were buried in the trench. The sequence, directed by Greg Yaitanes, jump cuts between Beth and Rip’s faces with each shot of Rip’s gun, showcasing the emotional weight of the scene. Later, Zachariah sings “The Streets of Laredo,” commonly known as the “The Cowboy’s Lament,” in honor of the herd.

“He’s obviously a very hard guy, but the thing is, he loves animals more than he does people,” Hauser tells TV Insider of the cattle disaster. “It’s not only the animals, but it’s their future. He’s literally shooting their future, and he knows it. That’s a tough place to be for anybody. The emotion in that scene runs very deep for him.”

Dutton Ranch Episode 4 (Emerson Miller / Paramount+)

Beth and Rip found the people responsible for fudging the cow’s medical records and set fire to their trailer. When the dust settled, they were both emotionally depleted. Rip rarely cries, but he has cried in front of his wife before in Yellowstone. In this episode, however, he needed a moment alone.

“I don’t think he’s trying to hide it from her,” Hauser says of Rip’s feelings. “I think he’s just trying to keep it together.”

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With their herd gone, Beth and Rip have to begin again. Will they be forced to make an ally out of 10 Petal boss Beulah? With their son, Carter (Finn Little), now romantically involved with Beulah’s granddaughter, Oreana (Natalie Alyn Lind), their lives are becoming more intertwined.

“They admire [each other] and are competitive and are jealous and in some ways become co-conspirators as the show goes on,” Bening tells us. Reilly agrees that Beth and Beulah have met their match in each other.

“It’s such a great, wonderful idea [to have Beulah],” Reilly says. “In our universe, it was very male-oriented, and Beth was the only real powerhouse of a woman. Obviously, there were other really beautifully drawn characters.”

They share “this unapologetic audacity and [being] in touch with her own violence and fierceness underneath this absolute utter heartbreak of pain and betrayal and sadness,” Reilly says. “The fact that I get to have Beth meet another woman that she can relate to and see herself in and almost have a bit of a crush on, like I do Annette, I did get to meet somebody that it was like going up a gear.”

Oreana is the daughter of the dangerous Rob-Will (Jai Courtney). Lind tells TV Insider that their relationship “is real messy,” adding that he’s “not the perfect model of a dad.” She says that Oreana has her dad’s “fiery” spirit, but her defensiveness against grandmother Beulah is not angry, youthful rebelliousness. It’s her trying to break free of her family’s generational trauma that will continue to be revealed throughout the remaining five episodes of Dutton Ranch Season 1.

Learn more about this episode in the full video interview above.

Dutton Ranch, Fridays, 8/7c, Paramount Network, Streaming on Paramount+