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Taylor Sheridan’s The Madison Premieres To Huge Fan Fare

Taylor Sheridan’s latest television venture, The Madison, premiered on Paramount+ on Saturday, March 14.

In a rare move, the six episode season dropped its first three episodes that day, and the show quickly surpassed the CBS hit (and another Taylor Sheridan show) Marshals on domestic Paramount+ charts, taking over the number three spot.

The last three episodes of the season dropped on the streaming service on Saturday, March 21st, and as of press time, is the Number One show on Paramount+.

If you haven’t finished the last three episodes of Season One, stop reading, there will be major spoilers ahead!

Episode 4 – “Tomorrow is Goodbye”

The episode begins with Paul (Matthew Fox) and Preston Clyborn (Kurt Russell) in a flashback. They were fishing together in one of their favorite spots, talking about life, love, and loss. We find out Paul is a widower and has been struggling since his wife, Melissa’s death.

But, he says that the river is the only place that his grief feels manageable, a common theme for the show.

In present day, Stacy Clyburn’s (Michelle Pfeiffer) friend Lili, who was with her when she received the phone call that Preston had died, arrived in Montana to help with Preston’s affairs.

Stacy tells Lili about Preston’s journals and how she now feels like she never really understood her husband, since she didn’t know about hardly anything in them. But Lili helped her find a new perspective on the journals.

Instead of seeing the journals as something that is putting a wedge between her and her husband, she now sees it as a way to further connect with Preston.

Stacy, her daughters, granddaughters, and son-in-law go meet up with Van, the sheriff’s deputy played by Ben Schnetzer, who gives them the black box recording from the plane crash that took the lives of Paul and Preston.

As the audience knows, the last thing Preston said was his wife’s name, and now she is about to find out.

The family listens to the recording, which each of them react to in different ways. While Stacy is likely the most affected, it isn’t until later when she fully releases her emotions by walking into the river fully clothed and screaming. She is upset with Preston for leaving her, but she is also comforted that she was the last thing on his mind.

Back at the cabin, Stacy, inspired by Preston’s joirnals, decides to try fly fishing with her granddaughter Macy (Alaina Pollack). It is a hilarious moment, but they become successful and she realizes she is not just reading about Preston’s world, she is immersing herself in it. And oddly, she is enjoying parts of it.

Every other member of the family is starting to figure out their new life and seeming to enjoy themselves as well. But who knows how long it will last.

At dinner, the family seems to be getting along great, telling stories about their day. Lili looks at the Clyburn family and mentions how much Preston would have enjoyed seeing them all together in the place he loved so much. The room fell silent because they remembered why they are here in the first place: to bury Preston and Paul, which will take place the next day.

Episode 5 – “No Name and a New Dream”

This is the episode where they hold Paul and Preston’s funeral, and the only other people in attendance besides family is Van, local rancher Cade (Kevin Zegers), and his wife Kestrel (Danielle Vasinova), as well as Swenson (J. Downing), whose horse team and wagon brought Paul and Preston’s caskets to their burial site.

Stacy clearly had a lot to say about her husband and brother-in-law, but promised her family she would say it one day to her family. After paying their respects, they head back to the cabins for a lunch prepared by locals who had fond memories of the Clyburn brothers.

Stacy looks around at her daughters, Paige (Elle Chapman) – who seems to be disassociating- and Abigail (Beau Garrett) – who seems to be in the middle of a breakup with Van, she says to Lili, “It’s time to go home, isn’t it?”

Despite having great conversation and great chemistry, Van ends the relationship with Abigail, knowing that his job and his kids require them all being in Montana and the life he leads isn’t one he thinks Abigail is interested in. Despite her saying she wants to come back, he ends things with her, which is not what she wants.

When they arrive back in New York City, Stacy can’t take the emptiness of her big townhouse, especially not after she sees Preston’s wedding ring, which he leaves in New York when he travels after once losing it in the river, and smelling one of his shirts.

Stacy begins to see a therpaist named Dr. Phil Yorn (Will Arnett) and even though she doesn’t like the way he dresses or uses the word “hostile,” she begins to try to make progress in her grief journey with him.

Everyone is handling the return to New York differently. The grief has finally hit Paige and she can’t stop crying. Her husband, Russell (Patrick J. Adams), calls Stacy and Abigail, who rush to her side with her favorite ice cream.

Episode 6 – “I Give Me Permission”

The season finale begins, once again, in a flashback with Paul and Preston. They are drinking an Paul is getting emotional about losing his wife. He becomes angry an Preston is just trying to make sure Paul doesn’t hurt himself.

Eventually Paul falls asleep and Preston writes in his journal about what just happened. He admitted that he wished he hugged his brother, because they both really needed it. Instead of leaning on each other, they both sleep away the pain, which says a lot about how Preston’s family handles the upcoming events in the episode: the New York City funeral.

Stacy is nearly set off by her favorite barista who wasn’t aware of Preston’s death when she began talking about the deceased. She made it out of there without incident, but the same can’t be said about Paige when she goes back to work.

Paige’s boss pressures her to focus on work and put her grief aside, which is quite shocking. Moments later, she overhears her co-worker, Harmony, say that Preston and Paul deserved to die because of the color of their skin, their financial status, and their carbon footprint. Paige socked her and left her with a black eye, but Harmony wants to press charges so the police arrive to arrest Paige. Paige calls Abigail, who then calls Van to try and help them sort it out, although Abigail probably only called him to try to speak to him again, because all he said she could do was get a lawyer.

Stacy arrives and of course, she smooths everything out with Harmony and the police. Paige ends up getting fired, still. Stacy heads to Dr. Yorn’s office where she opens up about the impending funeral, and invites him.

Paige, Russell, Abigail, her daughters, and their dad Dallas all arrive at Stacy’s for the funeral where there are countless Wall Street-type men there to pay their respects to Preston.

Abigail goes to her mother’s room since she hasn’t come out yet an finds her not doing well. Dr. Yorn is called to help Stacy face all the people in her home. Despite the chat that seemed to be going well, Stacy leaves the funeral in a rush.

When she doesn’t return home, her children file a missing person’s report.

The audience finds out she went straight back to Montana. Van finds her next to Preston’s grave with a gun, and thinking the worst he rushed down there, but she only had the gun to protect herself against the wildlife.

She has decided to move full-time to Montana, and that’s where Season One ends.

Season Two has already been green lit and filmed, though we don’t know when it will premiere. We iamgine Stacy will continue to read Preston’s journals and find out more about his life in Montana. We also think she will try to experience everything he wrote about just to feel closer to him.

Time will tell if her family will join her, but our instincts says they will.

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