Every Taylor Sheridan Show Ranked from Weakest to Most Essential

Taylor Sheridan has built one of the most sprawling creative empires in modern television, and separating his work by quality has become a genuine sport for fans. When narrowing the list to only the projects where Sheridan holds an actual ‘Creator’ credit, the picture gets a little clearer, and a little more surprising.

From gritty crime dramas to sweeping Western sagas, this ranking looks strictly at the shows Sheridan built from the ground up, ordered from the most divisive to the most celebrated based on critic and audience reception.

‘Mayor of Kingstown’ (2021–present)

‘Mayor of Kingstown’ sits at the bottom of this ranking, and the numbers back it up, with an overall critics’ score that has hovered around the mid sixties on Rotten Tomatoes. The Jeremy Renner led crime thriller follows the McLusky family as they broker peace between gangs, guards, and politicians in a fictional prison town, and reviewers have historically called the show inconsistent season to season. The show has been described as an underrated project, darker, harsher, and more relentlessly bleak than ‘Yellowstone’, but also deeply compelling.

Despite the shaky start, the series found new life recently. Season 4 became the best received yet, hitting a perfect Tomatometer score, with ScreenRant’s review noting the season had some of the show’s most exciting action sequences and left viewers feeling that any character could die by the finale. The series has been renewed for a fifth and final season, and it is set to make history as the first Sheridan show to stream on Netflix in the United States later in 2026.

‘Lioness’ (2023–present)

‘Lioness’ lands just above ‘Mayor of Kingstown’ in this ranking, buoyed almost entirely by its lead performance. The espionage thriller follows a Marine recruited into a covert CIA program, and critics have consistently pointed to Zoe Saldaña as the reason the show works at all. One review noted that Zoe Saldaña gives a powerful performance that ups the ante from the previous season, with the show’s exploration of dual identity and duty making for meaty drama.

Even so, the series has struggled to shake criticism that it plays things too safe. One review described the sophomore season bluntly, noting that if ‘Lioness’ Season 2 was a spice, it would be flour, arguing Sheridan’s attention felt scattered while juggling multiple shows at once. Another critic pointed out that Sheridan’s other shows handle the family subplot dynamic much better, particularly ‘Mayor of Kingstown’, suggesting ‘Lioness’ still has room to grow into its premise.

‘Landman’ (2024–present)

‘Landman’ marks Sheridan’s dive into the world of West Texas oil, and the show has carved out a respectable niche among his newer efforts. The series continues to expand its footprint on Paramount Plus, regularly appearing near the top of the platform’s global charts alongside Sheridan’s other titles. It has become one of the streamer’s most talked about newer originals since debuting, with strong staying power in the months following release.

Fans have responded well to the shift away from ranches and prisons toward the high stakes, high money world of oil drilling, giving Sheridan a fresh canvas without abandoning his signature blend of family drama and blue collar grit. The show continues to hold a firm spot in the middle of the pack among Sheridan’s growing catalog, proving he can successfully launch new worlds outside the Dutton family orbit.

‘Yellowstone’ (2018–2024)

There is no Sheridan universe without ‘Yellowstone’. The flagship series about the Dutton family fighting to protect their Montana ranch put Sheridan on the map as a creative force, and it remains the backbone that every spinoff has been built around. Even with its ending marked by public friction between Sheridan and star Kevin Costner, the show’s cultural footprint has not diminished.

Sheridan has continued expanding the world well beyond the original series, and reporting has confirmed that Sheridan has gone on to create ‘1883’, ‘1923’, ‘Tulsa King’, ‘Lioness’, ‘Landman’, and ‘The Madison’, while also executive producing ‘Lawmen, Bass Reeves’, ‘Marshals’, and ‘Dutton Ranch’. That level of output cements ‘Yellowstone’ as the origin point of one of the largest creator driven ecosystems on television.

‘Tulsa King’ (2022–present)

‘Tulsa King’ brought a different energy to Sheridan’s slate by leaning into dark comedy alongside its crime drama roots, and audiences have responded enthusiastically. The Sylvester Stallone led series stars him as Dwight Manfredi, a mob capo exiled to Oklahoma after a twenty five year prison sentence, and the fish out of water premise has given the show a lighter, more quotable tone than much of Sheridan’s other work.

The show has also proven to be a legitimate streaming powerhouse, regularly landing near the top of Paramount Plus charts. It has climbed into the platform’s global top ten multiple times, sitting alongside Sheridan’s other hits like ‘Yellowstone’ and ‘Marshals’. Unlike several of Sheridan’s other series, ‘Tulsa King’ has not been given a defined endpoint, leaving the door open for it to keep expanding for years to come.

‘1883’ (2021–2022)

‘1883’ remains one of the most emotionally devastating entries in the entire Sheridan catalog, following the Dutton family’s original journey west. The prequel earned strong marks from both critics and audiences upon release, and its brutal, unflinching depiction of the frontier set a tone that later spinoffs would try to match.

The show’s ending, which saw the deaths of several major characters, directly shaped the direction of its own sequel series. Sheridan reportedly built the next chapter of the Dutton saga specifically because ‘1883’ concluded in a way that made a direct continuation impossible, choosing instead to jump decades forward for what became ‘1923’. That willingness to let a story end permanently, rather than dragging it out, is part of why ‘1883’ still holds up as one of Sheridan’s most respected achievements.

‘1923’ (2022–2025)

At the very top sits ‘1923’, the Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren led saga that many consider Sheridan’s finest work as a creator. The series became a genuine ratings phenomenon, with its second season premiere pulling in a massive global audience and outperforming the first season significantly. Critics have praised the show’s cinematic scale, and Ford’s performance in particular has been singled out as some of his best screen work in years.

The show concluded after two seasons by design, following Sheridan’s original plan for a bookended story rather than an open ended run. Brandon Sklenar, who plays Spencer Dutton, described the structure as one piece with a split in the middle, insisting the story was always meant to conclude. That sense of narrative discipline, paired with award caliber performances, is exactly why ‘1923’ earns the top spot among every show Sheridan has personally created.

Where would you personally slot ‘Tulsa King’ and ‘1923’ if you had to pick which Dutton era or crime saga deserves Sheridan’s next big swing?