Taylor Sheridan has built an impressive empire with his Yellowstone universe and its spin-offs. And because of this, he has turned rugged ranch life into a must-watch television show. Throughout the years, fans have loved his cinematic brilliance in turning power struggles, loyalty, and harsh landscapes into redefined modern westerns. But now, the director may be heading into unfamiliar territory – horror.

That’s right – he’s almost on the verge of acquiring the iconic Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie franchise. While the idea is exciting, it also raises a big question: will this be Yellowstone with a chainsaw? Well! Looks like, to make a horror movie in the future, Sheridan may need to trade in cowboy drama for real scares. Let’s dive deeper!

Can Taylor Sheridan bring real terror to the horror genre without making it Yellowstone?

Taylor Sheridan may be widely popular for his rugged western dramas, but he could be eyeing a bloody new challenge. That’s right – according to reports, the Yellowstone creator is a potential buyer for the Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise.

Taylor Sheridan in an interview with CBS Sunday Morning | Credits: YouTube

Though nothing is confirmed yet, his name has gained serious traction, thanks to his strong ties to Texas, the same state where Leatherface’s twisted story first began. While at the moment, he’s busy filming the second season of Landman, he will likely only serve as a producer if the deal goes through.

While fans are excited, the idea of him bringing his signature grit to horror sounds thrilling, but it also comes with a major warning sign: fans don’t want Yellowstone with a chainsaw. When it comes to the horror genre, viewers expect a great deal of chaos, fear, and fast-paced terror, not slow-burn family feuds on a ranch.

Sheridan’s strength lies in exploring broken, layered characters and moral struggles, but horror demands a different kind of storytelling. If he leans too much into his western style, the result could disappoint fans looking for the brutal energy that the horror genre is widely popular for.

So, in order to successfully sail through the horror genre, Sheridan would need to rethink his approach and embrace the genre’s demand for unpredictability and fear. Otherwise, the project risks losing what makes both Yellowstone and the horror genre so great.

Before Yellowstone, Taylor Sheridan directed a horror movie nobody remembers

Taylor Sheridan may be one of the biggest names in Hollywood today, but even he had to start somewhere. While fans now know him as the mastermind behind Yellowstone, Landman, and Tulsa King, his first project behind the camera was not a western. That’s right – it was actually a small horror movie, one that most people have either forgotten or never heard of in the first place.

A still from Vile | Credits: Inception Media Group

In 2012, he directed a movie called Vile, with a plot that followed a group of strangers trapped in a house, forced to endure pain and torture if they wanted to escape. While the premise fit the proper horror description, it failed to leave a mark. To this day, Vile doesn’t even have a rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which says a lot about how little impact it had.

Even Sheridan distanced himself from the project and said in a 2017 interview via Slash Film that he only took the movie as a favor for a friend and doesn’t really count it as his true debut. He said:

A friend of mine raised — I don’t know what he raised — 20 grand or something, and cast his buddies, and wrote this bad horror movie, that I told him not to direct. He was going to direct it and produce it, and he started and freaked out, and called and said, ‘Can you help me?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I’ll try.

Instead, he considers Wind River his first real directorial effort. But still, if Vile is anything to go by, he might need to prove he can truly deliver in the horror space.