Yellowstone season 2, episode 5 recap: Touching Your Enemy
Previously on Yellowstone, someone killed a herd of Yellowstone’s cattle and John asked Kayce to find the culprit, Jamie realized he may not have John’s trust just as the journalist from last season called to confirm facts for her take-down article, the Becks tried to recruit John in their fight against Dan Jenkins, and Jenkins realized Rainwater may not be the trustworthy business partner he originally believed he was.
The fifth episode of Yellowstone‘s second season, entitled “Touching Your Enemy,” begins with a flashback from when a young Rip first came to Yellowstone Ranch. Rip notices a horse loose in a field and goes to catch it. A young Beth, who primped for this moment in her room, intervenes. She tells Rip not to bother as the horse killed her mother. The conversation is contentious but ends with Beth encouraging Rip to watch her walk away.
That night, in the bunkhouse, Rip shines an old ranch hand’s boots as he mocks him for falling in love with the farmer’s daughter and for being a “little orphan boy.” Rip erupts in anger and starts beating the man. Another cowboy breaks it up and defends Rip.
Rip goes to the barn to sleep but when he walks in he finds Beth waiting for him. Rip confesses he killed his family and Beth confesses she killed her mother. Then Beth instructs him to kiss her.
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In the present, Beth watches Rip ride up on a horse. She looks past him to Walker. She confesses to Rip that she believes that if she can touch the good in someone she can make it part of her too. Rip tells her there’s no good in Walker.
Beth apologizes for what she did to Rip. He tells her she didn’t do anything, but she can anytime. Besides she never has to apologize to him. Then he rides off.
After the credits, Beth walks into breakfast. Jamie, Kayce, and John are discussing finding the plane they believe dropped the hay that killed the cattle in the previous episode. Beth points out that John didn’t want them to discuss work at the dinner table. A contentious argument about the differences between dinner tables and breakfast tables ensues. Beth is mostly just angry that John is dictating what they discuss and walks out. The men resume their conversation.
John tells his sons to continue their investigation as Jamie gets a text message from the journalist writing the expose about his father. John informs Jamie that he’s lost the right to question him for a while.
John goes to see Beth in the kitchen where he asks her why she has to make such a big scene about everything. Beth finally says what’s really on her mind: why is Rip living in the bunk house and cleaning out horse stalls? John explains that it’s the ranch foreman who doesn’t live in the bunkhouse and that’s Kayce.
Beth asks why Rip can’t sleep in the main house then but John says Rip wouldn’t want that. Then he points out that Rip’s living situation is something Beth can get past. Beth responds that Rip looks to John like a father. But John counters that he’s not Rip’s father, he’s Kayce’s father. Besides Rip’s not being punished, he’s making a sacrifice.
Meanwhile, Monica takes her class to an Indian Relay practice on her physical therapist’s suggestion. The physical therapist, Martin, explains the ritual to the class. In the end, he invites Monica to the real thing in Wyoming.
Back at Yellowstone, Jimmy asks Lloyd if there’s any work he can pick up at the ranch. Lloyd tells him yes but he’s on salary so he won’t make more money for it. Lloyd informs him that if a cowboy wants extra money, he wins with things like bronco riding and roping. Since Jimmy’s not good at any of those he probably won’t win money at them though.
In the main house, Jamie and John are meeting with the new Attorney General. Jamie gets a phone call and becomes distracted. Jamie tries to get his head back in the meeting but his phone starts buzzing again. John tells him to just answer it.
Jamie excuses himself and finally picks up. It’s the journalist. She needs to verify some of his statements — before she talks to John. The discussion with John is news to Jamie. He tells the journalist he’s rescinding his permission to be quoted and won’t confirm anything. He threatens to sue if she mentions or quotes him. The journalist tells him she’ll have her legal department call and walk him through his options, or lack thereof.
Elsewhere, Dan Jenkins is learning to use a gun from an expert. Jenkins gets into it.
Later, he drives home to find someone waiting for him in his driveway. Jenkins pulls his new gun on the man, a livestock agent, and the agent mirrors his actions. The agent shouts at Jenkins to drop his weapon. Kayce grabs Jenkins gun from behind and drags him inside.
The man who was training Jenkins earlier runs up and the livestock agent walks towards him. The trainer punches the agent and pulls his gun on him. At the trainer’s instructions, the agent throws him his gun and radio and cuffs himself.
Meanwhile, Kayce informs Jenkins that the Duttons don’t want him dead, they just want to be left alone to continue living their lives as they always did. Jenkins isn’t having it. He wants to know what Kayce wants.
So Kayce gets to the point — Jenkins killed Yellowstone’s cattle. Jenkins is floored. He doesn’t know how to kill cattle. But he knows how to crush empires and he’ll crush the Dutton’s.
As he talks, his trainer comes in, gun drawn. He approaches Kayce and Kayce engages. They fight and Kayce ends up holding a shard of glass to the trainer’s throat, Jenkins holds a gun to Kayce’s head, and the livestock agent, who managed to escape from own handcuffs, holds his gun to Jenkins’ head.
Kayce grabs Jenkins and threatens him again. Kayce demands the truth. Jenkins reiterates that he doesn’t know how to kill cows but when he sees how much pain the loss caused the Duttons he wishes it had been him.
Kayce and the livestock agent start to leave. As they go, Kayce suggests Dutton’s trainer go back to where he came from. The trainer refuses.
Back at Yellowstone, Kayce informs John it wasn’t Jenkins who killed the cows. John is surprised but accepts Kayce’s verdict.
John tries to get Kayce to open up, especially about his service in the war. John mentions he also never talked about his war service.
Kayce sits down and asks if John wants to hear a war story. Kayce tells John about going after a high-value target in Pakistan. During the mission, a man came out of a room shooting while using his wife and daughter as human shields. The soldiers froze until two of them were killed. So Kayce made a call — he killed the whole family.
That night, the Sheriff is watching football when someone delivers a package. It’s a bottle of liquor with a note that says “Don’t forget who you work for.” The envelope also includes a bullet. The Sheriff looks perturbed.
Later, John, Beth, and Jamie watch a press conference in which the Sheriff explains that the livestock agent who shot the teenager in the line of duty in last week’s episode was justified. He apologizes to the agent and the agency as a whole for not supplying back up to the officer more quickly. Beth wants to know how John got the Sheriff to say all that. John claims he didn’t.
Jimmy is trying to learn to do a maneuver on a horse in an effort to get good enough that he can win money at it. It’s not going too well.
The cowboys and some guests all compete at the maneuver. Jimmy wants to compete too. Everyone knows he’s in trouble. Jimmy’s pleased with his performance but all the other cowboys destroy him in the competition. Jimmy protests that his horse is the problem. So one of the cowboys trades horses with him and the cowboy still does significantly better with Jimmy’s horse than Jimmy did.
Jimmy’s about to go again with the cowboy’s horse when Lloyd finally intervenes. He tells Jimmy to get off the horse. Rip commands Jimmy to follow Lloyd’s instructions. Rip tells Jimmy to pay up even though the cowboy doesn’t want to take his money.
At the main house, Jamie goes to see Beth for advice. For some reason, Jamie always goes to see Beth when the chips are down, even though she despises him. Anyway, he repeats the pattern here. He haltingly tells her what’s going on: He gave dirt on John to a journalist and now an article condemning John will be published. Beth walks out of the room to go tell John. Jamie shoves her against a wall to get her to stop so Beth kicks him and then drags him into John’s study by his hair. She demands Jamie tell John what he did.
John gets Jamie up and instructs Beth to leave the room. John comments that he’s never seen Beth that angry — and that’s saying something. Jamie falls apart.
Next. Stranger Things beyond Hawkins: What we want in season 4. dark
We’re halfway through Yellowstone’s second season and things are reaching intense new heights. One way or other things aren’t looking good for Jamie. We’ll see what happens next week!
For a refresher of what happened on last week’s episode of Yellowstone, read our recap. You can stream the fifth episode of season 2 on Paramount Network.