It’s been years since the Bennett family first graced our screens, but people still can't stop talking about The Ranch third season. Honestly, it was the moment the show stopped being just another multi-cam sitcom with a laugh track and started feeling like a heavy, Midwestern Greek tragedy. You remember the vibe. Ashton Kutcher’s Colt Bennett is back home, trying to find his footing, and Sam Elliott is being, well, Sam Elliott. But this season—split into Part 5 and Part 6—flipped the script in a way that most fans didn't see coming. It wasn't just about the jokes anymore. It was about the fallout.
Netflix had a weird way of numbering things, didn't they? They called them "Parts," which basically means The Ranch third season is comprised of twenty episodes. Ten for Part 5. Ten for Part 6.
The Danny Masterson Exit That Redefined the Show
You can’t talk about this season without addressing the elephant in the room. Danny Masterson, who played Rooster, was written out. This wasn't some planned creative shift or a "character moving to another city" trope. It was abrupt. Masterson was fired by Netflix following multiple allegations of sexual assault, which he has since been convicted of in real life. But back then, in the middle of 2018, the writers had a massive problem: how do you remove the comedic engine of the show without killing the show itself?
They chose a cliffhanger.
In Part 5, we see Rooster being threatened by Mary’s ex-husband, Nick. Nick tells him to take his bag and vanish, or else. And just like that, Rooster rides off into the night on his motorcycle. For a long time, fans thought he might come back. The mystery of his disappearance hung over the first half of The Ranch third season like a thick fog. It changed the chemistry. Suddenly, the banter between the brothers—which was the heart of the series—was replaced by a void. Colt was left to carry the emotional weight alone, and you could see the shift in Kutcher's performance. He went from being the lovable screw-up to a man genuinely grieving a brother he didn't know how to save.
Life Without Rooster
When Part 6 kicked off, the tone shifted again. They found Rooster’s bike at the bottom of a ravine. No body, just the gear. This is where the show got dark. Like, really dark. Beau Bennett, played with a terrifyingly stoic brilliance by Sam Elliott, had to process the loss of a son he often belittled. It was brutal to watch.
The introduction of Dax Shepard as Luke Matthews was an attempt to fill that gap. Luke arrives as a cousin with a complicated past—PTSD, a history in the military, and a lot of baggage. Dax is great, don't get me wrong. He brings a frantic, nervous energy that contrasts well with the Bennetts' grumpy stillness. But he wasn't Rooster. He wasn't supposed to be. The writers were smart enough to make him a different kind of broken.
Why the Ranching Logistics Actually Mattered
Most Hollywood shows treat farming like a hobby. The Ranch third season actually dug into the grit. We saw the "Iron River Ranch" struggling with things that real ranchers in Colorado and Wyoming deal with every day. Drought. Corporate takeovers. The terrifying reality of the Neumann's Hill conglomerate buying up local land.
- The price of cattle.
- The cost of feed.
- The crushing debt of buying new equipment.
Colt tries to be a "mogul." He wants to expand. He buys the Peterson ranch, thinking he's making a power move, but he ends up overextended. It’s a classic story of rural ambition clashing with economic reality. You see the tension between Beau’s "old school" way of doing things—slow, steady, miserable—and Colt’s "new school" approach of taking big risks with money he doesn't have. It’s stressful. It makes you want to check your own bank account.
Abby and Colt: The Marriage Reality Check
Elisha Cuthbert’s Abby is the unsung hero of this season. By The Ranch third season, she and Colt are married and expecting a baby. This isn't a fairytale. They’re living in a cramped trailer. Colt is lying to her about money. He’s lying to her about his involvement in the search for Rooster.
The birth of their daughter, Peyton, should have been the peak happy moment. Instead, it highlighted the cracks. Abby is a teacher, a professional, and she’s trying to build a stable life while Colt is out playing cowboy and making secret deals. Their arguments felt real. They weren't "sitcom" fights where everything is resolved in 22 minutes. They were the kind of fights that leave you sleeping on the couch for a week.
The Supporting Cast and the Mary Spiral
We have to talk about Mary. Megyn Price plays her with such a raw, desperate edge. In the third season, Mary’s life takes a nose-dive. After Rooster vanishes, she falls into a hole of pill addiction and bad choices with Nick. It’s one of the most depressing arcs in the series. Usually, shows like this keep the "junkie" characters at arm's length, but Mary was part of the family. Watching the Bennetts try to help her—and fail—was a harsh reminder of the opioid crisis hitting rural communities. It wasn't "very special episode" material. It was just the reality of the setting.
Then there's Debra Winger as Maggie. She’s mostly at the bar or her trailer, acting as the philosophical counterweight to Beau’s cynicism. Her relationship with Beau in this season is fascinating. They’re divorced, but they’re tethered. They’re the only ones who truly understand the history of the land they’re standing on. When they clash over how to handle the ranch or their kids, you see decades of resentment bubbling up.
Technical Execution: The Multi-Cam Drama
It’s rare to see a show filmed in front of a live audience handle such heavy topics. The Ranch third season pushed the boundaries of the format. You’d have a scene with a dirty joke about a cow, followed immediately by a soul-crushing monologue about loss. The lighting got darker. The shadows in the Bennett house seemed longer.
The cinematography (if you can call it that for a sitcom) started favoring close-ups. You needed to see the lines on Sam Elliott’s face. You needed to see the tears in Kutcher’s eyes. It was a bold move that alienated some fans who just wanted "That 70s Show on a Farm," but for those who stuck around, it was rewarding.
Realism Check: The Colorado Setting
While the show is filmed on a soundstage in Burbank, it’s set in the fictional town of Garrison, Colorado. Residents of the actual Western Slope of Colorado often pointed out the inconsistencies—the way they talk about "the hill" or the travel times between towns—but the spirit was there. The struggle of the small-time cattleman against the corporate machine is a very real theme in the American West.
The show accurately captured the feeling of a town where everyone knows your business. In The Ranch third season, this becomes a liability. Colt can't hide his failures because the guy at the feed store already told his dad. That lack of privacy is a staple of rural life, and the show used it to drive the drama forward.
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What Most People Miss About the Ending
The end of Part 6 (the second half of the third season) left us with a massive cliffhanger regarding Nick, Mary’s ex. Without spoiling the exact beat for those who are catching up, it involved a gunshot and a lot of suspects. But the real "ending" of the season wasn't the mystery. It was the total fragmentation of the Bennett family.
By the final episode, the trust was gone.
Beau didn't trust Colt.
Abby didn't trust Colt.
Colt didn't even trust himself.
The season started with the loss of a brother and ended with the loss of the family's moral compass. It set the stage for the final act of the series, moving it away from comedy entirely and into the realm of a rural noir.
How to Revisit the Season Effectively
If you’re planning a rewatch or diving in for the first time, keep these points in mind to get the most out of the experience:
- Watch the body language: Pay attention to Sam Elliott in the background of scenes where Colt is talking. His physical reactions often tell more of the story than the dialogue.
- Track the money: If you actually follow the deals Colt makes, you can see the disaster coming from miles away. It’s a masterclass in "sunk cost fallacy."
- Listen to the music: The soundtrack—full of country legends like Lukas Nelson and Shooter Jennings—perfectly mirrors the emotional state of the characters.
- Acknowledge the shift: Don't expect the high-energy comedy of Season 1. Accept that this is the "winter" of the show's narrative.
The legacy of the third season is complicated because of the real-world controversy surrounding its cast. However, as a piece of storytelling, it remains one of the most daring experiments in Netflix's early original programming history. It took a stale format and used it to explore grief, poverty, and the death of the American dream.
To understand the Bennett family, you have to sit with them in the quiet, uncomfortable moments of this season. It's not always pretty, but it's remarkably honest about how hard it is to keep a family—and a ranch—together when the world is trying to tear them down. All that's left is to see how the fallout of these choices ripples through the final parts of the series. Check out the episodes on Netflix, specifically looking for the transition between episode 10 and 11, to see exactly where the show's DNA changed forever.