Yellowstone viewers stunned as Taylor Sheridan casts supermodel ...

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Yellowstone viewers have been blindsided by an unexpected guest appearance in the latest episode of the hit show.

The Paramount series, following ranch owners in Montana, is drawing to a close with a final roster of episodes that has been ruffling feathers due to the sheer amount of characters it’s killing off.

In the latest instalment, though, it was not the departure of a character, but an appearance, that stunned fans, as showrunner Taylor Sheridan reprised his role of the immensely arrogant Travis Wheatley.

*Spoilers follow – you have been warned*

Sheridan’s scenes, which he wrote for himself, saw him show off his muscles as well as his horse riding skills – and, to cap it all off, the TV writer and producer cast a supermodel as his girlfriend.

That’s right – in the latest episode of the show’s final season, Bella Hadid shows up for an interaction with Kelly Reilly’s Beth Dutton, who mistakes Hadid’s character as an employee working for Travis.

“You seem like a moderately intelligent woman,” Beth tells Hadid’s character, asking: “How can you work for this f***?”

Hadid’s character responds: “I would never work for a horse trainer; Travis is my boyfriend,” to which Beth says: “I take the intelligent part back.”

Later in the episode, Beth refers to Travis as “the most arrogant man I’ve ever met” and say that he is “such an a**hole it’s almost attractive” – but when she sees his admirable horse riding skills, she states: “OK, yeah, I get it.”

Fans chimed in on the turn of events on social media, with one calling it “objectively hilarious” that Sheridan cast Hadid as his girlfriend.

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Others were simply surprised to see Hadid, with a viewer writing on X/Twitter: “Watching Bella Hadid in an episode of #YellowstoneTV definitely wasn’t on my 2024 bingo card.”

An additional fan stated: “……why the f*** is Bella Hadid in Yellowstone?” with another adding: “The gasp I gasped when I saw Bella Hadid in the new Yellowstone ep.”

The concluding chapter of season five kicked off with the death of John Dutton, the lead character played by Kevin Costner, whose departure from the series has been well documented and mired in controversy.

After the airing of his character’s death, the Oscar winner said: “I didn’t see it. I’m going to be perfectly honest. I didn’t know it was actually airing last night. I didn’t realise yesterday was the thing.”

Yellowstone airs weekly on Sundays on Paramount and is available to stream on Paramount+ in the UK.