Taylor Sheridan Retcons John Dutton's 'Train Station' In Yellowstone Spinoff Marshals

Two episodes in, Taylor Sheridan’s new Yellowstone spinoff Marshals has already retconned the darkest part of John Dutton’s family enterprise. “Zone of Death” sees Kayce Dutton revisit one of his father’s old haunts as a U.S. Marshal for Montana, and become more than a little uneasy about what he and his colleagues might find there.

This second episode of Marshals reveals that two of Yellowstone’s biggest crimes remain unsolved by local law enforcement. John Dutton’s death is still officially considered a suicide, and Jamie Dutton is thought to be alive and on the run. It also reintroduces us to an area of land frequented by the Duttons, but by an entirely different name.

One thing unites almost all of Yellowstone’s most shocking deaths. Most of them resulted in the deceased’s body being taken to the “Train Station”, a stretch of uninhabited wilderness where the Duttons disposed of their victims. In Marshals, though, this dumping ground is no longer the “Train Station”. As episode 2’s title suggests, it’s officially become the “Zone of Death”.

Taylor Sheridan's Marshals Just Retconned John Dutton's "Train Station" From Yellowstone

The darkest Yellowstone episodes are synonymous with John Dutton’s notorious “Train Station”, a place which has absolutely nothing to do with trains. It’s actually a lawless area of land belonging only to wild animals, which serves as a convenient hiding place for the evidence of virtually every murder John and his family have ever committed.

The words “Train Station” alone struck fear into the show’s viewers and characters alike, especially when they came from the mouth of Kevin Costner’s central protagonist. It meant only one thing: somebody was about to die in brutal fashion. Even John’s adoptive son Jamie Dutton eventually ended up there, after he was murdered by his own stepsister, Beth.

We shouldn’t expect to hear these words in Marshals, however. Kayce Dutton’s Yellowstone sequel has retconned the name of this same stretch of land, turning it from the Dutton family’s secret hiding place into somewhere well-known to federal law enforcers as the “Zone of Death”.

When, in the second episode of Marshals, Kayce and his fellow U.S. Marshals are tasked with intercepting a botched drug deal, it’s the “Zone of Death” they visit. Kayce is right to be worried, and not just because of the bodies his family has left there. Apparently, the Duttons weren’t the only criminals making use of this ungovernable wilderness.

Yellowstone & 1923 Never Explicitly Referred To The "Zone Of Death"

It’s highly significant that Marshals explicitly refers to the place known as the “Train Station” in Yellowstone as the “Zone of Death”. This new name directly connects the Dutton family’s historic body count with a real place in Yellowstone National Park.

While it’s long been assumed that Taylor Sheridan based the “Train Station” on the actual “Zone of Death”, this latter name has never been used in the Yellowstone franchise before now. From Jack Dutton’s death there in the prequel series 1923 to the finale episode of the original show, the territory has only ever been referred to indirectly.

Whenever John Dutton or his ancestors took someone to the “Train Station”, only those with extensive knowledge of Yellowstone’s real geography would have any reason to believe their body disposal site had anything to do with a real place. But Marshals just made it all too real.

John Dutton's "Train Station" Isn't The Same Place As The Real "Zone Of Death"

1923 goes to great lengths to explain the fictional origin of the “Train Station” in Yellowstone, but Taylor Sheridan’s idea for this macabre motif in his Western franchise is actually inspired by the real-life “Zone of Death”, as Marshals alludes to. The “Zone of Death” is a stretch of land within the Idaho part of Yellowstone National Park.

Spanning 50 square miles, it has no human inhabitants, and technically doesn’t fall under any local jurisdiction as a result. For this reason, it’s been speculated that serious crimes – including murder – can be committed in the area without any legal consequences for the perpetrator. In truth, the “Zone of Death” has inspired more works of crime fiction than actual murders.

In any case, it isn’t geographically identifiable with the location in Marshals, Yellowstone, and 1923. In Taylor Sheridan’s TV shows, the area in question lies on the border between Wyoming and Montana. However, the real “Zone of Death” is wholly in Idaho, close to the state’s border with Wyoming but nowhere near Montana.

• 

  Marshals

  • 

    Logan Marshall-Green

    Pete Calvin

  • 
• 

  Created by Taylor Sheridan

  First TV Show Yellowstone

  Latest TV Show 1923

  Upcoming TV Shows The Madison

  First Episode Air Date June 20, 2018

  Cast Kevin Costner, Luke Grimes, Kelly Reilly, Wes Bentley, Cole Hauser, Kelsey Asbille, Gil Birmingham, Brecken Merrill, Jefferson White, Danny Huston

  Yellowstone is a neo-Western drama series created by Taylor Sheridan and John Linson, centered on the Dutton family and their fight to protect the Yellowstone Dutton Ranch from various adversaries, including land developers and nearby reservations. Premiering in 2018 on Paramount Network, the show has been praised for its depiction of power struggles, family loyalty, and rural conflicts. It has expanded into a franchise with spin-offs such as 1883 and 1923, and an upcoming sequel series is in development.