Yet another iconic episode of “1923” aired Sunday, and Harrison Ford’s lead character absolutely stole the show with a brilliant monologue about the failures of our species.
Just when we thought “1923” was getting a little soap-opera-y, creator and writer Taylor Sheridan reeled in the horror for his already top-rated “Yellowstone” prequel. Entitled “The Rule of Five Hundred,” episode seven of “1923” featured everything from the brutal abuse of prostitutes, the Catholic Church, to perfect predictions of the end of freedom in America.
While most will likely fixate on the sexually deviant scene between Timothy Dalton and the two prostitutes, it’s Ford’s lead character of Jacob Dutton who stole the show for me. While sat at dinner with his nephew Jack Dutton (Darren Mann), his pregnant fiancé Elizabeth (Michelle Randolph) and the great matriarch, Cara (Helen Mirren), Ford explains how humans are not designed for macro-societal lifestyles.
There’s another Yellowstone Prequel coming out and it might even be better than 1923https://t.co/vG2vL2acO6
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) February 9, 2023
“The Rule of Five Hundred” was defined in Sheridan’s writing as the trend that when small groups of people live together, they almost always do so in peace. A community can be birthed, sustained, based on fundamental morals and the understanding that individual greed means collapse for all.
When people gather in tribes or groups of more than 500 people, that is when the abuse starts. At this size, certain individuals and smaller factions within groups will steal, rape, pillage, enslave, thriving in their greed.
Sheridan used the analysis to set up Ford’s accurate prediction that one day, the government will start to create laws that will limit our ability to speak freely in this, the greatest nation on Earth. (RELATED: Two Major Updates Announced For The Next Series From ‘Yellowstone’ Creator)
What’s wild is that in recent weeks, I have asked friends, family, colleagues and experts whether the human species could survive at our current level of modernity without the grotesque environments of cities and without a glorified pyramid scheme for governance. Until Sunday’s epic episode of “1923,” I’d yet to hear a definitive answer, but Ford’s Dutton got pretty darn close (or Sheridan did with his epic writing).
I know our current degree of development and our social organization is leading us toward certain collapse. While the progressives fixate on saving a planet that has and always will be absolutely fine, and others try to redefine our greed as a right, we are actively ignoring our unsustainability and viability as a society. Humans may survive whatever happens next, but I highly doubt that in another 100 years from today, we’ll be in a better place, if we’re even here at all.
If “1923” has taught us anything thus far, it’s how far we haven’t actually come in our social development. It’s just held a mirror up to how disgustingly greedy we’ve become in just a couple of generations.