In a recent interview about the season 1 finale, 1883 producer David Glasser explained how the episode really “comes together at the end.” 1883, a spinoff of Taylor Sheridan’s hit series, Yellowstone, has been faithfully following an early generation of Duttons and their associates as they make the journey west.
It’s been releasing new episodes since December and comes to a close with today’s finale. Here’s how Glasser feels that the finale really comes together.
Just as a warning, MAJOR spoilers for the episode ahead.
Essentially, 1883 fans were absolutely shocked to see that Elsa, our story’s main character and Narrarator, does not finish the journey and dies en route. It was an incredibly bold and tragic way for the season to end. And Glasser discussed this with The Hollywood Reporter. Turns out he feels that showrunner Taylor Sheridan planted seeds from the start.
“Taylor [Sheridan] sort of teased you with it in the beginning, and what you really understand at the end of the day is that the entire journey comes together at the end. For every single character, even down to our young boy John Dutton Jr., you can see where this goes forward in this journey,” he said.
The ‘1883’ Producer Explains How the Dutton Family Lost Something Huge in Order to Find a Home
Glasser also noted how bittersweet that ending was. How a lot of the characters did get what they wanted, but at that terrible price.
“For James and Margaret (Faith Hill), they lost a daughter but found a place to build a better life. Shea (Sam Elliott) wanted to see the coast one more time — that’s what he wanted out of this journey after losing his family. Thomas (LaMonica Garrett), who had closed everything off in his life, found what he wanted: a woman,” Glasser explained. And that’s exactly what Sheridan apparently set out to do. Wrap this up nicely.
“[He] just brings everything full circle. You understand the pain of this journey they invested in. Everything that happened sort of has a full-circle wrap to it. He closed every little piece up,” Glasser continued. The ending of 1883 was such a tear-jerker. But it was quite true to what journeys were like at the time. They were lucky that as many of them survived as they did.
So with that being said, is there going to be a second season? Things were wrapped up nicely enough that it feels like 1883 could stand on its own.
Paramount + has announced that there will be more episodes coming. But the streaming service doesn’t want to call them a “second season.” So it’s hard to say what’s to come, but we do know we aren’t saying goodbye to that world quite yet.
