'Yellowstone' Season 3 Episode 8: Who is Walker, why is his return a ticking timebomb for the Duttons?
Spoilers for 'Yellowstone' Season 3 Episode 8 'I Killed a Man Today'
Rip Wheeler (Cole Hauser) considers himself a lucky man. He is now engaged to the only woman he ever loved, the girl of his dream Beth Dutton (Kelly Reilly) and there is nothing that is going to come in their way.
Or is there?
In Season 3 Episode 8 'I Killed a Man Today', Rip is starting on the wedding preparations and the first thing he must do is find himself a best man. Now in all of the Bunkhouse, who is the one man who is fit to be the best man for Rip's wedding? None other than Lloyd (Forrie J. Smith).
At the end of the episode, when Rip takes Lloyd along with him to free the old horse into the wilderness, he is visibly nervous - hasn't spoken for hours on the drive and can't even find the words to begin somewhere. He eventually does manage to ask him to be his best man and undoubtedly Lloyd agrees. The old man has known Rip ever since he arrived on the ranch as a young boy and the fact that they even share the Yellowstone brand only makes their bond foolproof.
But in this episode, we catch a glimpse of another cowboy with the brand - one who is never supposed to be seen, one who is meant to be dead.
At the end of the episode, when Lloyd and Rip go to a bar to celebrate Rip's wedding news "you have outlived your past," Lloyd tells him and he turns around to see none other than Walker playing his guitar. Played by the Grammy and Oscar-winning singer-songwriter Ryan Bingham, Walker is now suddenly returning to the show after being away for a long time.
The former prisoner, who gets a second chance at the Yellowstone Dutton Ranch thanks to Rip, eventually caused the foreman a lot of regrets when the two come to collide later on. The last time we saw him was in Season 2 after Jamie Dutton's (Wes Bentley) disastrous attempt at covering up his tracks ended in him killing a journalist in cold blood. With Rip and Walker's help, the murder is made to look like an accident as they dump her body in the river.
Following this, the cowboy was supposed to be taken to "the train station" bidding farewell to the Dutton ranch. We all know what 'the train station' is. It is a dangerous, deep pit in the wilderness of Montana where the Duttons (mainly Rip and Lloyd) go to dispose those who could pose a threat to the family, the ranch and the land.
Walker was supposed to take to his grave the secret of Jamie's involvement in the murder of the journalist. Kayce Dutton (Luke Grimes) took his word and then let him walk away. That's dangerous and something even fans noticed during Season 2. "Unfortunate that Kayce decides to let THAT particular branded man walk, seeing what he knows. Tick, tick, tick....boom! There's no way I can see them just letting THAT thread go un-pulled, do you? I mean, I don't think Walker's "word" is worth f**kin shit, unless it serves him personally to keep it. If he gets arrested and is facing a decent amount of time, I can absolutely see him offering that shit up to get out of it," a fan had theorized last year.
Jamie is now the Attorney General. The Duttons' land is under immense pressure. Why then has Walker returned from the dead? What will this mean for the Dutton family especially with so much at stake?
'Yellowstone' airs on Sundays at 9 pm ET/ PT on Paramount Network.