Colby's Death on 'Yellowstone' Underscores How Dangerous the Show's World Is

Spoiler alert: This post contains spoilers for the second half of Yellowstone Season 5.

The second half of Yellowstone's fifth season has had a high body count, to say the least. In just the first four episodes, three major characters have met their end. Following the episode "Counting Coup," though, many wanted to know why Colby was the latest character to meet his end.

Colby, who is played by Denim Richards, has been a part of the show since the very first season. He's one of the ranch hands, and he met his end while trying to save Carter, another young ranch hand, from a wild horse. While Carter shoots and kills the horse, Colby is trampled to death first, bringing his time on the show to an end. Following Colby's death, many wanted to understand why his exit happened. Here's what we know.

Fans were pretty upset by Colby's death, with some suggesting that there was no good reason to kill the character. In fact, some people were so upset that they were convinced Colby had been killed off for reasons that had nothing to do with the show. That doesn't appear to be the case, though, as Denim explained in an interview after the episode that his death was a decision made by the writers.

Denim explained that Colby's death "really emphasizes the realities of cowboy life."

"We have this saying that everyone’s going to fall off a horse at some point in their life," he continued. "It’s not if, it’s just when and how bad. That is not a phenomenon. These things do happen, so I do think that there’s that element where I think it is about really wanting to emphasize that this is a reality."

Executive producer Christina Voros said something similar, emphasizing that cowboys are subject to random dangers all the time.

“For anyone who really understands the lifestyle of cowboys and working with animals and the risks of the job — and Rip says it about himself — it’s a dangerous job, and this kind of thing happens and it happens in a split-second,” she said.

“This death comes as a shock because it’s so simple, and it’s so grounded in the world in which all these characters work that it’s profoundly tragic … and the timing of it is just gut-wrenching," she continued.

While that explanation may have satisfied some viewers, there were plenty who felt that the randomness of the death, and the fact that it's part of a long string of significant character deaths, makes the whole thing feel unearned.

Given that Colby's death was the writers' decision, it seems clear that Yellowstone isn't going to run through the tape with all of its long-running characters intact. Colby's death wasn't motivated by the plot, but it takes another piece off the board as the series hurdles toward the final episodes of its five-season run.