Taylor Sheridan on why 1883 is "close ended": "I created this peek through time to show you this one specific journey"

Deadline

"I’m not someone who likes to tie everything up in a bow and explain how everyone lived happily after, or didn’t," Sheridan says of the 1883 finale, adding: "For me, as a storyteller it feels close ended. I’m going to peek through the window of a different era and see what I see then." Sheridan also acknowledged that he has a lot of shows on his plate, saying: "I’m grossly overtaxed. It’s impossible, what they’re asking for. But it was impossible what they asked for last year. I don’t know what else to say. But…the goal with 1883, I wanted to tell this really abstract odd structured story. If you were paying attention, I tell you exactly what was going to happen, in the first scene of the first episode. And then hopefully made you fall in love with the world, and forget that stuff, and play with your expectations that there’s no way what I’ve already told you could actually happen. To play with structure that way, felt like a new rollercoaster ride for an audience, and hopefully a really reflective and beautiful one. We wanted to make a ten-hour movie that ended, and that’s what we did."

ALSO:

• 1883's finale was gut-wrenching emotional torture: "I wouldn’t call it a show that I’d recommend to anyone, but I’ll concede this much: It accomplished what it set out to do, which was to Dear Zachary the hearts of middle-aged, middle-American men," says Dustin Rowles, adding: "Take away the Oregon Trail, the violence, murders, rapes, dysentery, snake bites, and amputations, and at its heart, 1883 is some real John Green bullsh*t camouflaged by horses and unruly facial hair."
• Tim McGraw says he and Faith Hill struggled filming the finale
• Faith Hill weighs in on 1883 finale