Why Taylor Sheridan Is Leaving Paramount+: Inside the ‘Yellowstone’ Creator’s Split With the Streamer
Yellowstone’s creator made a shocking decision to part ways with Paramount+ just weeks ago, and this time Taylor Sheridan’s fans think the blame isn’t on him.
All good things come to an end, but the new boss of Paramount+ might already be regretting about letting one of the streamer’s best collaborators slip through his fingers.
For years, Yellowstone’s fans have been keeping an eye on the news about the show’s creator Taylor Sheridan continuing to make a number of other hit TV series for the streaming platform, resulting in all of those shows breaking records with high ratings.
The latest example is Taylor Sheridan’s prequel series for Yellowstone titled 1923, the second season of which was released earlier this year and became the best opening Paramount+ has ever had.
However, Sheridan has recently been confirmed to depart from Paramount+ when his deal with the streaming expires, which the writer/director’s fans call Paramount’s complete fault.
Why Is Taylor Sheridan Leaving Paramount+?
Though nothing about this was eventually confirmed, rumours were circulating about upcoming major changes that Sheridan’s numerous TV shows would have to endure once Paramount+ gets a new boss.
The news started spreading sometime in spring this year, and several months later, in August, American film producer David Ellison was assigned as Paramount Skydance’s CEO.
This reportedly brought nothing but problems for Sheridan’s shows, with Ellison cutting those series’ budget that Sheridan himself has already been used to for quite a while.
In response, the writer considered moving his TV projects to another streaming platform, which would mean Paramount+ would be left with not a single successful show it could boast of.
“It’s a huge loss for them. If you look at Paramount+, [Sheridan] is responsible for 90% of their successful programming”, Jessica Reif Ehrlich, Bank of America Securities senior media and entertainment analyst, commented the matter for Variety.
Viewers Have No Blame on Taylor Sheridan This Time
Considering that Yellowstone’s fans have been repeatedly complaining about Sheridan’s shows degrading in their quality, this time they came to the creator’s defence.
According to many users discussing the matter on Reddit, Sheridan most likely won’t lose anything now that he’s moving all of his deeds to NBCUniversal, while Paramount+ might be getting into a huge crisis once the deal with Sheridan is over.
“Sheridan shows are basically the only Paramount+ originals that chart on Nielsen so it's sort of shocking they let this one slip”, rageofthegods wrote.
“They already screwed up by losing the rights to Yellowstone to peacock right before it really went mainstream”, barbaraanderson added.
“He [Sheridan] seemed second only to Tom Cruise when it comes to the amount of power he held at Paramount, and was likely about to receive even more (if that’s possible)”, SlothSupreme noted.
