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The Yellowstone franchise has expanded on CBS with Marshals while going through some major changes including cast shifts and a surprise offscreen death.
The hit Paramount+ franchise started with Taylor Sheridan‘s hit series Yellowstone, which premiered in 2018. Fans got to know the Duttons — including Kayce (Luke Grimes) and Monica (Kelsey Asbille), who remained at the center of the show until the finale.
After teaching at a local school on the Broken Rock Indian Reservation, Monica went on to become a professor at Montana State University while navigating life with Kayce, who moved them back to the Yellowstone Ranch following his past tension with dad John (Kevin Costner).
The original show came to an end in 2024, later expanding its universe with Grimes’ CBS show Marshals and Dutton Ranch. Marshals quickly found success when it premiered on CBS in 2026 — but it also shocked existing fans with the reveal that Monica died.
Puck reported at the time that Marshals ran into issues when plotting out the new CBS show centered on Kayce’s life after Yellowstone. To avoid making the new series too identical to its flagship show, Marshals chose to remove Monica from the narrative and shift the voice of the show to be more of a fast-paced procedural.
According to the newsletter, Paramount allegedly worked with lawyers for months on how to successfully feature other Yellowstone leads Beth Dutton (Kelly Reilly) and Rip Wheeler (Cole Hauser) in their own Dutton Ranch spinoff without facing potential legal issues over their story being too similar to the OG show.
CBS and Paramount have not publicly addressed the Puck report.
Ahead of season 2, keep scrolling for everything to know about the Marshals changes:
Offscreen Death
When the series premiered in March 2026, fans were shocked to learn that Kayce’s wife, Monica, had died after battling cancer.
“Kayce had such a perfect ending in Yellowstone,” showrunner Spencer Hudnut told TVLine at the time. “His dreams had finally come true. As we were trying to figure out how to tell the next chapter in Kayce’s story, it felt like he really needed to be shaken out of that. Unfortunately, tragedy tends to find Kayce, so something bad was going to happen for him one way or the other. It just sort of played out that it was going to be Monica.”
Hudnut said Monica’s death will continue to drive Kayce, adding, “To me, Monica is really guiding Kayce through this first episode, trying to help him find his new path. And if you actually break it down, Tate is at that rally to honor his mother, and Kayce goes there to protect Tate. So if not for Monica, Kayce never would have been in that position and may not have found this path.”
He concluded: “We really wanted to be respectful of the way that we said goodbye to her. I also didn’t want to step on the ending of Yellowstone, because what they had was a beautiful ending. Unfortunately, real life intervened.”
Asbille has not yet broken her silence on Monica’s onscreen death. She did grant access for her likeness to be used on the show, which allowed Marshals to include photos of the fictional character on screen.
Finale Concerns
During the season 1 finale, which aired in May 2026, Andrea (Ash Santos) was offered a job that would take her from Montana to Washington, D.C. Meanwhile, (Arielle Kebbel) and Cal (Logan Marshall-Green) were on a mission when they got ambushed — with Tom Weaver (Chris Mulkey) involved in the potentially deadly situation.
(In the season 2 first look, Kayce, Miles (Tatanka Means), Andrea and Thomas Rainwater (Gil Birmingham) made appearances — but Cal and Belle were noticeably missing.)
It wasn’t clear whether Belle and Cal were killed off screen despite the show being renewed for season 2. Marshall-Green and Kebbel, however, hinted to The Hollywood Reporter at the time that they have begun filming season 2.
Cast Changes
Deadline confirmed in August 2026 that the spinoff will feature more scenes with Cal’s estranged daughter, Maddie (Morgan Lindholm). Lindholm’s expanded role comes after Maddie was introduced in season 1 as a bartender with a surprising connection to Cal. She later started dating Miles, which will also continue to be explored.
The show also cast Marque Richardson in a recurring role as Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick Burns.
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