Following their marriage, the Southworth family ranch, Southfork, became the Ewings' home, where Jock and Miss Ellie raised three sons: J.R. (Larry Hagman), Gary (David Ackroyd/Ted Shackelford) and Bobby (Patrick Duffy).

J.R., unscrupulous and unhappily married to former Miss Texas beauty queen Sue Ellen Shepard (Linda Gray), was frequently at odds with Bobby, who had the morals and integrity that J.R. lacked.

At 17, Gary secretly met and married 15-year-old waitress Valene Clements (Joan Van Ark), producing the first Ewing grandchild - petite and saucy Lucy (Charlene Tilton) - before returning to Southfork with the intention of settling down.

Ray had previously engaged in a short fling with Pamela, but she fell deeply in love with Bobby, and the pilot episode begins with the two of them arriving at Southfork Ranch as newlyweds, shocking the entire family.

Meanwhile, Pam's brother Cliff (Ken Kercheval), who had inherited Digger's hatred towards the Ewings, shared J.R.'s objections to the marriage and continued his father's quest to get revenge.

Donna Reed also joined the main cast during season 8, temporarily portraying Miss Ellie until Barbara Bel Geddes returned in the following year.

Season 13 saw several additions to the main cast: Academy Award winner George Kennedy as Carter McKay, who buys Ray's ranch and eventually becomes the head of Ewing Oil rival WestStar; Cathy Podewell as the young and naïve Cally Harper Ewing, J.R.'s second wife, whom he married to escape false rape charges; Sasha Mitchell as J.R.'s illegitimate firstborn son, James Beaumont; Kimberly Foster as April's devious sister Michelle Stevens, who marries both James and Cliff Barnes; and finally Lesley-Anne Down as PR woman Stephanie Rogers.

Donna moving to Washington, D.C., where she later married Senator Andrew Dowling (guest star Jim McMullan), with whom she raised Ray's daughter Margaret.

[16][17] As season 11 ended, Ray sold his ranch to Carter McKay and left Dallas for Switzerland with Jenna and Lucas, Charlie having already moved there to attend a finishing school.

[13] Sue Ellen left in the season 12 finale, moving to London with her new husband, film director Don Lockwood (guest star Ian McShane).

[20] Miss Ellie remained on the show until near the end of season 13, when she and Clayton left Dallas, deciding to travel around Far East Asia before eventually settling in Europe near Ray and Jenna.

Clayton Farlow made four appearances, clearing up business that included deeding Southfork to Bobby; April Stevens Ewing died early on in the season, kidnapped on her honeymoon by Hillary Taylor (guest star Susan Lucci); Cally Harper Ewing left midway through the season to build a new life, with a new boyfriend and her and J.R.'s newborn son; Liz Adams broke her engagement to Cliff and left near the end of the season, and James Beaumont left the show a couple of episodes prior to the series finale, to start a new life on the east coast with his newly discovered toddler son Jimmy, and Jimmy's mother Debra Lynn (guest star Deborah Tucker).

Series creator David Jacobs left his day-to-day duties as executive story consultant at the end of season 2, in order to focus on the production of spin-off Knots Landing.

[22] Although Katzman was to continue writing for the show during season 9 and also acted during this season as "creative consultant" (which meant he was sent copies of all scripts and asked to give his input), Capice decided to bring in a new production team: joining him and associate producer Cliff Fenneman were James H. Brown as producer and Peter Dunne as supervising producer/showrunner, executive story consultant Joel J. Feigenbaum, and story editors Hollace White and Stephanie Garman.

Scriptwise, Patrick Duffy's return was explained by having the entire season 9 being a dream of Victoria Principal's character Pam, effectively sweeping away the events occurring during the period in which Katzman's involvement with the show had been minimized.

MGM built a full-size replica of the Southfork Ranch backyard and pool on one of its soundstages, allowing for filming of "location" shots during the latter part of the season.

The "Who Done It" episode of Dallas that revealed who shot J.R.?, the famous 1980 cliffhanger, received the highest domestic ratings at that point with over 90 million American viewers (representing more than 53% of the U.S. households and 76% of the U.S. television audience for November 21, 1980) tuning in for the answer.

Whilst negotiating with the distributor to acquire the next season, their commercial rival, the ITV franchise holder Thames Television unexpectedly stepped in and met the price.

The BBC reacted angrily to this development, pulling the current series mid-run, and threatening to broadcast the remaining episodes simultaneously with Thames Television's intended scheduling in November of that year.

Detailing the origins of the Barnes-Ewing feud and the creation of Ewing Oil, and covering a timespan from 1933 to 1951, the movie was written by series creator David Jacobs.

The younger characters Christopher Ewing, and Cliff and Afton's daughter Pamela Rebecca were recast with Chris Demetral and Deborah Kellner taking on the roles.

On November 7, 2004, CBS aired a primetime TV special titled Dallas Reunion: The Return to Southfork, in which the stars reminisced about their work on the series (by coincidence, actor Howard Keel, who played Clayton Farlow, had died earlier that same day).

The front and back lawn of the fictional Ewing family home played host to a massive barbecue filled with people from the Dallas area, across the U.S. and around the world (who paid as much as $1,000) to reminisce and celebrate the series, as well as meeting with cast members.

[39] On March 30–31, 2018, a 40th anniversary reunion was held at Southfork Ranch in Parker and the Longhorn Ballroom in Dallas, with cast members Patrick Duffy, Linda Gray, Charlene Tilton and Steve Kanaly attending the festivities.

[40] In honor of the show's 45th anniversary, another reunion was held on June 13, 2023 at Oscar's in Palm Springs, California which was attended by Patrick Duffy, Linda Gray, Steve Kanaly, Charlene Tilton, Audrey Landers and Joan Van Ark.

In addition, both productions have a lead character prominently referred to as "J.R."[44] Dallas is alleged to have helped partially hasten the downfall of the communist regime in the Eastern Bloc country of Romania during the final years of the Cold War.

Shortly after the execution of Ceaușescu and his wife on Christmas Day 1989, the pilot episode of Dallas, which had been edited for a sex scene, was one of the first Western Shows aired on the newly liberated Romanian TV.

After hunting down most of the main cast by any means necessary (e.g., climbing over security fences and ambushing hotels), Collins interviewed them and gained more knowledge about some of the decisions made throughout the show's seasons.

Amongst the cast, the participants were Larry Hagman, Linda Gray, Patrick Duffy, Ken Kercheval, Charlene Tilton, Susan Howard and Mary Crosby.

Country singer Hank Williams Jr. had a hit with a song called "This Ain't Dallas" comparing his and his wife's life together with that of J.R. and Sue Ellen.