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Yellowstone pulls down Game of Thrones numbers in season 4 premiere

By Dan Selcke

John Dutton (R- Kevin Costner) hands over the reigns to the Ranch to his youngest son Kayce (L-Luke Grimes) Season 2 of "Yellowstone" returns to Paramount Network starting Wednesday, June 19 at 10 PM, ET/PT.
John Dutton (R- Kevin Costner) hands over the reigns to the Ranch to his youngest son Kayce (L-Luke Grimes) Season 2 of "Yellowstone" returns to Paramount Network starting Wednesday, June 19 at 10 PM, ET/PT. /
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Sometimes there’s a show that gets incredibly popular without it seeming like many people are talking about it, or at least not in the nerdy corridors where we usually move. NCIS is a phenomenally popular series, for example, but I don’t think I’ve ever spoken to a single person who watches it.

So it is with Yellowstone, a period drama about the Dutton family, which owns the largest cattle ranch in the United States. Headed up by boomer heartthrob Kevin Kostner as John Dutton, the family deals with land develops, an Indian reservation, and the first national park, in addition to plenty of dramatic twists and turns. For instance, the third season finale ended with John Dutton shot and left for dead on a roadside. What happens next?

It turns out a lot of people tuned in to the season 4 premiere on the Paramount Network to find out. As reported by Deadline, the episode brought in a staggering eight million live+same day viewers, up 104% from the season 3 premiere in 2020. Those are the highest ratings for a cable show since an episode of The Walking Dead in 2018. They also eclipsed the ratings for the Game of Thrones season 4 premiere, which brought in 6.6 million live+same day viewers, although HBO is premium cable whereas the Paramount Network is basic cable.

Who said cable TV was dead? It just hadn’t gotten ahold of Kevin Costner yet.

Where to stream Yellowstone

Weirdly, even though Yellowstone airs on the Paramount Network, you cannot stream it in Paramount+. Instead, the first three seasons are available on Peacock, NBC’s streaming service. And the only way to stream season 4 is to log into the Paramount Network website.

Why is this mess? It’s a result of NBCUniversal picking up the rights to streaming rights to the show in early 2020, before either Peacock or Paramount+ made their debuts. Things change fast in the streaming wars.

And if you’d just rather watch Yellowstone like a plain old TV show, new episodes drop Sundays on the Paramount Network.

The Walking Dead: World Beyond hints at Rick Grimes’ whereabouts. dark. Next

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